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  WORKS OF CHARLES SPURGEON - VOLUME 1
  by Charles H. Spurgeon
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The first volume of Spurgeon's collected works, containing twenty gospel sermons
including 'Able to the Uttermost,' 'The Sorrow that Leads to Repentance,' 'From
Sorrow to Joy,' and other messages proclaiming the power of Christ to save.

  Chapters: 99

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  TABLE OF CONTENTS
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    1. BOOK: Able to the Uttermost (20 Sermons)
    2. 01. Able To The Uttermost
    3. 02. The Sorrow That Leads To Repentance
    4. 03. In The Place of God's Choosing
    5. 04. From Sorrow To Joy
    6. 05. Safe In The Father's Care
    7. 06. Salvation At The Cross
    8. 07. Giving God His Due
    9. 08. The Christian's Badge
   10. 09. From Gloom To Glory
   11. 10. The Glory of the Grace of God
   12. 11. When God Speaks
   13. 12. In God's Garden of Rest
   14. 13. The Day of Atonement and the Feast of Tabernacles
   15. 14. Held and Kept
   16. 15. A Comprehensive Prayer
   17. 16. Satan with the Sons of God
   18. 17. Playing the Fool
   19. 18. Opening the Storehouses of Grace
   20. 19. "While the Lamp Holds on to Burn"
   21. 20. The Master's Summons
   22. BOOK: According to the Promise (20 Sermons)
   23. 01. A Sieve Needed
   24. 02. The Two Seeds
   25. 03. The Two Lives
   26. 04. Differing Hopes
   27. 05. Persecution Consequent On The Promise
   28. 06. The Parting
   29. 07.  Whose Are The Promises?
   30. 08. The Promise A Free Gift
   31. 09. The Promise Of God A Reality
   32. 10. The Peculiar Treasure Of Believers
   33. 11. The Valuation Of The Promises
   34. 12. The Lord’s Promise — The Rule Of His Giving
   35. 13. The Rule Without Exception
   36. 14. Taking Possession Of The Promise
   37. 15. Endorsing The Promise
   38. 16. The Promise Used For This Life
   39. 17. Searching Out The Promise
   40. 18. The Time Of The Promise
   41. 19. The Promises In Possession Through The Spirit
   42. 20. Jesus And The Promises
   43. BOOK: Advice For Seekers (14 Sermons)
   44. 01. Do Not Try to Save Yourself
   45. 02. Despised Ones Seeking Jesus
   46. 03. Seekers Touching Christ
   47. 04. Still No Light, and Why?
   48. 05. “We Wait for Light” (Isaiah 59:9)
   49. 06. The Invitation
   50. 07. Something to Be Set Right
   51. 08. Hindrances to Coming to the Light
   52. 09. Seekers Encouraged—The Substitute
   53. 10. Seeking
   54. 11. How Luther Sought and Found
   55. 12. Saved through Faith
   56. 13. May I Believe?
   57. 14. A Needless Question Answered
   58. BOOK: All of Grace (19 Sermons)
   59. To You
   60. I. What Are We At?
   61. II. God Justifieth The Ungodly
   62. III. "It Is God That Justifieth"
   63. IV. Just and the Justifier
   64. V. Concerning Deliverance from Sinning
   65. VI. By Grace Through Faith
   66. VII. Faith, What Is It?
   67. VIII. How May Faith Be Illustrated?
   68. IX. Why Are We Saved by Faith?
   69. X. Alas! I Can Do Nothing!
   70. XI. The Increase of Faith
   71. XII. Regeneration and the Holy Spirit
   72. XIII. "My Redeemer Liveth"
   73. XIV. Repentance Must Go with Forgiveness
   74. XV. How Repentance Is Given
   75. XVI. The Fear of Final Falling
   76. XVII. Confirmation
   77. XVIII. Why Saints Persevere
   78. XIX. Close
   79. BOOK: An All Around Ministry (12 Sermons)
   80. 01. FAITH
   81. 02. “FORWARD!”
   82. 03.  INDIVIDUALITY, AND ITS OPPOSITE
   83. 04. HOW TO MEET THE EVILS OF THE AGE
   84. 05. “A NEW DEPARTURE”
   85. 06. LIGHT, FIRE, FAITH, LIFE, LOVE
   86. 07. STRENGTH IN WEAKNESS
   87. 08. WHAT WE WOULD BE
   88. 09. STEWARDS
   89. 10.THE EVILS OF THE PRESENT TIME, AND OUR OBJECT, NECESSITIES, AND ENCOURAGEMENTS
   90. 11. THE PREACHER’S POWER, AND THE CONDITIONS OF OBTAINING IT
   91. 12. THE MINISTER IN THESE TIMES
   92. BOOK: Around the Wicket Gale (11 Sermons)
   93. Preface
   94. I. Chapter One: Awakening
   95. II. Chapter Two: Jesus Only
   96. III. Chapter Three: Personal Faith in Jesus
   97. IV. Chapter Four: Faith Very Simple
   98. V. Chapter Five: Fearing to Believe
   99. VI. Chapter Six: Difficulty in the Way of Believing

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  CHAPTER 1: BOOK: ABLE TO THE UTTERMOST (20 SERMONS)
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Able to the Uttermost Twenty Gospel Sermons by Charles Haddon Spurgeon

I. Able to the Uttermost II. The Sorrow that Leads to Repentance III. In the
Place of God’s Choosing IV. From Sorrow to Joy V. Safe in the Father’s Care VI.
Salvation at the Cross VII. Giving God His Due VIII. The Christian’s Badge IX.
From Gloom to Glory X. The Glory of the Grace of God XI. When God Speaks XII. In
God’s Garden of First XIII. The Day of Atonement and the Feast of Tabernacles
XIV. Held and Kept XV. A Comprehensive Prayer XVI. Satan with the Sons of God
XVII. Playing the Fool XVIII. Opening the Storehouses of Grace XIX. “While the
Lamp Holds on to Burn”

XX. The Master’s Summons


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  CHAPTER 2: 01. ABLE TO THE UTTERMOST
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I. Able to the Uttermost

Wherefore He is able to save them to the uttermost that come unto God by Him,
seeing He ever liveth to make intercession for them.—(Hebrews 7:25.)

There is great power in advocacy. Many a man has no doubt escaped from the just
sentence of the law through the eloquence of the person who has pleaded for him;
and let us hope that far oftener justice has been obtained, where otherwise it
might not have been, through the clear and earnest pleadings of the advocate
before the bar. There is a remarkable instance in Holy Scripture of the power of
pleading. Benjamin and the rest of Joseph's brethren had gone away from the
Egyptian court. On their road home to their father Jacob they were overtaken by
Joseph's steward. He charged them with having stolen Joseph's silver cup. This
was, of course, denied, and an offer was made that the sacks of corn should be
searched. Beginning with the eldest, the steward continued his search till he
came to Benjamin's sack; and there it was. There was no denying the evidence.
The fact was proved. They themselves were all unwilling witnesses that the
charge was true. The stolen goods were found upon Benjamin. They go back; they
are brought into the hall of Joseph, whom they think to be the governor, and do
not know to be their brother. He charges them somewhat severely with their
ingratitude. They had feasted at his table; he had sent them away with
provisions; and the only return they had made was that they had stolen his cup.

Now, as it seemed to them, there was a clear case against them. Benjamin must be
kept a prisoner. They make an offer all of them to stop and to be bondsmen, but
Joseph says, "No, the man with whom the cup is found, let him lie in prison."
And then it is that Judah rises and begins to plead, and marvellous was the
effect of his pleading. He did not attempt to urge that there was innocence in
the case of Benjamin. It appeared to him very clear that the cup was there:
therefore he did not attempt that plea. But he described his father at home, and
the love that the old man bore to this, his youngest, son. He said there had
been two by his father's favoured wife, but one is not, and this is the only one
that is left. He declared that if this child was taken from him he should see
his father dying of grief; he should bring his grey hairs with sorrow to the
grave. And then he went on to plead that he would be willing to stay and be a
slave instead of Benjamin. Substitution was his argument. "Take me," said he.
And then he mentioned that he had made a covenant with his father Jacob, and had
said, "My life for the lad's life. I will be a surety for him." And with all his
might he pleaded his own suretyship engagement; he pleaded his willingness to
fulfil it by becoming a substitute, and begged that Benjamin might go free. Such
seemed to have been the effect upon Joseph that he could no longer restrain
himself. He had played his part well up to that moment, but suddenly he bade the
Egyptians begone, put every stranger out, and then, bursting into a flood of
tears, he cried, "I am Joseph your brother. Doth my father yet live?"

Perhaps he might have continued a little longer the part he had assumed, but
Judah's earnest-hearted eloquence prevented all this, and the soul of Joseph
poured itself forth in love. It was a faint type, this, of the power of the
advocacy of our greater Joseph, the shepherd of Israel. He pleads for us His
brethren, guilty as we are. He does not deny our guilt, but He pleads that He is
a surety for us. He brings forward the ancient covenant engagements into which
He entered with His Father when He put His life for our life; and there He
stands, even now, pleading also His own substitutionary sacrifice—not only that
He is willing to be bound for us, but that He has been so bound—not merely that
He is willing to take our guilt and be regarded as the guilty one, but that He
has been number ed with the transgressors and has borne the sin of His people.
No wonder that the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost,
which is given to us. No wonder that e'en the Father pours forth His love in
plenteous streams of benediction upon the souls for whom the Saviour pleads.

Now, for a very short time this evening I have to call your attention to the
advocacy of Christ, and you will notice in the text that there are three points
worthy of your careful observation. The first is that the participators in the
benefit are mentioned—"they that come unto God by Him." Secondly, the benefit
itself is mentioned, and the extent of it. "He is able to save unto the
uttermost." And then, thirdly, concerning the benefactor, we have a teaching
with regard to the source of His power to save: "Seeing He ever liveth to make
intercession for them." Briefly, then, upon each head.

I.

It is a very important enquiry for all here present, who are the participators
in the intercession of Christ. Not all mankind, certainly, for our Lord has
expressly said it. "I pray for them. I pray not for the world, but for them also
which Thou hast given me." And, if you remember, there is a sort of enlargement
of that, but it does not alter the case. He says, "Neither pray I for these
alone"—who were already around Him and were saved—"but for them also that shall
believe on Me through their word"; so that this intercession is for His people,
and for those who shall be His people. Or, to put it in the words of the text,
to which we will keep, "He is able to save them to the uttermost that come unto
God by Him." Here, then, are the people for whom He pleads. He maketh
intercession for "them that come unto God by Him."

What is coming to God? Now, every man, every reasonable man, who sincerely
desires to exercise worship, wishes, when he worships, to come unto God. When I
pray I do not wish my words to die on the air, but that they may come to God.
When we sing, if we are at all thoughtful, we are not satisfied with catching
the melody, but we want our praises to come up to God. Worship is a sort of
coming to God. There is a coming to God for the supply of our needs. We are
sinful. The only way to get pardon is to come to the offended God for it.
Besides, being sinful, we need to be purged from the propensity to sin. The way
to get holiness is to come to the holy God for it. Whenever we have any need or
any want, he that knows that all good things are of God will come to God in
prayer for the supply of his need. Coming to God means seeking pardon and
desiring to be reconciled to Him. By nature we are going away from God, and that
is the place where the sinful heart wants to be—farther and farther from God;
but when the Holy Ghost touches us, then we desire to come to God to seek
pardon, that the obstacles between us may be removed, and to seek holiness that
we may be like God and able to have communion with Him. To come to God is for
the spirit to approach the great unseen Spirit, whatever it comes for—whether to
pray or to give thanks—whether to seek pardon or to seek sanctification.

Now, there are some in the world who try to come to God, but they do not come by
Jesus Christ. Such persons are excluded from the benefit of the Saviour's
intercession. "He is able to save them to the uttermost that come unto God by
Him." By Him. Some will come by an earthly priest. They believe that he has a
power which they have not, which is a delusion and a lie—a very fit lie for men
to teach who wish to gain power over their fellow-creatures, but of which an
honest man would be utterly ashamed. Every Christian is a priest unto God, but
no man is more a priest than any other man. Each believer is one of the chosen
priesthood, but none above the rest of Christians. Christ will have nothing to
do with you if you come unto God by a human priest, for the human priesthood is
ended. There is but one priest, even Jesus, who is "a priest for ever," as we
read just now, "after the order of Melchisedek." All that intrude into that
office now are simply thieves that come not in by the door, but climb up some
other way.

There are some who try to come to God without any mediator at all. They speak of
addressing the Deity themselves. This would have been proper enough before the
fall, but now the great scriptural truth is given out: "No man cometh unto the
Father but by Me." You may think you are approaching God, but you certainly are
not. There is a presumptuous familiarity about such an approach which is rather
a dishonour than an honour to God. "There is one God and one Mediator between
God and man, the man Christ Jesus"; and to attempt to approach God without the
Mediator is to insult His Son and so to provoke the Most High. Alas! there are
some foolish enough to attempt to approach God on the footing of their own
goodness. Let them beware lest the pure and holy God break forth against them,
for this is a terrible provocation of His fiery holiness, for the uncleanness of
man to talk of holy things—for sinful man to speak about worthiness—for guilty
man to dream of merit. Who art thou? Get thee back to Thy place among the
lepers. Cover thy forehead and cry, "Unclean, unclean!" What hast thou to do to
come unto the temple of the Most High, for "all our righteousnesses are as
filthy rags." 'Tis all God thinks of thee, and His thoughts are true.

But, beloved, there are men in the world, and they are not a few, who have been
taught by divine grace to come unto God by Christ. They have sought pardon for
the Mediator's sake, and found it. They seek every blessing now in Jesu's name,
and they obtain it. They live now in dependence upon the Son of God, and their
life cannot die. This is the way to come to God—trusting in Jesus, pleading His
merits, acknowledging our own unworthiness; and Christ will stand by every man
and save every man to the uttermost who comes unto God in that way by Him, for
this is the appointed way. God bids you, sinner, come to Himself through Christ.
"There is none other name given under heaven among men whereby we must be
saved." Come through that door which is marked by the blood of the atonement,
and you shall be admitted. Attempt any other entrance, and you shall be driven
away as breaking through the laws of God. It is the appointed way, and, thank
God, it is a most fit way. We can come to Jesus, for He is a man. He can go for
us to God, for He is "very God of very God." The blended natures of the human
and the Divine make the Lord Jesus a suitable medium between man and God. All
the wisdom in the world could not have devised a more excellent plan than this.
The son of Mary and the Son of Jehovah! O thou blessed Saviour, with Thy right
hand grasping the Deity, and with Thy left hand laying hold upon the infirmities
of manhood! Well may we come unto the Father by Thee. Thou art the ladder that
Jacob saw, and the rounds are so placed that we may readily climb by Thee into
heaven. Thy foot doth rest on earth: Thy top reacheth unto the excellent glory
of the Godhead.

Beloved, since we have, then, a way of coming to God that is appointed by God,
and that is so fit a way, let us also be glad that it is so available a way. Any
soul here that wishes to come to God by Christ may come. There is no embargo in
Scripture against any man's coming. "No man cometh unto the Father but by Me";
but whoever will come that way may come, and he may come as he is. He may come
without any other help than that which God has provided. That is a sweet
thought. You do want a mediator between your soul and God, but you do not want
any mediator between your souls and Christ. You cannot come to God except
through the intervention of another, but you may come to Jesus just as you are,
whoever you may be, and in whatever state of heart you may be. If God the Holy
Ghost do but give thee the will now to come, and thou desirest to approach to
God like a poor prodigal, saying, "Father, I have sinned," come along the
blood-stained way of the Redeemer's sacrifice, and there shall be no lion there
to stop thee, but all along it the sweet bells of Heaven shall ring, "Come and
welcome! Come and welcome! Come and welcome!" Every soul may come that cometh to
God by Jesus Christ. That is the limit; but come by Him, and those that come
unto Him He will in no wise cast out.

Thus we have described the persons. Oh, happy is the preacher if he can hope—if
he could hope—that all came to God this way. May he hope that some will be led
to-night to come unto the Father through the crucified Son.

II.

Now, the second interesting point of our text is this—the benefit which Christ
the intercessor is prepared to give, and the extent of it. "He is able to save
to the uttermost "—or, as the margin puts it, "He is able to save
evermore"—"them that come unto God by Him."

First, He is able to save them. Now, there are some that come to God or desire
to come, and they say, "Oh, that I might be saved, but my sins! my sins! my
sins!" His precious blood is pleaded before the throne, and it can put away all
sin. "But my sins," saith one, "far exceed those of any other man. My sins, they
are many, grievous, aggravated. They clamour against me. Like Abel's blood which
cried against his brother Cain, my sins cry out against me." Yes, and thou art
like Joshua of old, who stood in the vision in filthy garments, and the angel of
the Lord said, when he was accused of Satan, "Take away his filthy garments from
him." Jesus saith the same to thee. If thou comest to God by Him, He is able to
take all thy filthy garments from thee, and to make thee now pure. Believe it;
it is His own gospel. He is able to make you as though you had never sinned. If
you have had a long course of sin, in a moment He can blot out those sins, and
set you in the sight of God as though you had never once transgressed. The
pardon which Jesus brings is perfect and complete, making a clean sweep of all
iniquity, so that if the sins of the pardoned be sought for they shall not be
found, for He will pardon those whom He reserves in this respect—in having power
by pleading His blood before God. He is able to save from sins, and from the
uttermost sins, those that come unto God by Him.

Oh, that blessed word, "to the uttermost"—because there are some that seem to
have gone to the uttermost. There are persons who appear to have sinned as far
as ever they could. They have flung the reins upon the necks of their fiery
steeds, and then they have lashed them to see how fast they could go. We see
some who seem to defy all laws, human and divine. They sin with both hands
greedily. In the ways of transgression they seem to have wings to their heels as
they run along the dangerous pathway. Well, but if thou wilt stay in thy course
and come to God by Christ, thy sins, which are many, are forgiven thee. Though
they be red like scarlet they shall be as wool: though they be as crimson they
shall be whiter than snow. Glory be to God, we have a Saviour not for little
sinners, but for great sinners—ay, the greatest sinners that ever lived. "This
is a faithful saying, and. worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came
into the world to save sinners, of whom," saith Paul, "lam chief."

Yes, but there are some who, when they are coming to God by Christ, not only
find sin in the way, but they find Satan in the way. "Oh," saith one, "I have
such horrible thoughts. Ever since I began to seek a Saviour I have felt
blasphemies rising within me, to which I was a total stranger before. I am
forced to clap my hand to my mouth for fear sometimes I should say these
frightful things." Well, do you hate these things? If so, they are none of
yours; they are Satan's injections. Press forward to God by Jesus Christ, for
the living Intercessor is able to save you from Satan. "He hath desired to have
you, that he may sift you as wheat," but Jesus has prayed for you that your
faith fail not. "Resist the devil, and he will flee from you," because he sees
Christ behind you, and he is always afraid of Him. "Ah, but," saith another, "it
is not only that. I have such an evil nature, ant ever since I have been seeking
God through Christ my nature seems to be more evil than ever it was. Whether it
is worse or not I cannot tell, but it seems so to me. Why, when I try to pray I
find rebellious thoughts. I get up and go to my business with a solemn
resolution that I will live near to God, but at the close of the day I seem to
have drifted farther away than ever. 'When I would do good evil is present with
me.'

Snatches of old songs come up when I am trying to praise God; and recollections
of old sins come and haunt me just when I desire my mind to be most in union
with the purity of Heaven." Ah! we know what that means. What a mercy it is that
Christ is able to save to the uttermost them that come unto God by Him from
their besetting sins, from their constitutional sins, from these inward
temptations, from their tendency to evil. Christ killed on the cross not merely
our actual sins, but our original sin, too. While the blood made atonement for
the guilt, the water which streamed with the blood presented cleansing from the
power and the defilement of sin within us. Continue still to come to God through
Christ, poor soul, however hard thou be beset, for surely He lives who will
intercede for you.

I wish I could depict—if it were possible I would—the souls that have gone to
the uttermost. Perhaps there is one here driven to desperation. He has come to
God by Christ, and yet feels he cannot come. He believes that everybody else
might be saved, but not himself. He feels that he, of all men, bears a mark like
Cain upon his brow. It may be that once he was a professor, and he thought he
walked with God. Now he has lost all hope—not only all the comfort, but, as he
believes, all the life of true religion in his soul. He believes himself to be
the most hopeless case that was ever laid at the feel of the great Physician.

Oh, my dear friend, I am glad of that—not glad of your sorrow, but I am glad
that now there is opportunity for Christ to show how grandly He can save. What
renown it brings to the Saviour when He saves to the uttermost! Why, when He has
fully saved you, you will sing louder than anybody; you will work for Him more
than any. You will be like the woman who broke the alabaster box: you will love
Him much because you have had much forgiven: and when you get up yonder, where
all the singers meet, you will want to lie the lowest at His dear feet, and yet
to sing the most sweetly to the praise of His grace. I am glad I have met with
you. I only trust the Master may meet with you now, and prove that "He is able
to save to the uttermost them that come unto God by Him." Oh, if you do but come
to God by Him, He can, He will, save you, far as you may have gone, and
desperate as your state may be.

I seem to hear somebody say, "I am afraid of death." Oh, then, how this text
ought to cheer you! He is able to save to the uttermost. A man has lain long
upon his bed, and grown very faint: the bones are coming through the skin. He
has a difficulty to breathe; sleep forsakes him. Now comes the trial hour. The
death-sweat lies cold upon his brow. He can scarce pray: his thoughts are
distracted by his pains. He cannot listen now to good advice. The mind has
become feeble. Ah! even in those last moments he that has come to God by Christ
need be under no alarm. He is able to save when we are not able to pray; able to
save when we are not able to think. Do not think that the Lord will let the
safety of His people depend upon their happening to be conscious when they come
to die. Oh, no; we are in the hand of Christ. A lifeboat saves the man that is
in it, though that man may be fainting and unconscious while he is there. So
will Christ bear into Heaven, I doubt not, many a soul that shall be too faint
to know the moment of its departure; and it shall come back from its swoon and
find itself no longer on the pallet that grew hard in its long sickness, but
there with a crown upon its brow praising the Lord. Well, if there be any fear
of anything after death Christ is able to save to the uttermost, for after death
comes the judgment, the resurrection, the standing before the throne, the sheep
as well as the goats. Ah! in—

That day of wrath, that dreadful day, When heaven and earth shall flee away,

before the Judge's face—in that dread hour beneath the wings of Him who is
messenger of the eternal covenant we will cower down and rest in safety. "He
shall cover thee with His feathers, and under His wings shalt thou trust. His
truth shall be thy shield and buckler." Unto the uttermost He will save us.
Thoughout eternity He will still live, and, living, He will still be able to
save them that come unto God by Him.

III.

Now the third point—though upon all these things we might profitably enlarge—the
third point is the source of this remarkable power which rests in Jesus Christ
our Saviour.

Why is He "able to save them that come unto God by Him"? It is because "He ever
liveth to make intercession for them." Notice the terms: "He ever liveth." Under
the old law, when a priest died there might be an interregnum before the next
took his office; at any rate, there might be some time elapse during which the
worshipper or penitent might bring his sacrifice, and there would be no one to
present it. That case can never occur with us. He ever liveth. I think I have
told you the story which Robby Flockhart, who used to preach in the streets of
Edinburgh, was accustomed to tell sometimes about the usefulness of a living
Saviour as well as a dying Saviour. He said that when he was a soldier one of
his comrades was condemned to die. Calling in his friend Robby, he made his
will, and left him what little money he had; but on the day appointed for the
shooting of the soldier he was pardoned. "So," says Robby, "he lived, but I lost
my legacy, for a testament is not in force while the testator liveth." Jesus,
the great testator, is dead. There is no fear about that; therefore the
testament of His love is valid. It would not have been unless He had died.
"Well," said Robby, "another time a person left me a small legacy, and I did not
get it, for some rogue of a lawyer got a hold of it, and I never saw a penny of
it. And," said he, "I used to say, 'Ah! if he had been alive he would have seen
me righted; he would have got his old friend Robby the money.' But being dead he
had no power to see his will carried out. Ah," said the good old preacher,
"Jesus Christ lives to see His own will carried out. He died on the cross; that
made it valid. He lives again to see it carried out, so that every blessing in
His will, in the covenant of grace, is sure to all those to whom it belongs";
and those are known as those who come unto God by Him. What a mercy it is to
have a dying Saviour! What a mercy it is to have a living Saviour! Oh, to
confide in Him who hung upon the cross, but who now sits upon the throne! Here
is one great rock upon which to build our hopes, and we need never fear that the
foundation shall fail us at any time. "He ever liveth." But do notice the words.
"He ever liveth to make intercession for them." We say sometimes of a man, "Why,
that man lives for pleasure." We mean that that is the great object of his life.
Another man seems to live for his children. Very well, the text says, He lives
to make intercession, as if He had nothing else to do but that—as if he lived
for that, threw all his life into that—to make intercession for those that come
unto God by Him. Do I strain the text when I put it so? I think I do not. He
lives to reign. He lives to come again. He lives for many objects; yet is it
fair to say that all the force of His life seems to run in this channel. He
lives to make intercession for those He bought upon the cross; that is ''for
those that come to God by Him."

O may we all come to God that way! May we come to God through a crucified
Saviour. May He be our channel of communication with the Lord, for, if so, the
intercession of Jesus goes up for us—goes up for us continually. Why is there
such power in the intercession of Christ? It is because Christ is what He is—God
and perfect man. It is because Christ did what He did: He suffered, and He kept
the law. His merits and His miseries put power into His plea. His nature and His
office and the covenant make His plea effectual. It is this that keeps us in the
favour of God. If the Lord should hide His face from His servants Jesus stands
in the gap and says, "Remember that they are Thy people, that they are bone of
My bone and flesh of My flesh. Accept them for My sake." And once again the
Father takes away the cloud, and His unchanging love shines on His people. And
when His people are in great need, then Jesus comes again, and saith, "My
Father, all things are Mine. Give to My people what they need. Give the Holy
Spirit yet again to them"; and it is done. And in temptation Jesus comes unto
the Lord, and says, "Thy enemy assails My people. He accuses and vexes them.
Deliver them." And deliverance is sent. You do not know, dear brothers and
sisters, what you owe to the pleadings of Christ. If you could only put your
ear, as it were, to the keyhole of heaven's palace and hear Jesus pleading
there, oh, what notes would you hear I—not sighs and cries, 'tis true—

For with authority He pleads, Enthroned in glory now.

It is a royal pleading, not a pleading with bloody sweat as in the garden of
Gethsemane, but it is effectual pleading, and wins for us everything the Saviour
seeks for our good.

What shall we say, then, to all these things? Why, that happy are those that
come to God by Jesus Christ. Let them be happy. Christ is able—and we are sure
He is willing—to save them to the uttermost. Go and be glad. Go your way. Eat
the fat and drink the sweet. Let your head lack no oil, and your face no
ointment. "Rejoice in the Lord always, and again I say rejoice." "Be glad in the
Lord, ye righteous and shout for joy all ye that are upright in heart." But if
you have never come to God by Christ, you have no intercessor; you have no share
m His blood. You are lost; you are dead in sin. What then? The voice of the
Gospel speaks even to you, and it says, "Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, and
thou shalt be saved," May the Spirit of God go forth with that Gospel, and may
you be made to live by the power of the Holy Ghost, that you may then believe in
Jesus, and find salvation in Him! The Lord bless you! And may we meet in Heaven
for His, the Intercessor's sake! Amen


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  CHAPTER 3: 02. THE SORROW THAT LEADS TO REPENTANCE
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II. The Sorrow that Leads to Repentance And there followed Him a great company
of people and of women who also bewailed and lamented Him. But Jesus, turning
unto them, said, Daughters of Jerusalem, weep not for Me, but weep for
yourselves, and for your children.—(Luke 23:27-28.)

Those who beheld the Saviour were mainly women. Women had ministered to Him of
their substance, and now, when they could not show their bounty, they showed
their sympathy. It is remarkable that in the whole history of our Saviour no
woman behaved badly to Him. He might be deserted, or betrayed, or slandered, or
put to death, but this was left for men. It was contrary to the Jewish law for
any person to show sympathy with a condemned individual. We have every reason to
believe that that was the law of the time.. It became the traditional law. We
are told it was the law then. But the women braved the law, defied it, and
showed their sympathy with this man who was being taken forth, like a
malefactor, to be put to death. His disciples, who were men, fled like women,
and the women were as bold as men. They played the man who might have been
expected to be feeble, and those who ought to have been strong became weakness
itself. Our Saviour did not think lightly of the compassion of these women. It
is recorded in Holy Writ that He bestowed upon them His last acknowledgment. I
know He spake afterwards before He died, but, they were rather cries than
words—they were grief's ejaculations, but His last speech on earth, I may say,
was made in acknowledgment of the tender sympathy of these bold but sorrowing
women, who clustered around Him en His way to His death.

I wonder who they were. Would it be wrong to suppose that they had heard His
speech, that they had been charmed by the gracious things that dropped from His
lips? Had it been more than that; had some of them been healed? Were those there
who had felt His mighty touch, and had gone their way restored after years of
suffering and infirmity? Probably there were some. Or were there those there who
had had their children healed, their friends and relatives restored, and who
felt gratitude to Jesus for making those who had been the objects of their
anxiety to become once again the objects of their delight? I know not what may
have been the miracles that bound these women to the Saviour, but certain I am
that it was not mere pity for a person about to be put to death, for they do not
appear to have wept for the other two who were taken out to execution. The
Saviour did not say, "Weep not for us," but He recognised that the weeping was
about Him, and Himself personally, and He said, "Weep not for Me, but for
yourselves, and for your children."

It was not because they saw a man about to die that their tender hearts flowed
over in their eyes, but because they recognised in Him something more than an
ordinary man. They did not look upon Him as a criminal about to be executed;
there was some tie of love and gratitude between their hearts and Him.. It seems
to me that it would be better to die amid the tears of sympathising women—better
to die amidst the multitude who wept and bewailed your death than it must be to
live as some men will have to live for years to come, amidst the lamentations of
many and the accusations before the throne of God of others against them as men
that made war against the human race and caused thousands to be slain. Better to
die with Jesus, than to live with emperors and kings who make war. Curses thick
and heavy fall upon all who shed human blood, but, let the curse fall upon the
Saviour, as it did, it comes amidst the bewailings and lamentations of those who
have sympathy with Him in His grief.

I shall now invite your attention to our Saviour's speech to these women when He
said, "Weep not for Me, but weep for yourselves, and for your children."

I.

Notice, first of all, our Lord's disinterestedness. He was in a condition when
one would have thought He would have was in a condition when one would have
thought He would have courted compassion. He had a heart of tenderness like
ours, and He needed human sympathy, but yet He put it away. He bade them not
weep for Him, not because He despised the sympathy, for, as I have shown you, He
loved it; but He was so little selfish that He would not have them spent their
sorrows upon Himself. And this was no unusual circumstance in the life of
Christ, for Him to be altogether oblivious of Himself, and only thoughtful for
other people. This, indeed, is the whole secret of His ever being in this world
at all. Had He thought of Himself, He had never left yonder shining throne and
the courts where seraphim sing. It was because He thought not of Himself but of
us that He came down to earth to be born of a woman, to live in suffering, and
to die in shame. All through His life we constantly see Him putting off
everything that would give Him comfort—that would give Him honour—that would
give Him ease—that He might do good to the sons of men. To go through the whole
of that it would require rather a series of discourses than the little
conversation we are able to hold in the few minutes we have at our disposal this
evening. I would just take you to the table where He sat with His disciples at
the last supper. It was the last meal that He would eat with them before His
death; but He does not ask for pity. There is no cry like that of Job, "Have
pity upon me; have pity upon me." He pities them, and comforts them, and His
speech is somewhat on this wise: "Let not your hearts be troubled"—not asking
for sympathy from them, but even putting that aside and giving all His
thoughtful consideration for their weakness and future trials. Instead of asking
them to comfort Him, His thought is all for them and nothing for Himself. It was
just so when He came to the garden, and when the passion there began. When the
bloody sweat was falling upon the ground He did look to them for sympathy, but
when He found them asleep, how readily He made excuse for them. "The spirit,"
said He, "is willing, but the flesh is weak. Sleep on, now, and take your rest."
He had looked to have some tenderness from them, but when their sorrow overcame
them, and He received none, He had no bitter reproving words; and when they came
at last to seize Him, while the traitor's kiss was still upon His cheek, and
they who bare the lanterns and torches laid hold upon Him, He did not for a
moment think of Himself, but He said, "If ye seek Me, let these go their way."
The shepherd thinking only of the sheep, ready to lay down His life for them,
making no terms or conditions for Himself. He touches the ear of Malchus, he who
has been wounded by Peter. He could heal others, but He makes no reservation of
good things for Himself. It was a true word though spoken in bitterest irony and
sarcasm. "He could save others" (and He did everywhere) "but Himself He could
not save." His love would not let Him; He was too disinterested to make any
provision for Himself.

We see just the same thing on the cross. There where His throes were at their
worst and His agony was at the highest He has a thought, but the thought is for
His murderers: "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do." He has
another thought, and it is for his mother, and He says to the favoured disciple:
"Son, behold thy mother," and to His mother, "Woman, behold thy son "—all
disinterestedness from beginning to end. And so it was in the case of the text
which lies embedded like a precious gem. "Weep not for Me," saith He, when most
He would have prized their tears, "Weep not for Me, but weep for yourselves, and
for your children."

Now, in this great disinterestedness of our Saviour, there is surely something
for us who are His disciples to learn. Our highest condition will be, when we
are like our Master, and our best rule in life is in all things to copy Him.
When we are in much grief, we are often very covetous of human sympathy. It is
natural that we should desire it and be affected and cheered by it. But
sometimes the natural may be allowed till it reaches a point beyond the right
and the noble. Let me remind you that there is a higher thing than the reception
of what is pleasant for us. It is sometimes a higher thing to put it away, and,
thinking of other's griefs, to ask sympathy to show itself elsewhere, rather
than upon us. You will find it often, I think, as Christians, to be a right
thing and a strengthening thing for yourselves, to bid the sympathy which awaits
you go and reveal itself to others. "It is true," you may say, "I feel sorely
sick, but there are others that have greater sickness than I and less of comfort
to alleviate their sorrow. It is true I am poor and you may pity me, but there
are some poorer than I am. If you have help to give and pity, help them first."

It was a noble act of the dying soldier—the dying captain—when they lifted up to
him some water. He was dying very fast, but he noticed a poor soldier nearer
death than himself turn round with longing eyes, as if he wished he could have a
drink, and the captain let the cup pass from himself and let the soldier drink.
And it is often the grandest thing we can do when wanting much we are content to
want because there are some that want still more—when we can say, "I am thankful
to you for your compassion that weeps for me, but there are worse griefs than
mine." "Daughters of Jerusalem, weep not for Me."Why, in the act the mind grows
stronger. That act of self-denial will do more to console you than the
consolation itself. You have gotten more than you received; you have girded up
your loins with a strength which otherwise you would not have gained. What
nobility it confers upon us, when our self-denial can be carried out even in
bitter times and in seasons of dire distress! Do you tell me it is more than can
be expected of man? I grant you it is, and therein is the glory of divine grace,
that it can produce what nature cannot: it can make Christians do what, as
mortal men, they could not think of doing—it can make them look unto Him, who,
being man, is set before us as our great example, and whose infinite perfections
it is our joy to seek. I cannot say more, I feel I speak unworthily of such a
theme, but I commend it to your thoughtfulness—the disinterestedness of
Christians carried out to the last hour.

II. But now, in the second place, I must direct your attention to our Lord's
clearness of judgment. The clearness of Jesus, I think, is seen in this. There
was cause to weep on His account and His being put to death, but with
impartiality He judged that there was greater cause to weep for something else.
Putting Himself, therefore, quite out of the question, by His disinterestedness,
He impartially judges that there was a deeper and bitterer cause of grief for
these women than the fact that He Himself was about to be put to death. The sin
of which their nation was guilty, the overwhelming judgment which was soon to
come upon them, and which their children would soon have to suffer—these, He
conceived to be in His supreme judgment, a direr cause for grief than His own
death. Is it not one of the most sorrowful things on earth that there should be
anything that should be graver cause for sorrow than the crucifixion? I think I
may stand here and say that grief for the dying Saviour ought to be matchless.

Alas! and did my Saviour bleed? And did my Sovereign die? Did He devote that
sacred head For such a worm as I?

Well might the sun in darkness hide, And shut his glories in, When God th'
Almighty Maker died, For my, the creature's, sin.

Well might I hide my blushing face, While His dear cross appears;

Dissolve my heart in thankfulness, And melt my eyes to tears.

Is not this the first cause of all grief, the greatest source of all sorrow?
"No," we have to reply, "it is not," There is a greater reason for grief than
this. We have the Saviour's authority for it. If He saw us to-night weeping
before His cross, with sorrow for His suffering, He would say to us, as He said
to these women, "Daughters of Jerusalem, weep not for Me, but weep for
yourselves and for your children." It is a pleasant sight in some respects to
see a congregation moved with the story of the Redeemer's suffering. When one
has been describing the cross of Christ, and all the griefs He suffered there—it
has seemed right, and we have thought it also a holy thing that hearts should be
affected, and that tears should flow, but there is something that ought to be
wept for more than this. There is a grief that lies deeper than this, though
this seems to reach even to the abyss—it is sin. It is sin for which the
daughters of Jerusalem were to weep, sin that would destroy them. And Christ
to-night seems to tell us that sin is more to be wept for than even His death.

Now let me show you how this is. In the first place, if we weep for what He
suffered, but mourn not for sin, we mourn the effect, but forget the cause, for
it was sin that lay at the bottom of all that He suffered. In the garden where
the bloody sweat fell, what made the cup so bitter, so overflowing with the
death draught? It was your sin and mine. There were the transgressions of His
people made to meet on Him. At Pilate's hall and at the bar of Herod, it was not
so much the spitting in the face, nor the mockery when they made Him King with a
thorny crown; it was the real shame of sin that was laid upon the Saviour. He
had never sinned, but He stood in our place, the place of shame, the place of
dishonour. It would have been very little for Him to have been made little of
and to be despised and rejected; He could have borne that well enough, but His
face was darkened because God "made Him to be sin for us who knew no sin, that
we might be made the righteousness of God in Him." And when He went to the tree
you must not think that the cruel nails that pierced His hands and feet or the
agonies of thirst were the intensity of His sufferings. Each of your sins became
a nail that pierced His soul, and unbelief a spear that went through His inmost
heart. His suffering there arose from the hiding of His Father's face from Him,
and that hiding was the result of our sin. It pleased the Father to bruise Him.
He hath put Him to grief and made His soul an offering for sin. The Lord hath
made to meet upon Him the iniquity of us all. "Why hast Thou forsaken Me? "That
awful question which the Son asked of the Divine Father has all misery condensed
into it, but the bottom of it is sin, sin, sin! It is not, then, the effect that
can ever be so much to be wept over, as the cause, and therefore wipe your eyes
as you behold the bleeding Saviour, as you see Him scourged, or mark Him
crucified—drop not the tears of sorrow there—but look further, and see your sins
that caused it, and bow your heads in bitterness, too. And yet, sweetest grief,
I can say,—

My sins, my sins, my Saviour, How sad on Thee they fall!

Seeing Thy heart's dire anguish, I ten-fold feel them all.

"Weep not for Me," but for your own sins weep.

Think again, and here is another reason for weeping—that sin has reigned in this
world and still reigns in it, that this very Saviour, whose precious death is
the source of our salvation, is still rejected. I have sat in my chamber and
thought over the griefs of my Lord till I have felt my soul melted within me,
but if I have gone forth and met with a penitent heart, and pointed that soul to
the cross, and faith has been given, and that soul has looked to Christ, I feel
that Christ has seen of the travail of His soul, and I have felt what I know He
feels when He remembers no more the travail for joy that a soul is saved—a brand
plucked from the burning. But, go out of your quiet room after you have mused
upon the subject, go down one of our streets and listen to the oaths and
blasphemies, stop opposite that corner where the lights flare so brightly and
the cups flow so freely; see those who go in and out with bloated faces; mark
the signs of vice from yonder theatre, the harlots in their hordes at eventide;
think of all this, and ten thousand times more than this which my lips cannot
utter, and which your ears must not hear—and all this going on in a city where
Christ is preached! and done by people who know about the Saviour—many of them!
That drunkard was in a Sunday School; that fallen woman had a godly mother;
those that curse and swear at least know the name of Christ. Hear how they use
it! How they trample it in the mire! Oh, this it is that you may weep over.

Women of London, weep not for Calvary; but weep for your own city and the
iniquities which the moon sees and which the sun beholds. Here, that Christ
should be preached, that the Sabbath should be set apart for the telling out of
the matchless story of man's redemption, that man should be prayed for at the
mercy-seat, and yet sin should run down our streets and God should be
blasphemed—oh, weep for that.

I think I know something worse, and that is this. This house is thronged almost
as often as ever the Word is preached—thronged by hearers—these aisles, these
seats all full, and Jesus Christ talked of, and I can say very simply, very
plainly—you have no difficulty in understanding what I have to tell you—and I
may say also very affectionately and earnestly that my heart goes—I am no
deceiver in that respect—with every word I say. I would God I could preach
Christ better, but I do preach in the best style I can, and I would be willing
to go to school to begin to learn to preach if I could but hope that I could
have more effect. But there are persons who come and listen and hear the way of
salvation, but won't follow it. They hear of pardon being freely presented to
them, but they will not have it. They hear of hell, and they will go to it: they
hear of heaven, but they will turn their backs upon it. Oh, say you, "They are
people that come in by chance now and then—they only hear it once or twice, or
three or four times, and go away and forget it." Ah! if it were so I would be
grieved, but these are not the people I now allude to. They are those that are
always here—if not always here on weekdays, always here on Sabbath days. And
they are attentive hearers, too, and they have a great love for the minister,
and they don't forget his sermons, and they talk about what they hear; but they
will not love the lovely Saviour, nor will they come and lay their burdens down
at His dear feet, but year after year and year after year, they hear it, but
they hear it not. The charmer charms, but they are deaf adders to His charms.

III. And it is not the preacher only that has this disappointment. Some are in
classes, where earnest Christian men and women speak to them. Some of them have
had godly parents, mothers in heaven, and they themselves were on the road to
heaven. They were brought up amidst influences of the most holy kind from their
earliest childhood. What will ever affect them? What means can be devised to
reach them, for they seem as though they were covered with iron and with steel,
with armour of metal impenetrable. They hear, I say, but they hear not; they
see, but they see not. Their hearts seem heavy till I fear they have so long
neglected Christ that He in His justice has said, "Let them alone; I will give
them up; they shall see their own delusion." Oh, here is something to weep
about. You that are inclined to think of the cross and of the Saviour's body
taken down all gory from that cross, and wrapped in linen and laid in the grave,
put away your tears and think of these that lay in the caves of sin till they
become corrupt, and God puts them out of sight.

Once more and let me follow this course of sin a little further, and I think you
will hear the blessed Master say more emphatically than any words of mine can
say, "Weep not for Me, but weep for yourselves and for your children." Hearers
of the Gospel, you will not be always the hearers of the Gospel. The hour of
your departure out of this earth draweth nigh. There are some, I fear, at this
moment, who used to hear the Gospel at this very place, who are now where they
will never have another warning and another invitation. Dare your thoughts
follow them? Dare you think of them as shut up for ever in outer darkness where
there is weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth? Dare you remember the words
of judgment, "These shall go away to everlasting punishment"? Can you think of
that dire expression, "Where their worm dieth not, and where the fire is not
quenched "? Oh, it is not Calvary to be wept for, but hell, souls lost, lost,
lost, souls that heard of salvation, souls that were invited to the
Saviour—lost, lost for ever! Angels might weep here. I say the very seraphs
might bend from their golden thrones to weep over spirits cast away by that dire
sentence, "Depart, ye cursed, into everlasting fire in hell, prepared for the
devil and his angels." Daughters of Jerusalem, weep not sentimental tears, but
shed tears of real grief for souls that are passing away into this destruction,
destroying themselves by rejecting the Saviour's love. I wish I could speak more
on that, but I cannot, I can only put it before you in that rough way, and may
God touch your hearts. But the last thing is, I think I see in this text our
Lord's practicalness. You see, I have given you His disinterestedness, His
clearness, and His judgment, and now I will speak of His practicalness. He never
would have had what was not of practical use. If they did weep, He could not
help it—He must die. All the tears they shed were of a sympathy too feeble to be
of any service to Him. But, "weep for yourselves," said He, "and for your
children," as if there were something practical here.

Let me observe that weeping for sin is a much more practical thing than weeping
for the Saviour, for, first, tears for sin—would God I could see them in every
eye—betoken some degree of spiritual life. Those that mourn their sin, that
regret and lament that they have transgressed—surely there is something
trembling in their souls that gives me hope. When it can be said of any man,
"Behold, he lives without sin," though he may not yet have found the Saviour,
yet is there much encouragement in his case. When I speak of tears I do not mean
those that flow from the eyes only, for some could not weep tears—I mean tears
of the heart, the repentance of the soul. Where these are I say there are signs
of some life, and it is through these in God's hands when we get life that we
reach to something higher. I believe that when a soul has love to Christ, and
has found perfect pardon, the continuance of repentance is the grand means of
attaining to a still higher condition. To continue still to mourn sin is to
continue to grow in grace. Tear drops are blessed watering for the flowers of
grace. Though our sins are forgiven, yet now we mourn them more than ever we
did, and by mourning for sin we reach from the lowest state of spiritual life to
a higher one.

Let me add that the way from the higher state to the very highest is very much a
road that is watered by tears. I do not believe any man will ever come to be an
advanced Christian except by sorrowing much for sin. If your spiritual life has
nothing of the dew of repentance about it it is a poor thing—I am afraid it is a
fiction. Well, I must judge no man, but I would stand in doubt in my own case if
mine were such. "Rejoice in Christ Jesus." But there comes the rest, "Rejoice in
Christ Jesus, and have no confidence in the flesh." Where there is no confidence
in the flesh we have a good deal of sorrow and mourning over sin. Rowland Hill
used to say it was the only thing about heaven that he regretted—that there
would be no repentances. "Those eyes like the eyes of doves by the rivers of
waters "—those eyes of repentance let me never lose them. Let me weep for nought
but sin, and none but Thee and then I would, oh, that I might! have none but
Thee! There is something practical here.

And, did you notice, our Saviour said, "Weep for yourselves"? But He also said
"Weep for your children." We are all anxious that our children should be saved,
and God will grant us that blessing probably whenever our anxiety is deep.. I do
not believe in weeping parents that will have all their days godless children.
Or if the weeping parent does not live to see his children saved, yet his
prayers will be registered in heaven, and God will bless his children even after
the parent has gone to heaven. At any rate, can any of you think of your sons
living a godless life or of your daughter unsaved—can you think without feeling
your bowels yearning over your own offspring? The Saviour bids you exercise that
natural emotion and give to it a spiritual tongue—exercise your love to your
children by pleading for them before God for Christ's sake, and then there will
be something practical in your weeping which there would not be in merely
weeping for Christ. If you weep for yourselves, weep for your children, and then
grace will come of it and salvation will come of it, and God will be glorified
and you will be blessed. The Lord in His infinite mercy give us all to hide
beneath the cross of Christ, and then may our dear children come there too for
Jesus' sake. Amen.


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  CHAPTER 4: 03. IN THE PLACE OF GOD'S CHOOSING
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III. In the Place of God's Choosing As a bird that wandereth from her nest, so
is a man that wandereth from his place.—(Proverbs 27:8.)

We have here the wisdom of Solomon. This will mainly concern human affairs, for
a great many of his proverbs are not intended for the spiritual eye, but to be
of literal service to us in the business of life. But I believe a greater than
Solomon is here, for he wrote under divine inspiration, and therefore we may
take a passage like this to have some other meaning than we shall find in the
mere letter of it, and the principle which it involves may be carried into a
higher sphere than that of human business. I shall endeavour to blend the two.
There is no less Solomon here because we have the Holy Spirit, neither is there
any less the Holy Spirit because we have a Solomon. Let us believe that we have
something of both, and find the meaning which may be conveyed in the text from
both the human and the divine side.

I.

First, I think the principle of the text may be applied to a man in his place in
providence. As a bird that wandereth from her nest, so is a man that readily,
constantly, hastily wandereth from his place. There are times when a man may
remove, and remove very far, very much to his own advantage, and also very
rightly. It is always difficult with those who love their native land and the
associations of home to bring them to emigrate, and yet from the 'day when God
came down to see the tower of Babel, it has been His policy that the whole earth
should be replenished with inhabitants, and He intends, by some process or
other, that men shall be scattered from dense centres of population, and that
the whole earth should be peopled. Had all our ancestors stayed at home, had it
been wrong for them to leave their land, where would have been the vast
populations that now are teeming in the other world across the Atlantic? And
Australia might still have had but a few wild savages and wild beasts roaming
over the place. It is not, therefore, wrong for people to move from their
places. There are times when it is eminently right that they should do so. When
is it right, then, for a man to move? I answer that he does not contravene the
spirit of this text if he wanders from his place, having no nest from which to
go away. A bird wanders from its nest, but when a man has no nest, when he is in
a land where he cannot earn his daily bread, when he cannot maintain his
children, when he finds that the comforts of home are not his, that he cannot
obtain them by any legitimate or lawful calling, then he cannot be said to be a
bird that wanders from his nest because he hath not any nest to wander from. Let
him wander till he can find a nest. You will see the rooks at this season of the
year. They try one tree, and if, after they have laid a few sticks, it does not
suit, they leave it and go on to another. And very right, too! It would be
foolish to proceed in an impossibility; and sometimes a man is foolish for
sticking in one place where it is not possible for him to provide things honest
in the sight of all men. A man, again, does not contravene the spirit of this
text if God breaks up his nest for him, for if the nest be broken by a superior
hand, the bird must fly. And so, if God in providence evidently makes the
present position of any Christian man to be untenable, he may not be afraid to
venture, though it should be to the utmost ends of the earth, to rivers unknown
to song. If God bids him go, he may go safely enough; he is no wanderer; for
when God saith "Go," then we do not wander from our home. Whenever the cloud
moved in the wilderness, Israel moved. They would have been sinful to have moved
without the cloud: they would have been equally sinful to have stood still when
the cloud had led the way. If you can feel that God's providence is directing
you to change your position, to change your habitation, to change your trade, to
change your place; if you can feel that you are doing so with a single eye to
God's glory, do it; and the God who was with Abraham when he went out of Chaldea
and came into Canaan will go with you. The God who has bidden His servants
wander hither and thither, and been with them in their wanderings will be with
you. You need not fear. Go, and the Lord go with you. But the text comes with
full force to those persons who are of a restless disposition. There are some
who are always wandering from their home. They cannot settle to anything. They
are everything by turns, and nothing long. They are here, there, and everywhere.
Such persons cannot prosper. A tree that is often transplanted is not likely to
bear much fruit. Our English saying is that three removes are as bad as a fire,
and you may rest assured that they are so, that constantly moving means
constantly losing, and that changing and changing means constantly having a
discount taken after all from your comfort. God deliver us from that spirit that
cannot be content. Having food and raiment, let us be therewith content. Do not
let us be always sighing for new scenes—fresh scenes and pastures new. The text
condemns those, again, who change out of mere motives of avarice or ambition.
Because they shall get more, though they have enough, they will break up all the
comforts of their abode. To desire gain is not sinful. There is a limit up to
which it is lawful, beyond which it becomes covetousness, which is idolatry, but
to be always looking after this world's goods and hoping that you shall be rich
and able to get into another condition is not to be seeking first the kingdom of
God and His righteousness, but seeking the world, and they that seek the world
shall find that it will deceive them. I have no right to move a step simply out
of selfishness. I ought to have a far higher motive than that. With the
Christian the first thing in life is to do good—to glorify God by doing good,
and when he feels, "I can do good there which I cannot do here, and yonder is a
wider sphere, and a sphere more suited to me, where I may hope to bring more
honour to my Lord and Master," then he may go; but to go from restlessness or to
go from selfishness is to go like the bird that wandereth from her nest: it
shall not be blessed of the Lord.

II. And so, too, if our removing comes out of cowardice or indolence. There is
many a time a man runs away from the battle: he does not like it. Instead of
fighting through it bravely like a soldier of the cross, he tries to get where
none of the shots can reach him, where he need not strike a blow. Many a person,
without being quite conscious of it, has been guilty of cowardice in this way.
He has said, "My temptations in a certain condition are very great; therefore, I
will exchange my condition." Are you sure that that is right? If the temptations
are great, grace also is great. May it not be that the fighting with those
temptations will be to God's glory and to your own advantage, and are you right,
therefore, in going? Many a man changes his temptations for the worse. I should
be very much afraid of shifting any of mine; for those I have I begin to know a
little about, but if I had a batch of new ones, I do not know how I might endure
them. Our temptations are very much like the mosquitoes of which they tell you
when you are travelling, that you had better let the old ones stop on, for if
you drive them away there are some new ones hungrier than the others that will
come, and you will be worse off than before. The temptations of poverty you do
know, my brother, but you do not know the temptations of wealth. The temptations
of the family you know, and you propose to run away from them into solitude. You
do not know those temptations, and you might not be able to withstand them. God
has fitted the burden to the back, and the back to the burden. Of all the
crosses in the world, your own cross is probably the easiest cross for you to
carry. If you had somebody else's cross you might well bewail yourself that you
had made so sad an exchange. Tarry where you are, and be not cowardly, neither
seek your own ease. It is not the first thing in life to be easy and to be happy
and to be merry and to be rich and to be admired and to be prosperous. There is
something nobler than that. It is often a far grander thing to know nothing of
what rest means in life, except rest in God, to know nothing of ease, to know
nothing of prosperity, except prosperity of soul, and through much tribulation
glorifying God in difficulty and finding your way to eternal bliss through it.
The gist of the whole matter is in the matter of providence. The God who has
appointed the bounds of our habitation has been wise in the appointment. It is
sometimes wise for us to move: let us take care we do not move till it is wise.
Let us not be like those who are as the will-o'-the-wisp, constantly flitting,
but remember that as a bird that wandereth from its nest, so is a man that
wandereth from his place.

Well, now we shall get a stage higher than this. So far it is Solomon, and
savours of the world; but, in the second place, the text may very well be
applied to the man who wanders from his place in the religious world—his place
in the Church. There are times when a man does well to leave the Church with
which he has been connected, when he could not do a better thing than sever the
connections of his youth. Besides, if I am in a Church, and am persuaded that
the doctrines taught are not the doctrines of the Scripture, the sooner I enter
my protest against them the better. If I have been brought up in a Church and
even have been converted in a Church, and have been edified in a Church in which
I see that some other authority is acknowledged than the authority of Christ and
some other teaching than the teaching of the Holy Ghost in the Word; if I am
convinced of the error of that Church, from that moment I shall be guilty, I
shall be an accomplice in the Church's sin if I remain in it. The voice of God
to my conscience ought to be, '' Come ye out from among them! Be ye separate.
Touch not the unclean thing." It will be one of the happiest days in your life,
though it may involve you in much trouble, if you can come right out and bear a
protest for the truth as it is in Jesus.

Sometimes, again, a man may well change his place in a congregation for the sake
of being better fed, really better instructed, or instructed in a way in which
he shall derive more profit from the instruction. One man will not edify all. If
one man did, where would all be able to be put to hear him? It is a great mercy
that, while ministries that are truthful agree in what they teach, yet there are
different modes of teaching suitable to different dispositions.. The Old
Testament speaks of the sheep feeding after their manner, and I have no doubt
different sorts of sheep have different manners of feeding, and that God
appoints different under-shepherds for different orders. The men that can hear
one man and be profited may not be able to hear another, and could not bear a
third. Yet the first, second and third shall be all equally good and equally
useful men. It is wrong for us to say which is better—Paul or Apollos. It is
wrong for us to be disputing about this divine, or that, or the other. God has
appointed the men who will suit His servants, so that they may all be fed; and
if I find upon the whole that I cannot hear a certain good man (without uttering
one unkind word about him, or thinking one hard thought) without laying all the
blame to myself because I am not edified by him when I see others are, it may,
perhaps, be the wisest thing I can do to go where my soul is fed and there to
settle down. But I must hesitate and ask myself about it, and not be as some
spiritual vagrants that I know of who are sometimes here, then there, and then
somewhere else, and nowhere long, and are about as useful to the Church as
vagrants are to the nation, that is, they are an encumbrance to it, instead of
being any ornament or assistance. No doubt, too, a man may very well change in
the religious world his position from one congregation to another for
considerations that have rather a regard to others than to himself. The wife,
perhaps, says, "I heard the other day with great delight such and such a
minister; but then, my husband would not go there. He would go anywhere sooner
than go there. But he would come to such and such a place, and therefore I
desire to join that Church in the hope that my husband will attend there and may
get a blessing." Sometimes you may say also, "Well, now, I should, perhaps,
personally be best under such and such a pastor, but then, I can help the school
in another place," or "They are weak and they need strengthening, and I shall
cast in my lot there and remove from the stronger to the weaker, not for myself
but for the sake of other people—that I may do good." Now, I believe that this
text would not at all apply to such a case as that, and that that dear brother
or sister would be right and wise in thus wandering from their place—in fact, it
would not be wandering from their place but would simply be finding their right
place and going into it.

III. But now, when is it that this text comes home to a man's heart or ought to
do it? It is when a man is constantly going from one Church to another, and from
one ministry to another, from love of novelty. There is a new star in the East,
and we have come to worship it. Behold, a new voice is lifted up, and our ears
are itching, and we must needs go and hearken to that voice and to none other.
Oh, it is childish! It is trifling with the ordinance of preaching. It is, I
would almost venture to say, profaning the Word of God to make our hearing it
merely an opportunity for the gratifying of our curiosity. Curiosity may be
gratified in a measure without sin, but for a man to go, and for the crowd to go
simply because such a person is spoken of—oh, let it not be so among us, for as
a bird that wandereth from its nest, so is a man that in that way wandereth from
his place. Many a minister's heart has been almost broken by the conduct of some
who have acted thus childishly.

Some, too, shift their place religiously from a desire of greater respect. They
are not thought quite enough of in the congregation where they are: they will
try and find a place where they shall be more highly esteemed. Dear friends, you
probably would not confess to such a motive; but I would have you sometimes
question your heart (which is deceitful above all things) whether that motive
may not come in in shifting your place from one Church to another. The highest
respect that any one of us deserves is very little indeed, for the shoe-latchet
of Christ we are not worthy to unloose, and if we get as good a position as we
are likely to adorn, if we get a menial service for Christ, it will be quite
high enough. There ought to be more scrambling after the lower places in the
Church and less desire after the higher ones, and there would be if there were
more Christianity among us. Some I have known who would attend a place of
worship when they were poorer, when they had a little business—who used to go to
a place of worship where they were much at home and much enjoyed the society of
Christians and communion with Christians. They got on in the world, and now
there is not a sufficient number of persons of their rank and station in life.
They have become so elevated and dignified that the Christian people who were
good enough to be their companions once are now their inferiors. If I called the
wandering from curiosity childish, what shall I call this? I will not insult
children by using such a word as that. It is degrading altogether for a man to
be caring about such things. How dwelleth the love of God in a soul that is
moved by such motives?

We have known, too, some who have shifted their place in the Church from some
little petty discontent, and these are as birds that wander from their nest.
Some insignificant trifle, something that might readily enough have been
explained, some pure misunderstanding may have led them to feel uneasy, and they
have gone elsewhere. I remember hearing of a man who was much displeased with
his pastor, and when enquiry was made it was found that his pastor had actually
gone by him in the street without acknowledging him. He Harboured anger in his
heart for some time about that, and he was much surprised when his minister said
to him, "Do you know, I am so shortsighted that, if I had not my glasses on, I
could hardly see 10 or 12 feet from my nose." Then he began to see how foolish
he had been to set down to anger, or want of affection, what was purely caused
by infirmity. But little things as small as that have often caused the foolish
minds of this generation to go shifting from place to place as a bird that
wandereth from her nest.

I am almost tired of talking of these things, and therefore will only mention
one more. There are some who will wander from Church to Church, and from
ministry to ministry, simply because others go. It is a strange thing that when
people cannot get into a place they are always wanting to come in, and if there
is room in any place they won't fill up the room. If other people will come,
they will come, and if other people will not come, they will not come. There is
so much of that—because others go. Now, my brethren, let every man judge for
himself. Are you happier? Does your soul rejoice in God? Do you see that the
ministry is a ministry of truth? Is the Holy Spirit upon the preacher? Is he
anointed of God? Is he made a blessing to the souls of your children? Do you
feel you can go there with a hope that by his teaching you can serve God the
better? Then go, if nobody else goes. If you are the only hearer, be honest to
the man and to your own self. But don't go merely because others go. We do not
do so in our ordinary dealings. We judge of goods for ourselves, and we will not
buy simply because others buy. And so it should be with the things of God. We
should find out for ourselves where Christ is best preached, where Christ is
most honoured, where His Spirit is most at work, and there, if that be our
place, let us abide. Let others go where they will, as for us, let us say with
Dr. Watts:—

Here would I find a settled rest While others go and come; No more a stranger or
a guest, But like a child at home.

Well, now, we shall get a step higher, and get a little more out of Solomon and
a little more of spiritual truth. The text is most applicable, in the third
place, to those persons who wander from their spheres of usefulness.. There are
such. I take it for granted that every Christian has something to do for Christ.
I liked a remark which I met with the other day, that a Christian man ought not
so much to try to find arguments why he should be a minister, why he should be a
preacher of the Gospel, as to think it needful to find reasons why he is not a
preacher of the Gospel. I believe there is truth in that, that we have all of
us, if we have any ability whatever, a call to tell out the Gospel of Christ,
and that our only excuse for not doing so must lie in our not having ability to
do it, and as we all have some ability of some sort for propagating the Gospel,
we are every one of us bound to be doing it. But there are persons who are quite
willing to do something for Christ, indeed, they are very hasty in desiring to
do it, and they commence at once, and what a rate they run at. No wonder they
soon get out of breath, and then they discover that the form of service they
have undertaken is not suitable and take up another, and with a mighty dash they
go to work at that and pull up just as suddenly and discover that after all
there is a third mode of serving God better than the other two, and they go at
this. Ah, and with what zeal! But with what suddenness do they again stop there!
They are this, they are that, they are the other, but they never succeed in any.
And alas, there are some Christians who, if they have been successful for a time
in some good work, will all of a sudden give it up. Either they get discouraged
because they have not present success, or else they have a notion that they have
done enough, and that it is time to rest. Dear brethren, if the husbandman
should give up his farm because, after he has been ploughing in October and
November he has not any harvest in April—if he should give up his lease and
resign his farm as soon as May began, where would be his reasonableness? Yet is
it so with some; they cannot continue in well doing. They seem to want to reap
at once, forgetting that we shall reap if we faint not, but that we shall only
reap "in due season."

Some have given up their work because, as I have said, they think they have done
enough. It is a strange reason for any Christian man to give. If the same reason
were to apply to nature what a sad state we should be in! The sun might say, "I
have shone enough "; the moon might say, "I have cheered the night enough"; the
sea might say, "I have gone to and fro like the pulse of life in the universe
and done enough "; the earth might shut up its stores of bread and say, "I have
yielded harvest enough"; and God Himself might say (and oh, how well and justly
might He say!), "I have done enough for this ungrateful generation!" My brother,
if you have only one more breath to breathe, breathe it out for God. If you have
grown grey and become decrepit in the Master's service, serve on and take no
furlough, but persevere until the last atom of life is gone, like John Newton
who, when he could hardly get up the pulpit stairs of St. Mary Woolnoth, and had
to be helped up and carried up and almost laid on the foot-board and was
persuaded not to preach any more because he was too old for it, answered, "What,
shall the old African blasphemer cease to praise God and preach Christ as long
as there is breath in his body? No, never!" We must still continue to labour for
the Lord. For, dear brethren and sisters in Christ, you that are working for the
Master, I want you to notice two or three things. Those that change their
spheres and modes of usefulness are like a bird that wandereth from her nest
because they lose the adaptation which they have been slowly gaining. The bird
gets fitted for her nest by sitting on it. It becomes a suitable nest for her. A
Christian worker begins to be used to his work, and, if he wanders, he loses
that. I cannot get the art of teaching children at once. I must by degrees work
into it. Well, if I renounce that work and begin another, I have got to begin at
the beginning again. I am like a person who learnt a trade, and after two years
gave it up and had to begin an apprenticeship to some other employment. It is a
pity to lose aptness for any service. But worse than that, he that changes his
labour loses very much: he loses the result of what he has done, and we want
every single stone we lay for Christ to keep its place. A man who begins a house
and does not finish it loses what he has spent upon the foundations and the
walls. He that sows, but will not stop to reap, loses the seed that he has cast
into the furrows. Don't leave that class of boys: stick to them. You have taught
them so many Sundays, you have prayed for them so many times—stick to them till
you see them converted. Don't leave that little station in the back streets. You
have got a few people together. Work on; don't lose what you have wrought. Feel
"I cannot throw all that away—these months, these years of service; I will stand
to it till God establishes my work and gives me some success in it." Don't lose
the labour you have already spent.

IV.

Besides, such a man shows by his moving from service to service that he is of an
unstable spirit. You know it is written, "Unstable as water, thou shalt not
excel." No man excels who lacks in perseverance. And, brethren in Christ, I do
pray that all the members of this Tabernacle may excel. I would have you to be
not ordinary Christians, but Christians of a special sort. If we cannot all
attain unto "the first three," yet let each one of us be a man of valour for his
Lord and Master.

Further, I am persuaded that any man who leaves the service of his Lord, leaves
it not for another sphere, but wanders from his place, is pretty sure to get
into a world of trouble. I would gently pluck a brother by the sleeve who has
been tempted to give up work for his Master, and I would whisper one word in his
ear, and that word should be "Jonah!" If he asked me for an explanation I would
say to him, Was not Jonah bidden to go to Nineveh, and he would not go? But he
went where he never expected to go, as the result of it! Jonah would never have
had to cry out from the bottoms of the mountains with the reeds wrapped about
his head if he had gone where God sent him. If we will not do as God bids us do,
but try to run away to Tarshish, we shall find that God has a will, and though,
perhaps, He may bring us up on dry land, as He did Jonah, we may find that He
will leave us in deep troubles because we left His service. Let us not so false
or faithless prove as ever to shun the service of God. It will sometimes come
across the most earnest Christian in times of faithfulness, "Oh that I could get
out of this! I am not doing my Master's work as I could wish. Not seeing the
prosperity I desire I cry out; with Elijah, 'Let me die! I am no better than my
fathers!' "May God cure us of this sickness! And I know of no better cure than
for him to let us see the crucified One with the thorn-crown about His brow,
working on and on through shame and suffering and rebuke, and never
relinquishing His life-work till, giving up the ghost, He at the same moment
said, "It is finished." May we set to it till it is done, being "stedfast,
unmoveable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, forasmuch as we know that
our labour is not in vain in the Lord."

Now, fourthly and lastly, we mount to our highest point. As a bird that
wandereth from her nest, so is a man that wandereth from his place in matters of
soul, spirit, life and grace. For where, dear brethren, is our nest? Where is
our place? I answer, it is at the foot of the cross. We have no safe
resting-place but there. Sinners resting in a Saviour, guilty, pardoned through
the blood, lost, rescued by the hand of the Redeemer, there is our place. The
temptation is to get away from that, like the Galatians, who, having begun in
the Spirit, thought to be made perfect in the flesh, They had walked by a simple
faith in God at first, but they hoped that their works and circumcision and
other ceremonies would make them perfect. Oh, poor little bird half-fledged, if
you have fallen from your nest, what must you do? And you are a picture of my
poor half-fledged spirit. It will never grow to perfection, and never be able to
take a flight to heaven except it shall abide within the nest of the atonement,
covered with the wings of everlasting love. There is no growing place, no place
of security, no place of comfort for a poor sinner but in Christ—in Christ
alone. Are any of us to-night tempted to go anywhere beyond that? Are we so
looking for sanctification as to forget that He is made of God unto us
sanctification? We knew ourselves to be sinners once, and we have begun to think
we are great saints. Now, have we got a notion that we are angels, or something
very wonderful? Oh, let us get out of that! We are nothing of the kind. When we
mistake ourselves for somebody very good, we had better look in the glass. If we
only make a little self-examination once more, we shall soon discover that "in
us, that is, in our flesh, there dwelleth no good thing." As an old ploughman
often has said to me, "If you or I get one inch above the ground we get that one
inch too high, for down, down, down is our place, flat before the cross." Having
nothing, yet possessing all things; being less than nothing, we find our all in
Christ.

Beloved, the same may be said of our place as Christians as to our belief, our
creed. Now, there are certain great truths taught in Scripture, as I think, very
plainly—the doctrines of grace they are commonly called. And there are some of
us who have known these truths for twenty years, and the more we know them the
better we love them. There are others who are ready to believe in new-fangled
notions. Something starts up as another discovery. What a many discoveries there
have been during the last twenty years, and nearly all have been exploded, and
so will the rest that remain in the course of a few more years. They come and go
like crops of Jonah's gourds; they come up in a night, and perish in a night. It
will be well for us if we do not prove like birds that wander from their nest.
As for me, my flag is nailed to the mast; it neither runs up nor down. Wherein I
have learned Christ, I will abide and so—

Let all the forms that men devise Assault my faith with treacherous art, I'll
call them vanities and lies, And bind the Gospel to my heart.

There is something taught in this Book, after all, and it is not a Book that we
cannot understand if we seek God's Spirit to enlighten us. There are certain
truths which have been burnt into our inmost experience. We do not believe them
now merely because they are here, but because they are written on the fleshy
tablets of our soul. We could not give them up. They are not matters of choice
with us as to whether we will hold these doctrines or not; God has taught them
to us, and interwoven them into our very being, so that we must and will hold
them. God grant we may not wander from our place in any of these things.

But, once again, let the Christian take heed of turning aside from his place of
walk and fellowship with God. The Christian's place is to live with Jesus. We
have each one of us our work to do on earth; but our true calling is a heavenly
one. When they asked Jonah in the storm, "Of what occupation art thou?" do you
remember his answer? He said, "I am an Israelite, and I fear God." That was his
occupation. And the Christian's true occupation is the fearing of his God. Oh,
that every day we might have the Lord before us and never wander from Him! For
if we do, we are just like the bird that has left her nest: we shall flutter
hither and thither and not find peace. Noah's dove is the true picture of the
believer. He may fly the whole world over, but there is only one place where
there is rest for the sole of his foot, and that is in the ark with Noah—in
salvation with Christ. If you have lost your fellowship, beloved, pray God to
bring you back again. If you are beginning to be lax and unspiritual, if you
have neglected prayer, if you have lost a sense of pardon, if you have got far
off from God, don't be merely mourning that you are far off and wondering how
you have got there, but say, "I will return unto my first husband, for then it
was better with me than it is now." "Return, ye backsliding children, for I am
married unto you, saith the Lord." And oh, beloved, I hope we may never wander
from one other place, and that is the place of supreme love to Jesus—complete
consecration to Him. Have we ever got there? Some Christians have not. They love
Christ, but not after the model He would set before them. They do not seem to
love Him above all things else. But if we do, if he be our life, our soul, our
all, if we live for Him, if in whatsoever we do, we do all to His glory, if we
have striven to rise to the point of being completely consecrated with the blood
mark on the ear and on the foot and on the hand and on the heart—all Christ's
and all for Christ, if we eat and drink and sleep eternal life, oh, let us never
come down from that mount. May God grant we may never descend from that place,
for if we do, we shall smart for it, and be as a bird that wandereth from her
nest. Those that never were there—well, they shall not have so much sin as we
shall if we have been once elevated, and then go back again to the beggarly
elements. That head that once leaned on Christ's bosom, if it be content with
any other pillow, is not worthy of Him.

Well, all this is concerning those that wander from their nest. But, alas! there
are some here to-night that have not any nest to wander from. They have not any
Christ; they have not any Saviour; they have not any home. A poor child sits
down at night upon a doorstep. The policeman comes up and says, "Move on!"
"Where shall I move to?" he says. "Go home, child." "I have not any home." "Go
to your bed." "I have not any bed." Well, now, that can be got over. We can find
the child a house: we can get the child a refuge somewhere, poor little thing!
But supposing in eternity, when the day of grace is over, you should have to sit
down, as it were, upon the doorstep, and you should have no home, and the
angelic messenger should say, "You cannot stay here: you must move on. Go to
your home." "Oh," you say, "I have no home, and it is too late for me ever to
find one, for the Master of the house has risen up and shut to the door, and He
will never open it again. I would not enter when I might, and I cannot enter
now." Ah, then you won't have to ask where you will have to move to, for the
dread certainty is this—if you have no home in Christ, you must make your bed in
hell.

God grant that you may never have to do that, for Christ's sake. Amen.


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  CHAPTER 5: 04. FROM SORROW TO JOY
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IV. From Sorrow to Joy Your sorrow shall be turned into joy.—(St. John 16:20.)
Our Lord was very honest with His followers when any-enlisted beneath His
banner. He did not profess that they would find an easy service if they took Him
to be their leader. Over and over again He stopped some young enthusiastic
spirits by bidding them count the cost; and, when some said they would follow
Him whithersoever He might go, He reminded them that though the foxes had holes
and the birds of the air had nests, yet He had not where to lay His head. He
never duped any man. He told all the truth to them, and He could honestly say to
them, "If it were not so, I would have told you." He kept back nothing which it
was needful for them to know in enlisting under His name. In this verse He
reminds His people that they will have sorrow. Let no Christian forget that. Be
he old or young, sorrow is an appointed portion for all mankind. And there is a
sorrow which is the especial benediction of the saints. They shall have that
sorrow if none others do. Oh, young spirit, you have just found a Saviour, and
your heart is very glad. Be glad whilst you may, but expect not that the sun
will always shine. Reckon for days of rain and days of frost and days of
tempest, for come they will, and I tell you of them now lest when they come they
should be strange to you and overwhelm you with confusion. And oh, child of God,
you have for many years been prospering; you have walked in the light of God's
countenance, and the Lord has made a hedge about you and all that you have, till
you have prospered in the land like the Patriarch of Uz. Remember that evil days
will come even to you as they did to Job, and expect them, for "in the world ye
shall have tribulation." This part of the inheritance of children, namely, the
rod, will be quite sure to fall to your portion if you be one of the sacred
family. Our Saviour, in the verse before us, not only tells His disciples that
they will have sorrow, but He warns them that sometimes they would have a
peculiar sorrow. When the world was rejoicing they would be sorrowing. "The
world shall rejoice," saith He, "but ye shall weep and lament." Now this is
sometimes hard for flesh and blood. We cannot read this riddle—God's people
sighing and God's enemies laughing—a saint on the dunghill with dogs licking his
sores and a sinner clothed in scarlet and faring sumptuously every day—a child
of God sighing and groaning, chastened every morning, and an heir of hell making
the world ring with his merriment! Can these things be so? Yes, they are so, and
we must expect them so to be; and if we read this riddle by the eye of faith, we
shall understand it. Yet we shall see God working even in these mysterious
circumstances, and dealing out the best to the best after all, and giving still
the worst to the worst in the long run.

Now, our Lord, in order to sustain His servants under the ill news of sorrow and
of special sorrow, gave them two thoughts. The first He put into three words—" a
little while." And here is a whole mint of golden consolation here—" a little
while." When things are only temporary, we put up with them. If we are
travelling, and we come to an uncomfortable inn, we are off to-morrow, and
therefore we make no great noise about it. A painful operation has to be
performed, but, when the surgeon tells us it will only occupy a second or two,
we submit to it. "A little while "—it takes off the edge of sorrow. If it be but
a minute, and then afterwards there shall be never-ending blessing coming out of
it, oh, then we glory in the tribulation, and count it not worthy to be compared
with the glory that shall be revealed in us. Afflicted child of God, I commend
to you those three words, "a little while." I beseech you to roll them under
your tongue as a sweet morsel when your mouth is filled with the wormwood of
sorrow. "A little while," and after that little while is over then it shall be
"for ever with the Lord." The other reflection which He gave them for their
comfort is that which is furnished by our text, "Your sorrow shall be turned
into joy." May God the Spirit give us comfort while we think over these words.

I. And first, brethren, this language was strictly true with regard to the
remarkable sorrow which was then coming upon them when our Lord spake. You know
the chapter. The Lord had been telling them of His death. They had been sitting
around the table, and He had revealed to them the fact that He was about to be
delivered into the hands of wicked men and be crucified, and that this would
make them weep and lament; but concerning this He says, "Your sorrow shall be
turned into joy." We have also another sorrow coming out of that, namely, the
sorrow that our risen Lord has gone away from us, has risen from Olivet and left
His Church a widow; yet that sorrow, too, is turned into joy. Let us speak,
then, about those two things.

You will soon see before you, brethren, a sacred feast. We are preparing
to-night to come around the table on which we have the bread and wine which
celebrate our Saviour's death. Now, it is a very pleasing thought that to
celebrate the death of Christ we have not an ordinance that is full of sorrow.
There is no rubric which tells us that we are to come clothed in mourning, that
we are to come together as to a funeral, that dirges are to be sung, that violet
colours, or such as represent sorrow are to be used. On the contrary, the
ordinance which commemorates and shows the death of Christ is one of joy, if
properly used. We come around a table, and sit there at our ease and eat and
drink, for the death which was so sorrowful is turned into joy, and the memorial
of it is meant to set it forth not as it was on the sorrowful side, but as it is
to us on the joyful side. Our sorrow is in the symbol turned into joy.

Now, let us think of the sorrow of Christ's death a moment. It was great sorrow
to see Him suffer, sorrow unspeakable to see Him die. You mothers who love your
sons, what a sword would have gone through your hearts if it had been your son
who was nailed to the tree! Ye brothers who love your brothers, what pangs would
have rent your spirit if he had been your brother who was hanging there. We
would, if it had been possible, have spared Him the thirst, have spared Him the
shame and spittle; we would have spared Him the nails and spared Him the crown
of thorns. We can never think of His sufferings without smiting upon our breast
with grief and saying—

Alas! my sins, my cruel sins. His chief tormenters were.

And as we look on His sufferings we ask:—

Oh, why should man offend, And make the Lord his Saviour die?

Bitter ought to be our regret that ever we should have wandered from the path of
right and made it necessary that our wanderings should be laid upon the
Shepherd's head. Woe, woe, woe unspeakable, that the elect of God should thus
have multiplied their transgressions and have compelled their Saviour to be
smitten even to death for their sakes!

We sorrow, too, from another thought that in the death of Christ, sin for a time
appeared to get the mastery over goodness. There He was, the perfect Man, the
advocate of all that was true and God-like; but His self-righteous foes, His
cowardly enemies hunted Him to the death, and they could not be content till
they had washed their hands in His blood. When I see Him upon the cross, I seem
to feel as if Satan, the old serpent, had bitten the heel of truth and poisoned
it. I begin to tremble for truth and righteousness when I see thus the pure and
perfect One laid low in the dust, but all these three sorrows put together, for
His sufferings, for our sins and for the temporary triumph of evil, are at once
turned into joy when we know that now the Saviour has finished the atoning work,
that He is accepted of His Father, that He has crushed the old dragon's head,
that He has given to sin and death and hell a total defeat.

Brethren, there is nothing to sorrow for when we look at the cross now, for
Jesus is again alive; He has glory about Him that He had not, and could not have
had, if He had not stooped to conquer and bowed His head to death. The man
Christ Jesus now sits at the right hand of the Father exalted far above
principalities and powers, and every name that is named. He sees of the travail
of His soul, and He is satisfied, and instead of mournful dirges we say, "Bring
forth Miriam's timbrel yet again, and let us sing unto the Lord, for He hath
triumphed gloriously! The horse and his rider hath He cast into the sea. All the
host of His enemies hath He drowned in the Red Sea of His atoning blood."

Moreover, brethren, we are gainers now. It is true our sin crucified Him, but
our sin is gone. The last act of sin was sin's own destruction. It pulled down
the house upon itself like Samson, and there it died. Our sin is put away by the
death of Christ. He has "finished transgression, and made an end of sin." And as
for truth and righteousness, they are gainers, too. Now, on the cross the crisis
of the great battle comes. Now is the prince of this world cast out. Now do
righteousness and holiness and truth win the day, and that for ever. Glory be
unto God, we come to the memorial of the death of Christ as to a festival. Our
sorrow is turned into joy. And as to our Lord's going away from us into heaven,
it does at first sight wear a very sorrowful aspect. We should be glad if He
should occupy that chair to-night and say, "Take, eat; this is My body." Oh,
what a happy crowd would you all be who love Him, if He stood in this pulpit
to-night and showed you His hands and His feet. We would stand at the posts of
His doors by the week together to get a sight of Him. If He had His throne in
Jerusalem this day, what pilgrimages would we make if we might but come anywhere
near His blessed person, and might kiss the very dust He trod upon! For what a
precious Lord was He! Oh, in our times of sorrowing, if we could but once see
His face, those dear lustrous eyes that seem to say, "I know your sorrows, for I
have felt the same," that blessed countenance that would speak consolation,
though it said not a word, and would say to every mourner, "I will help thee. I
have borne thy burden of old "—would not it be a joy to see Him? Surely I should
be glad enough to cease my ministry, and you might be glad enough, however
useful you might be, to give up your work as the stars hide their diminished
heads when the sun rises.

II.

But, brethren, there is no cause for sorrow. I am talking idly for the moment
now, for our sorrow is turned into joy. It is a great gain to us not to have the
Saviour here. And see ye how it is? He said, "If I go not away, the Comforter
will not come unto you." Now, it is a nobler thing to have the Spirit of God
dwelling in us than it would be to have Jesus Christ dwelling upon earth. For,
as I have hinted, if He were on earth we could not all get at Him; He could only
be in one place at a time, and how would the poor be able to get where He is?
And if He perambulated all the world yet in the natural order of things, it is
only now and then He could come to one place, and so some of us would have to be
pining all our lives to see Him. But now the Holy Ghost is here. The Holy Ghost
is wherever believers are. "Know ye not that He dwelleth in us for ever?'' And
whereas we see nothing, this is all the better for us. A life of sight is for
babes; a living by feeling is for poor puny infants, but the life of faith is
for men in Christ Jesus, and ennobles us by taking away anything that is to be
seen and giving us to walk after the unseen. "Though we have known Christ after
the flesh," says the apostle, "yet now after the flesh know we Him no more." We
have not Christ among us after the flesh, and we are glad of it, for now our
faith is exercised and God loves faith, and faith makes men into true men in the
sight of God, and ennobles them and makes them friends of God. For who was "the
friend of God" like Abraham, who believed God? Faith, then, being so much more
for our good than the most delightful sight, we have reason to thank God that
Jesus is gone and that the Spirit is given.

Besides, beloved, Christ can serve our turn better where He is than He could
here. What is He doing for us yonder in the unseen land? Why, know ye not He has
gone to take possession for us—gone ahead that He may say, "This heaven belongs
to My people; I am come here as their legal representative." The moment that He
put that pierced foot of His upon the golden streets He said, "These streets
belong to all whom I have redeemed with My blood, to all whom My Father gave Me,
and they shall possess this, for lo! I take possession of it." And inasmuch as
there was something to do to make heaven fit for us—I do not know what it
was—what a joy it is to hear Him say, "I go to prepare a place for you." Why,
brethren, heaven was not fit for us any more than we were fit for heaven till He
went there, and He is getting it ready, so that when we come home we shall find
our house furnished and all prepared. When God made Adam, He did not make Adam
first and suspend him in the air till he made Eden for him to live in, but He
made the garden, fitted it for Him, and then He made the man and put him in it.
And so our great Lord is gone to make heaven fit for us, and He will come again
and take us unto Himself that where He is we may be also. Now for this cause we
are glad that He is not here. We comfort one another with these words, and we
see how true was this promise of His, "Your sorrow shall be turned into joy."
Sorrow at His death, sorrow at His departing out of the world—these two sorrows
are now "turned into joy."

We pause awhile and change the subject. I see before me still the preparation
for the feast—for the supper, and therefore let me remind you that in coming to
that table we experience a transmutation of spiritual emotions with regard to
Him. I will show you what I mean. Some time ago, the Lord made us hungry and
thirsty after righteousness. We could not any longer be satisfied with the
world. We came to feel ourselves miserable. Our heart was pining for something.
We had once been quite content with present joys, but, on a sudden, we were
dissatisfied and felt a craving we had never felt before. Are you not glad of
it, because when you come to the table here you see that there is bread to eat
and wine to drink, emblems of the body and the blood of Christ? Do you know,
when I sit down at a good table, what I feel thankful for? Two things, if I have
got them. First, for what is on the table; but, secondly, for an appetite. For a
feast is a poor thing without an appetite. So, see you, the hunger and thirst
which God has given us after Christ are turned into joy when we come to see
Christ, for now we say, "How glad I am, how thankful I am that I could no longer
remain content! How happy am I that God gave me a distaste for all the joys of
the world, for now I am the man that can enjoy a crucified Saviour. Now I can
eat His flesh, which is meat indeed, and drink His blood, which is drink
indeed!" Well, at the same time when we felt our hunger we had another sorrow,
namely, that hungry as we were, we had not a crust in the house: we could not
satisfy our own hunger, do what we would. We went about the world to try and
find something to satisfy our need, but we could find nothing whatever. The
husks that contended the swine would not content us. We wanted something more. I
know at that time I had not a pennyworth of merits, though I had a mass of sins.
I tried to pray, but my prayers could no more fill my soul than wind could. I
tried to be diligent in hearing the word and doing good, but there is nothing to
stay a hungry soul in all that we can do. But now to-day, to-day in the sight of
that table and remembering this bread and wine, to picture Christ crucified the
food of the soul, I am glad that I had not got anything to eat, because now I
was driven to feed on Christ. Oh, what a blessed thing is an empty cupboard when
it brings a soul to the Saviour! Our sorrow is turned into joy, and we call it a
blessed famishing, a blessed emptiness, when we can have the emptiness and
famishing removed by feeding upon an all-sufficient Saviour.

So, you see again, our sorrow is turned into joy. And on the table of fellowship
to-night we see the wine-cup, and while it represents to us our Saviour as our
refreshment, it also reminds us that we were once foul and needed to be washed
in His blood. Now, it was a great sorrow to feel ourselves foul; it was a horror
to discover that we were soiled from head to foot with scarlet sins. But, for my
part, now that I have washed in the fountain filled with blood, I have forgotten
my sorrow about sin. It is turned into joy. Oh, the blessedness of being made
clean in Christ Jesus! Why, I think if I had been Adam, and had never sinned, I
should always have had some little fear that perhaps I had come short somewhere
if I had to depend on my own merits, even if I hoped I was perfect. Now, sinner
that I am, I entertain no fears, for I know Christ's righteousness is perfect; I
know His death cleanseth from all sin; and so the sorrow about sin is turned
into joy in the sense of perfect pardon and complete righteousness which belong
to us through the precious blood of our dear Lord and Saviour. Oh, when you come
to the table, my dear brethren and sisters, lay aside all your griefs, whatever
they may have been. Feel that if you must bring them with you they are
transformed and transmuted on the road; for your sorrow since you have believed
on Jesus is turned into joy.

III.

Now, for a moment or two, let me remind you that this truth will hold good of
all believers' sorrows. Your sorrow shall be turned into joy.. It shall be good
of some of them to-day. God will make your present sorrows to be turned into
joys. Do I address one person to-night who has been persecuted for Christ's
sake? Do I speak with one young person whose parents treat her ill because she
follows Jesus? Brother, sister, your sorrow is turned into joy, even now, for,
if ye be persecuted for righteousness' sake, happy are ye. Not, happy shall ye
be, but happy are ye. Even now ye have a great honour put upon you: you are
counted worthy not only to believe on the Lord Jesus but to suffer for His sake.
At the thought of Him, then, that sorrow is turned into joy. Perhaps I address
some who are under very severe afflictions. Beloved brother, if the Lord shall
reveal Himself in your afflictions, you will be very sorry to be rid of them;
you will feel that they are even now turned into joy. Constantly, in reading
Rutherford's letters you meet with the expression of his wonder that his enemies
should be so kind to him as they were. He speaks in a sort of holy sarcasm. They
banished him, sent him away from where he was wont to preach the Gospel, but he
said, "I find my Lord lives here and they have sent me into His arms. They would
not let me preach," he says, "and now my Lord doth make up for my dumb Sabbaths,
for, whereas I may not speak, He speaks to me and cheers my soul," and it seems
from his letters that, the more his enemies persecuted him, the more deep, the
more high his joy became.

I, too, know such a thing as that, that pain can come upon you and grace can
come with the pain, so that you feel thankful for it. I have heard saints of God
say that they have had great losses, but that the love of God has flowed into
their soul so that their losses they have reckoned to be their gains. We have
heard of one that said, "Let me go back to my bed again; let me go to my pain
again, for I had so much of Christ there that I would fain rather be always sick
than lose the sickness and lose the love of my Lord."

Yes, beloved, He can, at this moment, turn your sorrows into joys. If you have a
great lump of sorrow, you will have a great lump of joy, for He turns it all
into joy. One touch of His finger can turn the granite stones into gold; bring
them to His feet; ask Him to do it, and you shall be rich in joy to-night. Well,
if it is not done at once, it will be done ere long. It sometimes takes a little
time for a sorrow to turn into a joy. It is rather an odd figure of Cowper's,
but it is a true one:

The bud may have a bitter taste, But sweet will be the flower.

It takes a little time for our bitters to bloom out into sweetness, but they
will. If you are praying for your dear child, praying for his conversion but do
not see it, yet pray on, for your sorrow will be turned into joy. If you are in
great trouble about your husband, or your brother, or your friend, whose
conversion you are seeking, strive on still, for it will come. One day you shall
have the joy of your heart, and your sorrow shall be turned into joy. And that
trial you are labouring under just now—don't faint under it; wait a little. It
is a rough wind, but it is blowing you towards the port. It is a rough wave, but
it is washing you on to the rock. It is not to-day that you will see it, nor
to-morrow; but afterwards, and by-and-bye it will bring forth the comfortable
fruits of righteousness, and you will rejoice.

And, mark you, if never in this world, yet in the blessed country "on the hither
side of Jordan" your sorrow shall be turned into joy. It will be among the
delights of heaven, I do not doubt, to look back on the sorrows of life and to
see how they ministered to our meetness for the better land. There we shall make
songs out of our sighs and music out of our mournings; only let us wait and be
patient. The people of the world have the laughter to-day and we have the
sighing; they shall have the sighing by-and-bye and we shall have the laughter.

God is like a certain great man who had in his house two sets of cups. Those
cups were for his friends, and these were for his enemies; but they might take
which they would. He knew his friends were wise; his enemies were fools. Now,
these cups which were for his foes were very sweet; they sparkled on the brim;
they flashed. The wine was red, and it moved itself aright. But they were warned
that whosoever drank these cups would find that the dregs were full of death.
And his foes came in and drank and drank and laughed, and said the good man of
the house loved them best, for he had given them the sweetest wines. But on the
other table stood the cups that were ready for his friends, and his friends were
wise, and they went to them, and the cups were very bitter—very bitter! Ah, how
they set their teeth on edge and filled their mouths with wormwood! But they
knew that these were health-cups that would purge them of all disease and fill
their frames with a vitality and force which magic could not give; and therefore
these friends of his drank the cups with joy and thankfulness, for they knew
that he had prepared them in love; and while they heard his enemies laughing at
them they bore the laughter with composure, for they knew what the end would be.

To-day the saints and the sinners in the world are like two armies on the eve of
battle.. You go through yonder tents. On the left side you will hear the sound
of revelry; you shall see them enjoying the dance. Full bowls they quaff,
merrily. Say they, "We go forth to battle and to victory to-morrow!" That is the
camp of sin and of the enemy. Here you see the other camp; and the soldiers
there make not merry. They are men of sober stuff. They have a solid joy within
them, for they expect to win to-morrow; but they boast not. Each man is looking
well to his buckler, seeing that his harness is complete and his sword
well-sharpened; and you will hear at intervals the prayer, the cry to God, "Make
strong our arms, and send us like thunderbolts upon our foes." Now, by
to-morrow's eve, I wot, ye shall know what has become of them, for yon gay and
haughty cavaliers, with all their mirth, shall strew the field, and their
carcases shall be given to the dogs and to the fowls of heaven. But yon
suppliant hosts there, though they be reviled as Puritans, shall dash through
the hosts of their foes and shall lead their captivity captive. In which camp
would you wish to be? I have taken my choice, and I pray my brethren to take
theirs, and may the Spirit of God rule their choice that they may take the
bitter cups that are full of health and that they may go with the sober
prayerful camp whose song of victory shall turn their sorrows into joys.

Brethren, if the saints' sorrows are turned into joys, what are their joys? If
their bitters are sweet, how sweet are their sweets! And if the finger of Christ
touching the things of life can make them sweet, how sweet must Christ Himself
be! If He turns the water into wine, how rich must He be! And if He turns on
earth our sorrows into joy, what can the joys be where there are no sorrows, but
where the joys are unalloyed and undiluted and last on for ever! Blessed
sorrows, blessed joys! Who would not be a believer when even his sorrows shall
be turned into joys?

IV. But lastly, this little text is a Gospel. I think it is a Gospel for all my
hearers to-night. Your sorrows shall be turned into joys.. Whosoever among you
shall come to-night to those dear feet that were pierced by the nails, and will
come and trust in Jesus Christ to save him, shall have his sorrow turned into
joy. Are you sorrowing for sin? It shall be pardoned, and in a moment joy shall
fill your spirit. Do you sorrow because you are afraid you are not one of the
elect? Come and trust in Jesus, and you shall make your election sure, and the
doctrine that was so horrible to you shall be full of consolation. Are you
mourning because you are unfit to come? Come with all your unfitness, and you
shall thank God that you were saved from making a fitness and were enabled to
come as a sinner to Christ. Do you mourn because you have a hard heart? Come and
trust Jesus, and He will give you a heart of flesh and you shall bless His name
that you were another instance of His Almighty power to change the hearts of
men.

I would to-night that you would try my Lord and Master. I have known Him now
more than two and twenty years. Two and twenty years ago, last Friday, I avowed
my faith in Him in baptism, and I would not give Him a good character if He did
not deserve it. I would not lie even for Him, I trust. But, oh, there was never
such a Lord as He is! Sorrow He told us we should have, and we have had it, but
He has always turned it into joy, and up to this moment I can say of Him, if I
had to die like a dog and there were no hereafter, I would prefer to be a
Christian; and if there were no joy about religion but the present joy which it
gives to a believing heart, let me have it beyond all the joys of wealth, or
fame, or honour. There is none like Christ. I would that some of you would come
and take Him. May His Spirit guide you and may you to-night become His
disciples, and your sorrow shall be turned into joy, The Lord grant it for His
name's sake. Amen.


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  CHAPTER 6: 05. SAFE IN THE FATHER'S CARE
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V. Safe in the Father's Care

Thus hath the Lord spoken unto me, Like as the lion and the young lion roaring
on his prey, when a multitude of shepherds is called forth against him, he will
not be afraid of their voice, nor abase himself for the noise of them: so shall
the Lord of Hosts come down to fight for Mount Zion, and for the hill thereof.
As birds flying, so will the Lord of Hosts defend Jerusalem; defending also He
will deliver it, and passing over, He will preserve it.—(Isaiah 31:4-5.) The
kingdom of Israel in the days of Isaiah and later—the days to which this
prophecy would refer—occupied a position between the two great kingdoms of
Assyria and Egypt. It was, in fact, like corn between two millstones. But by
some strange infatuation the people were always most afraid of Assyria, and most
opposed to that state; and they were constantly desiring an alliance with Egypt,
believing Egypt to be the stronger of the two, and hoping, that through the
assistance of the Egyptians, the Assyrians might be kept in check. You will see
again and again that, contrary to the bidding of God's servants, the prophets,
they tried to enter into league with the Egyptians, when they ought, according
to the divine direction, to have submitted to the sway of the Assyrians. Again
and again were they rebuked for this, and never more pointedly than in the
language with which this chapter opens. They are told that woe shall be unto
them because they stay themselves upon Egypt, and they are reminded that the
Egyptians are men and not God; and their horses are flesh and not spirit. The
prophet tells them of the right place for their confidence. Where strength is to
be found there will he have them place their faith. The infinite Jehovah was
greater than the Assyrians or the Egyptians, for He is Lord of all. And Isaiah
would have his people confide in the Lord and put their trust in Him. To this
end he presents to them in the verses before us prophecies of the divine
protection in which God is represented under two figures. And here let me say
how condescending it is of God that He should represent Himself to us by
metaphors at all, for nothing that exists can be a true picture, nothing that
exists through His creation can be a true picture of Himself, the self-existent
one. The whole sea is too small a mirror for the Almighty to mirror His face in
it: the whole universe is too narrow to express the attributes of God. But let
it be a matter of astonishment to us that the Lord selects even animals to be
the types of Himself—wild beasts and little birds. This is frequently done
throughout Scripture, and is done in our text. First, the Lord is likened to a
lion, and in the next verse He is likened to birds. To a lion—this shall be our
first point—for strength: to birds flying—for solicitude for His people's good.

I.

First, then, the Lord for the defence of His people is represented as a
lion—illustrative of his power.. We will read the verse again. "Like as the lion
and the young lion roaring on his prey, when a multitude of shepherds is called
forth against him, he will not be afraid of their voice, nor abase himself for
the noise of them: so shall the Lord of Hosts come down to fight for Mount Zion,
and for the hill thereof."

Note, then, for strength the Lord here on His people's behalf compares Himself
to a lion. A lion—a beast of such matchless strength and courage that he is set
down as the king of beasts, the emperor of the forest. He seems to be formed and
fashioned by creative wisdom on purpose for strength. Those that examine his
form mark the development of his muscles, see how mighty is his spring and how
quick he is to devour and how terrible are his jaw teeth to break the bones of
his prey. There is none that can match him. Among the wild beasts he still wears
the crown. The king of the creatures that God hath made in the forest is the
lion. But oh, brethren, what is the lion when compared with the great King of
kings? What is a lion? Why, the mere insect of an hour is greater in comparison
with a man than a lion is in comparison with God. All power belongeth unto Him.
When we speak of the arm of God we mean Omnipotence; when we talk of His power
we mean that He is Almighty. None of us can have any conception of the power
that dwelleth in the Lord of Hosts.

Now all that power is pledged for the preservation of those that trust in Him.
There is not a grain of strength in Jehovah that is not promised, engaged and
certified for the defence of all His saints. When next you doubt, remember that
you doubt Omnipotence. When next you tremble lest He should not be able to
fulfil His promises, remember that you mistrust the Almighty one Himself. If
there were a limit to the power of Jehovah, there might be a limit to our faith,
for it were fair to measure our faith by the resources of God; but since there
is no shore to the sea of His strength, no summit to the mountain of His might,
for us to be dispirited, downcast, and distrustful is to forget the mighty God
who feeds the strength of every saint. For the defence of everyone of His chosen
and of His whole Church collectively God manifests Himself as the strong one,
"the Lord strong and mighty, the Lord mighty in battle, the Lord Who only doeth
wondrous things Whose name be blessed for ever and ever." The text having given
us the figure of a lion, then passes on to speak of a young lion. Very
frequently, when the idea of majesty and strength is to be conveyed to us
strongly, not only is the lion brought in, but the young lion; by which is meant
the lion in the prime of his strength, in the freshness of his youthful
vigour—not the old lion who has seen many fights, passed through many years, and
is beginning to grow decrepit. But the young lion leaps and springs with all the
agility of youth, and tears and rends his prey with all the fervour of
new-discovered strength. Now the Lord God, on behalf of His people, is not only
the lion—strong—but the young lion for ever strong—the young lion full of
strength, in the freshness of his vigour—the young lion delighting to use his
strength, in whom there is no failing, from whom his strength has in no measure
departed.

How I like to think of this! We are very apt to think that in the days of the
patriarchs faith in God could do wonders, and in the days of David it might slay
giants, but now—now we have fallen upon degenerate times, and as the fable is
that men were once greater in stature than they are now, and we are dwarfs
compared with our sires, so it is thought that the power of faith is much weaker
now and its accomplishments must necessarily deteriorate, and hence it looks as
if the security of God's people was not as great as it used to be. He could
deliver then; will He deliver now? He could spread a table in the wilderness
then, and He could divide a Red Sea to swallow up His people's enemies; but now
can we expect anything of the sort? Have not we come, as it were, to the end of
the feast when the great Master bringeth forth that which is worse, having
already set forth the best wine? Beloved, it is not so. It is unrighteous of us
to think it is so. If there be any failure anywhere, if we be straitened in any
place, let us rest assured of this, that we are not straitened of God. If faith
doeth fewer wonders to-day than in the centuries gone by, it is because faith
herself is weaker; but if she could deal with God as Abraham dealt with Him, if
she could lean upon Him as David leant upon Him, she would find Him the same
God, able to do the same wonders, yes, and ready to do them and delighting to do
them on behalf of His people.

Grow old! Nay, never can this be said of our God. He is no older now than He was
myriads of ages ago. Time makes no difference to Him. The ages yet to come are
present with Him as are the ages past. He is for ever the same. It has been said
of the Lord Jesus Christ, "Thou hast the dew of Thy youth." He is still young.
Though he is described in one place in Scripture as having a head and hair like
wool, as white as snow to show that He is the Ancient of days, yet in another
place it is said of Him, "Thy locks are bushy and black as a raven's," to show
that He is still in all the strength and vigour which He ever possessed. Oh, let
us not think that God has changed. From this fountain there has been no
diminution; it brims as it did of old. Is it not said, "I am God! I change not.
Therefore ye sons of Jacob are not consumed "? Is He not "the Father of lights
with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning"? Beloved, it should be
our delight to think that our Protector is not only strong but as strong as ever
He was—not only the lion but the young lion for the defence of His people.

II.

Now, pass on to a very important part of the metaphor. The Lord on behalf of His
people is like as the lion, and the young lion, roaring on his prey. Now, there
is no condition in which the lion is more terrible. We know that any creature
when it is feeding becomes fierce, if we attempt to disturb it. Try to take a
bone out of a dog's mouth, and you will soon see that what strength it has will
expend its fury, for it is soon awakened then. But a lion, when it has slain its
prey, and begins to devour it, and the shepherds come to take the sheep away or
snatch the lamb from him, is all awake. If it be possible, he will certainly
defend himself, and that which he has gotten with so much trouble; for the whole
lion is there! He is all awake, aroused and furious for the war. And such is God
for the defence of His people. "He that toucheth you toucheth the apple of Mine
eye"; that is to say, to touch a saint is to touch God in His tenderest place.

Now, there are many things which provoke God. All sin does so; but this is a
peculiarly God-provoking sin at any time to touch His people—molest His
servants? He may bear long with you, but He remembers it. He may not for the
moment avenge them; but there is an answer to that question, "Shall not God
avenge His own elect? I tell you that He will avenge them speedily, though He
bear long with them." I like to think of this—this picture of God over His
people protecting them, being as fully awake and aroused as the young lion is
when he bestirs himself to protect the prey that the shepherds would take away
from him. It is the picture of intensity of purpose. He means to have the prey,
and it shall not be taken from him. All his strength shall be put forth to
prevent it. The same intensity of purpose we see in our God. He determined to
save His people before the Day-Star began to shine, and from that purpose He has
never turned. Sooner than turn aside from His purpose, He gave His Son to die.
sent His Spirit to indwell in the hearts of His people, and nothing shall turn
Him aside from that purpose now. Behold, how Satan comes out against Him! See
how the powers of darkness rise with all their force! See how they come forth to
take the prey from the mighty God, to deliver out of God's hand into a dire
destruction! But shall they conquer Him? Ah! no. For the whole of God is set for
the defence of His Church. It is not one attribute that is there; they are all
there. As I said of the young lion over his prey, he is all a lion; every nerve
and muscle and bone of his body seems to burn with indignation against his foes,
so every attribute of God—all His power, His wisdom, His justice, His
holiness—all these are intensely aroused and all set with intense purpose for
the defence and the deliverance of His people.

How safe, then, are those that trust in God! You have not only God to defend
you, but that same God most fixed and settled as to His mind's eternal will—that
God concentrating all His majestic attributes upon this one point, that He will
save His people. He would sooner that the world should crash and the solid wheel
of nature should be snapped than that this which is His innermost decree, the
secret purpose of His inmost soul, should fail—even the salvation of His people.
O, my Lord, if I have ever doubted Thee, let this figure chase the doubts from
my mind. Hast Thou brought me into the bond of the covenant and sprinkled me
with the blood of Thy dear Son, and shall I not depend upon Thee? And now that I
see that Thou hast bestirred Thyself and shown Thyself strong on behalf of Thy
people, aroused Thy whole nature to the fulness of its majestic potency for the
deliverance and salvation of Thy redeemed, shall not my spirit be quiet and
still and calm? "The Lord of Hosts is with us: the God of Jacob is our refuge."
"If God be for us, who can be against us? "

Still, let us pursue the figure. This lion is represented as being surrounded by
a multitude of shepherds who have been called forth against him. The cry has
gone amongst the shepherds, "A lion! A lion has seized a lamb! Come forth, ye
shepherds! Take the prey out of the monster's fangs!" You see them come—some
timidly, advancing slowly, some more bravely, each one with his crook in his
hand or such instruments as they can gather. They find out the thicket where the
young lion is feeding himself, and they come as near as they can and create a
great din and make a noise that they may frighten him. But observe how it is
put." "He will not be afraid of their voice." He listens, looks around, sees who
it is, lifts himself up, and, perceiving that they are nothing but a company of
feeble men, he just lies down on his prey again, and goes on with his repast.
"He will not be afraid of their voice." It seems to me to be a grand picture of
the sublime indifference of God to His adversaries. "Why do the heathen rage and
the people imagine a vain thing? The people set themselves and the rulers take
counsel together: 'Let us break his bands asunder and cast his cords from us. He
that sitteth in the heavens doth laugh. The Lord doth have them in derision.'"
He is not stirred by them. What a grand passage that is in the song of Miriam
where the enemy said, "I will pursue; I will overtake; I will divide the spoil;
My lust shall be satisfied upon them." Hear the rage of that boast, and what
follows? "Thou didst blow with Thy wind: the sea covered them. They sank as lead
in the mighty waters!" Oh, how placid it is! How calm is God! His enemies are in
a rage: they stir themselves like these many shepherds—all excited—and they come
against the lion, and make strange noises to alarm him. But there the mighty
monarch of the forest lies still, and turns his royal eyes upon them, and lets
them menace as they will.

III. So for the defence of His Church this day and every day, in past times and
in all times to come, the Lord of Hosts is not afraid of all His enemies,
neither doth He disturb Himself on account of His adversaries. You see sometimes
in history very grand commotions. It seemed as if the whole world were stirred
to put down the Gospel about the days of Luther, and the trembling children of
God were not a little afraid. But how very quietly the Lord went on! He only
enabled His servants to preach the Gospel, to translate the Scriptures, to teach
children the Psalms—simple, homely means, and yet by such means as these He
checked all the power of Rome and all the cunning of the College of the Jesuits.
And this day sometimes, as we look abroad, our hearts sink, and we say, "Alas
for God's Church! What will become of His truth in the land? Surely we shall see
back the days of the Martyrs!" and all that kind of thing. "In quietness shall
be thy strength." "Stand still and see the salvation of God." He in whom we
trust is not afraid. Oh, if it were possible to think of God, if our minds could
conceive Him! How He must scorn the machinations of men! They meet together in
their council chamber; they are devising a plan by which they shall establish
Antichrist as on a rock, and God looks and He sees the rock is nothing but sand,
and that the building itself is all honeycombed, and if a fox pass by it it
shall fall. And then they meet together and say, "There is no God," and in their
wisdom they concoct methods by which "the fools that believe in God" shall be
put to nought, and God's cause shall be stamped out like a spark beneath a man's
foot!

Oh, how contemptible it must seem to the Most High! What miserable worms that
they should come together and think that they can in any way affect His kingdom!
Let ten thousand drops of spray conspire to move a rock in mid-ocean from its
base! Let a company of ants unite to shake a continent and move it from the
place where God has planted it! Their schemes and devices would be infinitely
more rational than the attempts of men to stay the course of God.

When He makes bare His arm, What shall His cause withstand? When He His people's
cause defends, Who, then, who shall stay His hand?

He looks upon His adversaries with scorn and contempt. Brethren, stay yourselves
upon Him then. Be of good cheer, for the Lord is confident; and let your hearts
glory in the strength of Him who has espoused your cause. To complete our
interpretation of this, it is necessary to notice that He says, "He will not be
afraid of their voice, nor abase Himself for the noise of them." A cur at the
sight of so many shepherds come out armed would turn tail and hide himself; but
not so the lion. He does not abase himself; he does not crouch and whine, as
though he asked his life of them; neither doth he turn away and look into the
thicket to find a shelter where he may conceal himself, but he goes on quietly
with his work and bids them do their worst. God will not alter His purpose to
please the devil nor shape His plans because of the power that is brought to
bear to stop them. All that has ever been done in this world has not affected
the divine purpose—nay, not a solitary atom. Up to this moment He hath done as
He will amongst the armies of heaven and the inhabitants of this lower world.
The most violent antagonists of the divine dominion have still been subservient
to His supremacy. He has yoked the tempest that came forth against His Church.
He has yoked it, I say, to her calm, and He hath ridden upon the wings of the
wind and made the clouds His chariot. It shall always be so. The powers of evil
shall be servants to the dominion of the Most High. He will not abase Himself to
them.

Now ye, His children—children of the living God, children of the light and of
the sun, abase not yourselves; walk not in the midst of God's adversaries with
bowed head. Be ye like Mordecai, who scorned to bow to men. Know ye that ye
yourselves are of the seed royal, and a royal mien becomes you who are the
descendants of the King of kings. Tremble not when they tell you that science
has discovered the unsuitableness of revelation; fear not when they say that
some great one of the earth has disturbed the very keystone of the Christian
arch. Are ye fools and slow of heart to think this? Do ye yourselves degrade
your own pedigree by doubting your Father and distrusting the power of the
eternal King? Nay, rather go on in confidence, in strong reliance upon the
almighty God, and you shall find that He will surely defend His own, achieve His
purposes, and win His victory, and at the last it shall be seen that the Lord
reigneth, even the Lord God omnipotent reigneth.

Now, the second metaphor has in it solicitude. Somehow or other strength does
not seem to comfort us when it is alone. That God is strong for His people is a
very precious truth, but we are so tender and trembling that we want to see
united with the power some tender attribute, and therefore we have a tenderer
figure here. "As birds flying, so will the Lord of hosts defend Jerusalem." I
suppose this alludes to birds flying for the defence of their young, and if so
(and I think it is so) it means this: First, the bird when it has little ones in
its nest is never long from the nest. It flies away for food for the young, but
it never flew so fast before as it does then. Its little heart never forgets the
nest, and if necessity takes it away for a few minutes it is quickly back, and
long, weary hours will the little birds sit there over their young charges,
lending to the little ones the warmth of their very life. But when they do go
abroad they fly swiftly. Now, it is just so with God. If we could conceive it
necessary for Him to leave His people for a while to attend to other concerns,
yet His heart would be with them, and He would fly back to them. The bird is
thinking of the worm, but only thinking of the worm for its little ones, and as
soon as ever it has got it, it flies back again to the nest with eager wings. So
if you have to conceive of God that He has to think of the management of the
world and the arrangements of providence, yet He only thinks of those things for
the good of His people; His heart is still with His chosen and He comes back to
them. Only the figure falls very short, for the Lord never has to leave His
people.. He can think of all other things, and yet think of them as if there
were none others in the world but them. I have often revelled in that thought
that the Lord can think of one of His people as much as if there were no other
being in existence but that one individual. If you were the only being God had
made, how He would think of you and what care He would have over you! He has
just as much thought and just as much care for you as if you were the only one,
though He has no need to neglect anything because His mighty mind comprehends
all. Neither has He ever to leave His people. You know that precious word, "I,
the Lord, do keep it. I will watch it—keep it every moment lest any hurt it. I
will keep it night and day." The Lord is ever with His people. "I am ever with
you," is God's word to His children. "I will never leave thee nor forsake thee."
But the argument is drawn from the bird, who, if it leaves for a moment, comes
flying back. So the Lord's thoughts and cares are ever towards His children. But
the little birds fly very swiftly in case their young should be in danger. That,
perhaps, is more the point of the picture. If they discover by some cry from
their little ones that some robber is about to injure the nest, how quickly they
come back! Only let the sound reach their ears and back they are at once for the
defence of those they so dearly love. Now, the Lord comes quickly for the
defence of His people. You remember that delightful psalm where David says that
he was sunken in many waters and he cried unto the Lord; the Lord came, and
David says, "He did ride upon a cherub and did fly! Yea, He rode upon the wings
of the wind." It was the fastest that could be found, and therefore God used it.
He sometimes appears to us to tarry, but He never does. He is always swift for
the defence of His children. We cry, "Make no tarrying, O our God," and when we
come to see the story in its true light, we shall find that He did make no
tarrying, but came quickly, yea, came at once to defend His children.

IV.

Birds, too, not only fly to come to succour their little ones, but they fight on
the wing and fight very bravely too. I was reading the other day a story of a
man who went to an eagle's nest to take its young. The young birds began to cry
as soon as he touched them, and he was at once assailed by the mother bird. It
darted at his eyes and head, and he almost lost his life. In fact, though he
escaped, he was a long time laid up in consequence of the serious wounds he
received. He managed to use his gun and kill the bird, otherwise his own life
would certainly have been taken. And it is not so only with eagles. Naturalists
tell us that the smallest birds will seem to gather unusual courage and
marvellous strength for the defence of their little ones. Birds that would
ordinarily fly at the approach, the mere sound of human footsteps, have been
known to attack and defend until their little ones have been able to escape.
Now, God will thus fight for His people: He will not suffer anyone to harm us.
He will defend us against Satan; He will guard us against persecutors; He will
avenge us against slanderers; He will put forth all His strength in order that
His children may be secured. Think of the little birds m the nest; there is the
mother bird flying round and round the nest, watching to see if there is an
enemy near, and if an enemy comes then that same bird is flying at the foe right
and left. Even so God is watching over His people lest any should hurt them; and
when a foe comes near them, then He flies on wings of love and darts at them,
showing Himself strong for the defence of His own people. As birds fly, so will
the Lord defend Jerusalem. These birds, whether big or little, however, expose
themselves to danger sooner than their young should be injured. They seem ready
to throw away their life for them, to preserve the lives of their offspring. And
God, though He cannot expose Himself to danger, yet, yet—I must say so—He makes
a sacrifice of Himself for His people. Did He not do so in the person of the
only begotten? Did He not come and lay down His life for His people that they
might be preserved? As the bird flies into the danger to save its young, so doth
Jesus fly into the jaws of death that He might save His people. And birds use
many arts for the defence of their young. Some will feign to be wounded. You
have, perhaps, walked in the morning and seen a lapwing appear to be wounded,
and you have thought, "I can catch that bird.." You have followed it, and it
seemed to fall right in your path where you might easily take it. It was not
hurt at all; it was only decoying you away from the nest of its young. Many such
arts have they. Love makes them wise for the defence of their little ones. And
the Lord has infinite plans of wisdom, deep designs of providence, marvellous
touches of supreme love and wisdom by which He will surely deliver His people
out of the snare of the fowler and bring them safely to their desired rest. Oh,
let us feel quite safe. Little birds are safe enough with their mother. To the
best of her power will she protect them. And we are safe enough with our God.
Let us not fear and tremble: quietly and patiently wait—always wholly, fully,
believing in Him.

Now notice the last two sentences of our text, for they are very well worthy of
our observation. "Defending also, He will deliver it, and, passing over, He will
preserve it." Now it is a precious thought that "defending also, He will deliver
it." There is a defence sometimes which does not end in deliverance. Valiant
warriors have defended cities, but after all have fallen a prey to the
besiegers; but God will defend His Church and He will defend it till He has
delivered it from the last attack. God will defend His people, and He will hold
His shield over them till no more swords shall be forged against them, and no
more arrows shall fly to their hurt. God does not begin and stop short.

The work that wisdom undertakes Eternal mercy ne'er forsakes.

"Defending also, He will deliver it." And then that last sentence, "passing
over, He will preserve it." Why, it takes me back to the days of Egypt; for God
preserved His people there by passing over. It was the passover that preserved
Israel. Forth into the black night went the angel of vengeance with his
unsheathed sword, but the blood-mark was on the lintel and on the two side-posts
of the house of Israel; and the angel sped past quietly and disturbed not the
household. Into every house untouched with blood he entered and left the slain
as a mark of his having been there. But Israel was preserved. Glory be to God,
in that last day when the destroying angel shall come abroad, passing over, He
will preserve His people. They shall not be hurt—nay, not a hair of their
heads.. The earth shall reel; the stars shall fall like withered fig-leaves from
the bough; all nature at the sight of the great Judge shall prepare to flee
away; but in that moment the people of God shall be secure in the bosom of
Jehovah; they shall enter into the chamber and shall shut to the door till the
tempest is overpast. "Passing over, He will deliver them." And until then, that
great and last passover, it shall always be so. Nothing shall hurt us. God will
protect us. Oh, come and cower down beneath the eternal wings. As I have seen at
night-fall all the little chicks gather together at the mother's cluck and
there, under the feathers, hide their little heads and rest; oh, come ye
children, ye people of God, come and shelter beneath the bosom of your Lord. Is
it not written, "He shall cover thee with His feathers and under His wings shalt
thou trust. His truth shall be thy shield and buckler." Come, then, and cower
down there for the night. And what day shall tempt you to come out? Nay, stay
there till the day break and the shadows flee away. Rest ever there till the
last night's dew has fallen and the last kite, the last hawk, has been seen in
the sky, and disappeared for ever. Stay there and trust ye in the Lord for ever,
for in the Lord Jehovah there is everlasting strength.

I sorrow deeply that any of you now present should be unable to trust in the
Lord; but I pray you may. It is a blessed life, the life of simple faith in God.
The way to God is through Christ's wounds. There is one door to heaven and that
is in the side of Christ. Go and rest in the atoning sacrifice and then trust in
the ever-blessed Father of your spirits and be not afraid, but rather go forth
and sing, "The Lord is my strength and my song! He also is become my salvation!"
And let this spirit be upon you evermore. Amen.


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  CHAPTER 7: 06. SALVATION AT THE CROSS
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VI. Salvation at the Cross And the land shall mourn, every family apart; the
family of the house of David apart, and their wives apart; the family of the
house of Nathan apart, and their wives apart; the family of the house of Levi
apart, and their wives apart; the family of Shimei apart, and their wives apart;
all the families that remain, every family apart, and their wives
apart.—(Zechariah 12:12-14.)

According to prophecy, we expect in the latter days the conversion of the Jews
to Christianity and their restoration to their own land, but it will not be
brought about in any manner otherwise than the way by which the conversion of
others is brought about: it will be by a visitation of the Spirit of God. He
will come to them, and He will be poured out upon them, according to the words
of this prophecy: "I will pour upon the house of David and upon the inhabitants
of Jerusalem the spirit of grace and of supplication." As the result of this
visitation of the Spirit they will turn their eyes to Christ, whom they once
rejected and crucified; they will come to believe in Him, and that faith will
produce the same result in them as it has done in others: it will lead them to
mourn—to mourn for their sin—not with the desperate remorse which sees no mercy,
but with that sweet evangelical penitence which is a mourning for Christ and a
mourning in connection with Christ—a mourning which will soon turn into joy and
melt into intense delight and peace.

Now, I am not going to speak any more upon that matter. We shall labour and pray
for the conversion of the Jews, and hope that this will be the result. But
to-night we are going to talk to ourselves, to the present congregation here.
And we shall begin by remarking that all true grace in the soul always comes
through the agency of the Holy Spirit. There is no conversion that is worth
having which is not wrought by Him. Not the eloquence of the preacher, nor the
cogency of his reasoning will ever melt a soul so as to create it anew. God must
work, and God alone can work so as to re-create a soul. Beloved, we have no hope
for this congregation, no hope in your prayers, no hope in the Gospel itself,
apart from Him who alone can apply it to the hearts and consciences of men and
make it the power of God unto salvation to them. And the next remark is that
wherever true grace comes it always leads the soul to Christ. If ever the Lord
gives a man the eye of faith, that eye of faith looks to Him who was pierced.
Any faith that rests short of the Cross is a faith that will land you short of
Heaven. Unless the atoning sacrifice be perceived and rested in, unless, like
the Jew of old, you come and lay your hand upon that sacrifice and accept it as
yours, you may have a faith that believes the Bible and a great deal about God,
and even have a faith which gives you a presumptuous confidence, but you have
not the faith of God's elect. Brother, is Christ all in all to you? Sinner, do
you look to Christ wholly and alone for your cleansing from sin? If not, may the
Spirit of God come upon you and give you to look away from all else to the
Saviour lifted upon Calvary, for, until you do, there is no hope for your soul.
And then, next, the context of the verses we have chosen leads us to say that
every true and genuine look of faith to Christ is attended with more grief on
account of sin. I am more and more afraid of that dry-eyed faith which I hear
preached so continually. I have been alarmed when I have heard repentance spoken
so lightly of by some. It is a mere change of mind, they say, and they quote the
Greek word for it. Believe me, it is a change of mind, but it is no superficial
change of mind. It is not such a change of mind as some suppose it to be. If you
have never wept for sin, I weep for you; and if you have a faith in Christ that
never made you regret your transgressions and loathe yourself in God's sight
because you committed them, then your faith is but a dream; you have never
looked on Him whom you pierced, or else you would mourn and be in bitterness as
one that is in bitterness for his firstborn. Why, beloved, repentance for sin is
not a thing that takes place just during the period of conviction; repentance is
a perpetual grief; and the more advanced a Christian is, the more he repents of
sin, and the more he laments that he should ever have fallen into it, and that
he may fall into it again. If there be no tears in Heaven, and I suppose there
will be none, yet, if I might make an exception, I would almost ask to be
permitted to shed the sweet tear of penitence even there. Oh, beloved, it
becomes such a blessed sweet bitterness to mourn for sin, that I would say with
our poet—

Lord, let me weep for nought but sin, And after none but Thee, And then I would,
oh, that I might A constant weeper be.

Yes, true faith has a tear in her eye. The faith of God's elect sees Christ
through the drops of penitence, and it is a blessed sight to look on Him who
bleeds while our heart bleeds for Him.

Now, to none of these things am I about to call your special attention, but to
one point only—it was needful to mention all these to come to it, viz., that in
true sorrow for sin, that true sorrow which accompanies faith, there always will
be a degree of separateness, a great degree of personality and individuality,
and, consequently, of loneliness—every family apart and their wives apart; and
my special prayer to-night is that God would give to this congregation that kind
of mourning for sin which would come to families apart and to individuals apart.

I.

First, to families apart—let us speak about that. He begins with the family of
the house of David apart. That was the royal family. In the day when grace
visits households, it brings the same mourning into every house. A king must
weep for sin as well as a peasant. The man after God's own heart and his family
must be bowed down with the same grief for transgression as the poorest in all
the tents of Judah. So, brethren, there are families here in this country that
are royal, and I would God there were royal mourning, for there has been royal
sin. God send it! And there are noble and princely houses in this land. It would
be the best news that should ever be heard if amongst them there should come a
mourning for sin, for in the high places of this land sin hath still her
stronghold, and may God grant that repentance may come there. We have not any
such here to-night, and therefore it is little needful to speak of it; but I
will liken those households amongst you that are rich and influential to the
house of David. There are special sins that belong to rich families, and I would
that rich families would come together and confess apart their special sins.
There are sins of luxury, sins of worldliness, sins that come from following the
fashions of the world. There are sins that spring up out of the prosperity with
which God surrounds us, sins that arise from a lack of carrying out our
stewardship when God's cause has not been remembered in fair proportion, when
the poor have not been succoured, when the sick have not been tended. Let me put
it to every family here that God has prospered—have not you sins to remember
before the Lord? It would be a blessed sign of grace if the father and mother
should call the household together and say, "Let us apart acknowledge our
transgression and cry unto the Lord that in His pity He would save us." For
there are some of you that have not all your children saved yet. You have not
your servants converted yet. Let the family of the house of David be apart.
There is no need that it should begin to make confession about the sins of the
poor and about the turbulence of the many. Leave that alone, and confess your
own. House of David, confess your own sin; keep to that, and be humbled for it
before the Lord.

Then came the house of Nathan, and that had to be apart. I suppose it is Nathan
the prophet. And in the prophet's house there must be confession of sin, for the
prophet is not sinless, neither the prophet's family. Alas! how often have the
ministers of God been the parents of godless children, and what the father has
built up on the Sabbath his sons have pulled down in the week.. The name of Eli
startles some of us. It had been better for us that some of our children should
perish at the birth than act as Eli's sons did at the tabernacle door; yet it
may be so if in the prophet's house there be not the confession of sin and
prayer apart. Let the minister call together; as the Lord speaks by him to the
people, let him take care that he speaks to the people also through his
management of his own house, for if we rule not in our own house, how shall we
rule well in the house of God? And if we have no concern for the salvation of
our own children, how shall we be as nursing fathers in the house of God? It
would be a happy sign for England if to-morrow all its ministers had this
mourning apart in the midst of our families, and I would to God it might be so.

But, then, the text goes on to speak of the house of Levi; and I hope I do not
strain metaphors when I say that this may refer spiritually to all the families
of Christian people, for we have no priesthood now except the general priesthood
of all the people of God. Christ hath made us priests and kings. So, then, I
say, let every Christian man at the head of a family call his children and his
servants together, and let there be prayer and supplication apart.

Now, I come home to many of you. You are working as Sunday school teachers, you
are working as evangelists, you are going from house to house as tract
distributors. Beloved brethren and sisters, never let even the tongue of scandal
be able to say of you that you cared for other households, but not for your own,
I remember well a man—his ease was a warning to me, and I hold it up as such to
you. He was always ready to attend the open-air preacher and pitch the tunes; he
was always glad to walk into the country when the lay preacher went to a cottage
meeting. There was scarcely a prayer-meeting at which he was not present. He was
a man with a large family in poor circumstances. He ought often to have been at
work with his boots and shoes when he was attending a prayer-meeting, and he
ought of oftener to have been praying with his boys at home than to have been
out helping others to do good in the street; for I saw his boys grow up one by
one. I knew and I often had told him of it, that, as children, they frequented
the public-house, as lads they were found in the theatre. He seemed everything
that was devout and earnest, and I believe he was so, and about everybody's
children he was careful except his own, and for the conversion of everybody else
he prayed except for the conversion of his own children. To them he never
spake—they said he never did; with them certainly he never prayed; and he was
constantly out, so that, whatever good example he did give them, they could not
see. And his sons grew up and died, one or two of them, in my presence through
drunkenness ere they had completed the age of manhood—through drunkenness and
vice—and none could say to that father a word of consolation, because he had
kept the vineyard of others but his own vineyard he had not kept. It is right
that you should take a class in the Sunday school, but not if your own children
are neglected. It is right that you should go out and work for others, but not
if your own household is uncared for. Therefore, I say to every Christian, call
your children and your household together, and make a solemn approach unto the
Most High with this prayer, "O God, save this household, for Thy mercy's sake."

II. The prophet then mentions the house of Shimei, and as we know nothing about
Shimei, though many have guessed a great deal, it may be sufficient to say, let
his household stand for everybody. As Levi's may stand for the Christian, let
Shimei's stand for those who make no profession. And there I could wish that
where as yet there has been no family altar set up, where as yet there has been
no profession of the faith of Christ, I could wish that the Spirit of God would
move the parents of the household this very night to call the house together and
to say, "Let us pray! "It were a good beginning if someone who stepped in here
to-night, not accustomed to the house of prayer on the Sabbath, should say,
"There is good sense in that! I am a father of a family, and where is my family
going? I fear going down to hell! Where am I going myself? Certainly not to
Heaven. This very night I will say to my wife, 'Wife, let us pray together; let
us pray for the children.' I am afraid it will be poor praying, but everything
must have a beginning." Oh, sir, what hope I should have of you if you had once
got that length! I should trust that the Lord would never let you go back again,
but that, having begun to pray, you would continue to pray till you had found
peace and pardon. Why, there are some who might say, "This house of mine has
been a drunkard's house. Forgive the sin! This house has heard the sound of
profanity; the oath has denied this house. God forgive us! This house has been a
Sabbath-breaker's house. This house has been the house of dishonesty. This house
has been the house of quarrelling, of wrath, of envying and strife and
bitterness! Lord, forgive us!" Oh that it might be said this night, "Salvation
has come unto this house," if God should see here and there and in this city
gatherings of families who have shut the doors and drawn down the blinds, and,
now apart, are turning unto the living God! Thou blessed Spirit, grant it may be
so, and Thou shalt have all the praise. But now I must pass on, because the main
point is the individuals apart. "The house of Levi apart and their wives apart."
Wherever there is real repentance for sin there will be secret prayer, secret
confession, secret crying unto God. I shall speak about that now. No man is
really impressed with a sense of true religion till he does begin to feel that
he must get apart. I have seen the huntsman with his gun intending to take a
stag. He has got a herd before him; he is riding through. They know him, and are
not much alarmed; but his object as he rides by them is to single out one. He
must get that one apart and alone if he means to have it for himself; he must
separate it. I often feel when I am preaching as if I were riding among a great
herd of deer, and I want to single out one. I cannot tell him; I do not know
him, but oh, the Lord does, and I have known many a time the man has been
singled out and the gun of the Gospel has gone off and he has fallen. The Lord
has saved that man and brought him down. It is a sure mark that God is at work
when the man gets separate, when he feels himself to be alone. If you hear in a
great crowd, no good will come of it, and when you come and pray with a number
of persons and feel as if you were only a part of the company and not yourself
praying, no good ever comes of that. National religion! Well, what is the
national religion of England worth? If it were sold for a button with the shank
off wouldn't it fetch a dearer price than it is worth? There is nothing in it:
it is merely a name. You may call it "a Christian country" or anything else you
like with almost as great truth. Personal religion is the only religion that is
of any value, and until you get a man to feel, "I must have that thing for
myself! I must be born again! I must have a new heart! I must have a right
spirit! I must be washed in the precious blood of Christ! I must escape from the
wrath to come!''—until he has got there there is nothing good in his soul. But
the getting apart is one of the earlier signs of a work of grace. For, my dear
hearer, have you not personal sins which you would not like to tell to anyone,
but which must be confessed to God apart. I am sure if anybody here could tell
to me or to any other living man all his actions he must be as shame-faced as
well could be. While the soul has any modesty left, confession to a priest is
impossible. It is only when it has a brazen forehead and is utterly shameless
than it can empty out itself before its fellow man. I question if it is ever
done even then, but before the Lord we lay bare our head. O God, thou knowest
the sins of my youth. Thou knowest the transgressions which my father knew not
of. Thou knowest where my heart has gone, and where my feet have gone, and what
my hands have done, and what all the members of this flesh of mine have done.
Thou knowest it all. And I say, dear friends, it is only apart that a man can
tell what he really feels.

If anybody was listening, you could not say to the Lord, "Lord, thou knowest how
I feel! I would come to Thee, but I cannot. I would melt before Thee, but my
soul seems as if it were made of steel that had been hardened in the vaults of
hell! My God, I would repent, but my heart is like a rock: only Thou canst smite
it and make the streams of penitence gush forth. I want to come to Thee but
Satan holds me back; or perhaps it is myself, worse than Satan, and I am
accusing Satan when I ought to blame myself." But alone we can tell to the Lord
our fears, our doubts, our difficulties, the hardness that we feel within. We
could not do it if we detected somebody else's ear at the keyhole; we should
have to stop at once. Therefore, to offer acceptable mourning before the Lord,
the soul must get apart.

III. And then, beloved, we should never forget that in our coming before the
Lord what we want is personal pardon and personal cleansing. That is a good hymn
we have in our book which ends every verse with "even me, even me.' My God, my
Father, if Thou wert to forgive all Thine erring children and not me, of what
avail were that to me? If peace and pardon were scattered amongst all the
thousands of this congregation, if I were left out, it would but make my case
the darker. To see the gleams of Thy love shining yonder and sit myself in outer
darkness—oh, that were to make my case worse than before! Beloved hearer, you
have personal sin; you want personal pardon. You have gone personally away from
your Father, and you must, like the prodigal, go personally back; you must have
His arms about your neck and have His kiss upon your lips and hear Him say, "I
have blotted out thy sin." Nothing short of this will ever give peace to your
spirit. Do you not feel it so? Well, then, get apart, and as if there were not
another sinner in the world go and confess your sin; as if there was no other
sinner that ever wanted a Saviour, go to the Cross and take the whole Saviour to
yourself; and as if no other soul ever wanted the work of the Holy Spirit to
work upon it, go to the Holy Ghost and commit yourself to Him and say, "Renew
and sanctify me! Purify me, O blessed Spirit, by Thine infinite power." May God
send us very much of the confession and the resulting comfort which alone can
bring peace to the soul.

I think I hear somebody say, "I understand that if I am to find peace and pardon
as a sinner I must go alone and cry to God for it apart: when shall I do it? To
you I reply, "Now." I would not like to take the risk of saying, "Wait half an
hour," for within that time the iron gate may have closed upon you. The only
time I am ever bidden to speak of is "to-day." "To-day, if ye will hear His
voice, harden not your hearts." You tell me that time does not suit you; you do
not know when you could get apart and alone. If there be no other hour, the dead
of night will serve your turn; God is awake. Rise before the break of day, if
your labour calls you early away; rise betimes, spurn the soft couch, and cry to
God in prayer. Man! if thou shouldst break any engagement, whatever it might be,
it were worth while to do it to find mercy. But to-morrow is a holiday. A great
many of you working people will have nothing to do to-morrow and are going to
spend it in merriment, and I shall not condemn you for that; but if you have not
found a Saviour, don't say to me, "I have no time for prayer." It were a blessed
thing if you spent all Whit Monday in prayer, so long as you did but find
Christ. Go to your chamber and say, "We will not leave this place till Christ
reveals Himself to us! He has promised to be the Saviour of all that trust Him,
and we will go and trust Him, and from His Cross we will never stir until the
blood-drops fall upon our guilty souls, and we can rise and say we are
forgiven." Oh, it were a blessed Pentecostal Monday if the Lord moved many to
pray apart—pray right on till they found a Saviour. I knew one who once came to
London and who was living in the country, irreligiously without thoughts of God.
He came to London and heard a Gospel sermon. He was a gentleman who liked to
hunt, and when he came home, one of his companions said, "Well, what's the best
news you've heard in London?" "I have heard," said he, "that Jesus Christ came
into the world to save sinners." The other said, "I think you've gone out of
your mind!" It was a blessed going out of his mind. I could point him out to
you. The Lord has kept him out of his mind ever since. He is here to-night. He
has a very different sort of mind. He is now rejoicing and delighting to serve
God, and a happier man there is not in this place than he, I believe. May God
bring many to find true happiness and give up sham happiness, which the world
tries to tempt us with. "Well, but," says somebody, "where's the place I could
get to be alone?" Place? Anywhere. In your chamber where you rest. Any little
place where you can shut yourselves in. Why, the very streets of London may
serve you for loneliness; for sometimes one can walk along them and be as much
alone as in the Desert of Arabia. Many a soul has found Christ in a hay-loft. I
know one who found him in a saw-pit. He, having no other place to get to, went
there. Behind the hedge, on the house-roof—anywhere where you can without
disturbance tell out your soul to God. Anywhere. God does not care where it is.
Sacred places this day there are none, save that all places are sacred where
loving hearts look after their Lord. "But, oh," says one, "suppose the time and
place are ready, in what manner shall I come? Could you lend me a book to pray
with?" No, not I! Let the books to pray with be burned. A blessed day when every
one of them was done with! Perhaps we might have a little real prayer if the
books of prayer were all destroyed. Go to God and tell what is in your heart.
Never mind the words. Any words will do if they spring from your soul. "But I
have not any words," say you. Never mind words: go and weep before the Lord.
Groan before Him and cry. Let your heart speak, and if it be language that no
ear can understand, God knows heart-language. He is a Spirit, and He knows the
language of spirits, and He will read the desire of your soul. There is no
standing upon etiquette and fine manners and goodly periods and choice
sentences. Say, "God, be merciful to me, a sinner! Save me, Lord, for Jesus'
sake," and there will be more prayer in it than in all the collects and all the
prayers that the most learned divines were ever able to compose. The fact of the
case is this: you will soon have to die apart. At that bedside there will stand
kind friends who must bid you adieu. They will have come with you up to the
brink of Jordan, but through the cool, chill stream they cannot go. Your
solitary spirit must go on its lonely way through the gate of iron. Oh, as you
must live alone and die alone, may His Spirit help you! And the time is coming
when you will have to be judged alone, for, though amidst the countless throng,
you will have to stand before the judgment seat yet, to all intents and
purposes, each man will have a separate judgment. Upon each man the eye of fire
will rest; for each man shall the books be opened, and upon each man will the
sentence come, "Depart, accursed." As you will sink alone into the pit that is
bottomless, and burn alone in yon Tophet, where the fire never shall be
quenched, I pray thee—and God speaks through me to some of you to-night—I pray
you turn and live; and may His Spirit turn you—even His infinite and omnipotent
Spirit—that you may seek the lonely place and with the lonely cry of a broken
heart cry, "Lord, save me! I believe in Jesus! Save me for the sake of Thy dear
Son! Save me, and I will give Thee praise."

Some will say, "Well, you teach these people to be selfish—each one looking to
himself." Yes, but no man can be unselfish till first of all his soul is saved.
A man that is drowning—I need not talk to him about unselfishness. Fling him a
rope, and when he can seize it and drag himself out of the waters, then he can
help others, but not till then.

"But," saith one, "you may drive these people to be melancholy." Would God I
could, if it led them to abiding and perpetual peace! A man without God ought to
be melancholy. Damocles, when he sits at table to feast, with a sword hanging by
a single hair, ought to be unhappy. He must either be unhappy or mad! But when
the sword is taken away, when repentance hath cried to God, and mercy hath
forgiven sin—then will be the time to have peace and joy; not till then. God
make you miserable until you have found a Saviour. Then you shall know a joy and
a peace which only Heaven can equal. God grant you to know it to-night! May you
not give sleep to your eyes nor slumber to your eyelids till you have nestled in
your Saviour's bosom where the spear-print is still fresh—memorial of His dying
love. Come, nestle there, and trust Him, and you shall be saved.

God bless you, for Christ's sake. Amen.


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  CHAPTER 8: 07. GIVING GOD HIS DUE
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VII. Giving God His Due I will offer to Thee the sacrifice of thanksgiving, and
will call upon the name of the Lord.—(Psalms 116:17.)

Brethren, this ought to be the result of every Christian's experience of divine
grace. "O Lord, truly I am Thy servant and the son of Thine handmaid; Thou hast
loosed my bonds; I will offer to Thee the sacrifice of thanksgiving." Being
delivered from spiritual bondage, and made servants of the living God, we must
and will praise the Lord as long as we have any being. Thanksgiving should
always run parallel with prayer in connection with the Church of God. What is
true of the individual is true of individuals collected as a corporate body.
There is not a true Church of God on earth, but what has abundant cause to say,
"I will offer the sacrifice of thanksgiving"; and we make a great mistake if,
when we hold our days of prayer and cry unto God, we do not at the same time
make them days of praise, and bless His holy name for what we have received.
David seems to me in this verse to stand out in contrast with many, for there
are some who will say, "I will continue to pray. "Yes," says David, "but I will
offer the sacrifice of thanksgiving." Others will say, "We will meet together
and sorrow over the sad estate of Zion; we will speak with one another about the
'defections of the faithful, the lack of piety, godliness, the superficiality of
piety, the heresy of much of the doctrine that is preached, and the worldliness
of much of the living that is lived." "Yes," David would say, "and I will come
with you, too, and make confession and humble myself before God, but I will also
offer the sacrifice of thanksgiving."

There is a tendency in the Church of God to play very much upon the discordant
strings of the heart rather than those which still remain in tune. David would
not forget how much there is that is out of joint. He would be among the first
to humble himself before the Lord, among the first to join with Jeremiah and
say, "Oh, that my head were waters, and mine eyes a fountain of tears, that I
might weep day and night for the slain of the daughter of my people"; but still
he resolves upon it, he declares it against all comers—"I will offer to Thee the
sacrifice of thanksgiving,"

Now, I want you, dear brethren, if at any time you have been inclined to deal
out the word of discouragement, or even the more bitter word of censure, all
round, upon this Church and that Church and the other, and upon this people of
God and the other people of God—instead of that, to come to the resolution of
the Psalmist which now lies before us and say, "With all the Church's faults and
with all our own, with all that there is to deplore and all that there is to
confess, yet from this we will not start aside: we will offer the sacrifice of
thanksgiving."

I make that my resolve to-night; and I do it for four reasons. First, because I
believe it is due to God; secondly, because I believe it is good for myself;
thirdly, because I believe it is encouraging to my fellow-workers; and fourthly,
because I think it is one of the helps towards the accomplishment of the purpose
we are aiming at.

I.

First, then, dear friends, I will offer the sacrifice of thanksgiving because it
is due to God, Whatever happens, let not God be robbed of His praise. Suppose it
be true that the ministers are not faithful. Shall not God have glory? Suppose
it be true that many of the members of Christian Churches are not what they
profess to be. Shall we leave off glorifying God because of that? Why, if He is
robbed of His glory by ministers or people, the more reason why those who do
love Him should sedulously cultivate His praise and earnestly offer to Him the
sacrifice of thanksgiving, for, notwithstanding all the gloomy views that may be
taken of religion in the world, we have this to recollect—we ought to praise God
that there ever was a Gospel at all. He might have left the world not only in
heathenism, but under the ban of everlasting perdition; He might have left us
without a Gospel to preach, without a way of escape from His wrath, with nothing
before us, as the sons of sinful Adam, but to go back "to the vile dust from
whence we sprang," and then to descend with the serpent into the place where he
bears the wrath of God for ever. I will rejoice and bless God while I have any
being that there is a Gospel, that there is an incarnate God, that there is an
atoning sacrifice, that there is an ever-living Saviour. If I have nothing else
to rejoice in, I will bless Him that ever these words were possible: "Jesus
Christ came into the world to save sinners," and that ever it could be within
the compass of fact that such a thing should be true, that we should be here to
hear it, and that our lips should be privileged to speak it. I will offer to Him
the sacrifice of thanksgiving. And I will thank Him that, notwithstanding all
the sins and infirmities of His Church, God has borne with us. Christ has not
sued out our divorce yet. We sometimes speak against the Church, and very well
we may, including ourselves in it. There are many faults and many failings, but
for all that the Church of God on earth is Christ's bride, and if He can put up
with her, I think we ought to do so too. If He still loves her, if still, for
all her faults, it is through her that His spiritual children are born into the
world; if He saith He hateth putting away, it is not for us to put her away,
and, as some do, talk about independent action altogether from the Church being
that which God is most likely to bless. I think that is most likely to bring
spurious results. But that which is done in connection with the visible Church
in due order, and after the Lord's manner, honours the Church, and God would
have the spouse of Christ honoured as well as Christ the King.

Beloved, I thank God, and I will, as long as I live, that He bears with His
Church. The Spirit of God has not gone from her. Still there are the living in
Zion; still her prayers go up; still her praises are received. There is a Church
of God in the world. Yes, blessed be His name for that! And I thank God,
beloved, that the Gospel is preserved among us. I believe that in many pulpits
it is perverted, philosophised upon, till the very soul of it has gone. We know
that in some of the Churches ritualism on the one side has stamped out the
Gospel, and rationalism, on the other, has all but buried it; but for all that,
the Gospel was never more truly preached than it is now. If anybody wants to
hear the Gospel they can hear it in this land, and hear it distinctly and
plainly, too; for many run to and fro, and the knowledge of God is increased in
the land. And I will offer to God the sacrifice of thanksgiving for this. And I
will thank Him that, notwithstanding all the dullness of the times, there is
probably more Gospel abroad in the world than ever there was. Why, in the days
of the apostles, there was not one Bible probably in the world to tens of
thousands that are existing at this present moment. The invention of printing
was a great blessing to the Church. You know that in our own English history it
would have taken a man almost a year's labour to have bought a Bible, and now
one can have it almost as a gift; and there is scarcely a language under heaven
but what the Bible is translated into, and the copies fall as thick as leaves in
Vallambrosa all over the lands. Oh, blessed be God, I will offer the sacrifice
of thanksgiving whatever anybody else may do. And I thank Him, too, that we have
got over the dark times of the Church. Oh, brethren, if once we were to come
under a tyrant's power again, and it was death to believe in Jesus, and
imprisonment to speak a word in Christ's name, we should begin to sigh and cry
for these times; but to-night I am not standing by a burn in Scotland between
the hills in some dark glen reading my Bible by a lightning flash, or talking to
armed Covenanters who are ready to guard their lives with swords. We are in the
land where whoever wills to talk of Jesus may do it. There is none to hinder us;
none to make us afraid. "I will offer the sacrifice of thanksgiving, and will
call upon the name of the Lord."

And, more than this, we have seen in this Church, and our brethren in their
measure have seen in other Churches, that the Lord is still at work. The Gospel
preached to-day saves souls as it did in days gone by. What if we do not see
three thousand impressed by one sermon, yet he who speaks to you now can count
those converted under his ministry not by thousands only, but by tens of
thousands; for to my own personal knowledge, either by conversing with them or
by letters from them, many more than could be compassed in twenty thousand have
I known to have been brought to Jesus Christ. And I know that under our own
college, the men trained in our own Churches have been privileged to bring into
the Church of God many more than ten thousand more souls whom God has blessed
them with. The kingdom does grow. It is not as we like, but still, God be
thanked that it grows at all. It might have gone back. "I will offer the
sacrifice of thanksgiving and call upon the name of the Lord."

And, once more, we will do this because He is ready to do a great deal more. God
is ready to convert millions instead of thousands, and He has given us a promise
of this that we so much delight to sing—

And a new song is in my mouth, To long-loved music set;

Glory to Thee for all the grace I have not tasted yet.

Glory be to God for what He is going to do! Clap your hands, oh, saints of the
living God, for He is about to win the nations unto Jesus. Ethiopia and the land
of Sinde and the dwellers in Arabian deserts—they shall come and bow before the
Lord. The joy of the latter days shall be so great that we may well anticipate
that joy and begin to rejoice in it now. As the husbandman rejoices in an
expected harvest, so let us lift up the shout of joy because the harvest is
certain, and if it tarrieth, it is that it may be the greater when it comes. I
will offer the sacrifice of thanksgiving, let others do what they will. Now,'
that is because it is God's due.

II. The second head was because it was good for ourselves. And it is clear,
because it is always good for ourselves to be just—good for our souls to perform
a duty well. It is just to praise God; and it is one of the obligations of the
saints to praise God's name. So it is good for ourselves besides. If we do not
praise God we shall catch ourselves getting sour and morose. A man that does not
praise God is not much liked, and then he goes off into a nasty sour, crab-apple
disposition, from which the Lord save us! There is a person that cannot look at
any work that is done except like a jackdaw or a monkey to pull it to pieces.
There is a revival. "Oh, yes, that is mere excitement." There is a Church with a
large increase. "Yes, there are a great many Churches, and they do gather in a
great deal, odds and ends, and all that sort of thing; but they are not strict
enough in their discipline." There is a young man raised up to make a stir in a
provincial town. "Ah, yes, they have gone up like a rocket, and come down like a
stick." That is a style to which one can be easily educated. I do not think
anybody ought to pay very heavy fees to be a nasty critic; one can grow into
that with a little watering very speedily, Now, to keep our souls sweet, let us
offer the sacrifice of thanksgiving just to keep this sour stuff, this horrible
leaven, from making us as some are—by making us a lump of bitterness. Let us
praise and bless the Lord. I have felt sometimes like the Quaker, who, when he
heard a man swear, said to him, "Swear on, friend; get rid of all that nasty
stuff thou hast in thy soul, for thou canst never go to heaven while thou hast
that in thee. Get it out as soon as ever you can." And the best way of curing
ourselves of the spleen is to offer the sacrifice of thanksgiving. Thanksgiving
will sometimes cure impatience, too. Sometimes in our zeal we really wish that
we could get up to God's throne and manage things better. That is the short and
long of what we are thinking of. We are not satisfied with the things as they go
on. We want to push the Church before us, and drag the world behind us, and do
in a day what ordinarily takes a century to accomplish—a very proper thing when
it is not carried too far. But when we thank and bless the Lord, it kills our
impatience, it prevents our falling into unpractical speculations, it enables us
in patience to possess our soul and to go plodding on with God's work, leaving
the results with God, who knows better the times and the seasons than we dare
pretend to do. But, brethren, if you have got into a bad consumptive state, and
your soul is dreary and heavy, and you are reading all the books that foretell
that Popery is going to cover the land, and you go to bed by daylight and think
the sun is set, get somebody, get especially the divine power, to help you to
sing, to help you to praise God. Oh, that you could get the good air into your
lungs by prayer, and then breathe it out again in a mighty burst of praise!
Nothing is so good for a man as to praise God. The man that prays but never
praises has not only the spirit of a beggar, but a beggarly spirit. If we are
always asking something from God and never thanking Him for what we get, the
Lord might well discharge us and say, "I will hear you no more; you are always
begging, and you never thank Me; and if you are not grateful for what I give you
neither will I give you more."

III.

Well, now, thirdly; I will offer the sacrifice of thanksgiving because it is
encouraging to my fellow workers. You know a very great deal in a Church will
depend upon the leader. Christian ministers are but men; but still, when God
sends them and they are what they should be, they very much affect the entire
Church, and if they get into a dull desponding spirit, the workers, the most of
them, feel the effect of it. If you have a frost in the pulpit, you will not, as
a rule, have too much warmth down below. If the pastor's spirit is depressed,
and he does not believe that God is doing good, why, the people begin to catch
the infection and feel the same.. Hence it is important, my friends, deacons and
elders round here, to keep up a cheerful spirit. You, my brethren in the Sunday
schools, keep up that lively cheerful tone of thanksgiving to God, or else the
teachers may get discouraged when they see that the superintendent gets
dispirited; for there is always a party in the Church that are naturally
desponding. They cannot help it. They were born in December, and they will never
have a birthday in June. They are of that kind of spirit that they flourish best
in the midst of a thaw and in wet times. They always look at the dark side of
matters. For their sake let us look at the bright side. Then there are always
some workers who are working under some very great discouragement; and if we do
not thank God for what He does, then they say, how can we expect any good result
to come of our labours. They think a great deal better of us, too often, than we
deserve. Why, there is nothing in the world, after all, among Christians that
will have a greater effect upon them than the courage of real believers. When
things are going heavily the bright eye and the cheerful ken of some one fellow
worker will often inspirit all the rest. When Paul was in the storm everybody's
heart sank, except Paul's, and because he was courageous he had an influence
over all that were in the vessel. I have known a dear young brother, and I did
know one dear aged brother, whose word and whose presence always cheered us. I
was reading last week a story of a ship, one of our ships of war, which had been
in desperate combat with the enemy. Into our ship was poured a tremendous
broadside; the deck was strewn with dead sailors, blood was flowing on all
sides, and the captain was just about to issue orders to strike the flag. There
seemed no hope but that the vessel would be blown into atoms unless the battle
was stopped. Now, there were on board the vessel some chickens. One of the shots
had broken the hencoop, and just at that moment a small bantam cock came and
stood on the side of the vessel and gave a tremendous crow. As soon as ever he
did that every man that was alive on board deck gave a loud cheer; the gunners
rushed to their guns and sent back a tremendous broadside; and, instead of
striking their flag, they captured the foe. It was no doubt a true British cock
that did that. And I like to see some of that true British pluck in Christian
men, so that when others are all desponding and despairing they can step forward
and say, "I will offer the sacrifice of thanksgiving." Come, brethren, you may
go away from your guns if you like, and you may cry, and you may weep, and you
may say, "This cannot be done and it shall not." I see enough blue in the sky to
betoken a good fair day ere the sun goes down; I see enough brightness in the
promise; I see enough in the gloomy hills of darkness, as my soul gazes upon it,
to believe that the promises do travel towards a glorious day of grace; and
therefore will I offer the sacrifice of thanksgiving and call upon the name of
the Lord.

IV.

We will do this and offer the sacrifice of thanksgiving, because it is one of
the best ways of promoting the great end we aim at. Do this Godward. We aim at
God's glory. It is well to offer thanksgiving, for it is to glorify Him, "Who so
offereth praise glorifieth Me," saith the Lord. And to do this in dark times is
to glorify Him doubly. Therefore let us be of a large and joyful spirit and
praise His name; because we are striking the very centre of the target when we
are glorifying God. And this is the object even of the salvation of sinners. For
sinners to be saved is not our object ultimately. The ultimate object is God's
glory through the salvation of sinners Let us get that then; and we shall do so
if we offer the sacrifice of praise. But secondly, we promote our object in the
saints, for when the saints are encouraged and led to thank God they are better
for service; they are more able to do it; they will do it in a better way; they
will do it with more faith; and the more of faith the more of result is there
sure to be; for the rule of the kingdom is, "According to thy faith so be it
done unto thee." If you want your men in good trim, O commander, say not a
solitary word that shall lower their spirit, but rather show them how to magnify
the name of the Lord. And again. This answers our end sinner-ward. O sinner, if
you see us thanking the name of the Lord we may remind you that you have much to
thank Him for. What if you are not saved? Yet you are not yet shut up in hell.
What if you are not forgiven? Yet you are where forgiveness is to be had. What
if you cannot say yet, "I am in the family of the Lord"? Yet still there is
space for you to arise and go unto your Father and confess your sin to Him. Oh,
you ought to offer the sacrifice of thanksgiving that you are on praying ground
still, and are yet where the Gospel is preached to you. I see much reason why
even you should thank God for what you have. And then I feel persuaded that the
unconverted are more likely to be converted—we speak after the manner of men—by
thankful Christians than by any others. I dare say there are some persons whose
hearts will be won to Christ by preachers of a very sorrowful, heavy countenance
and disposition. I suppose that when religion is painted as a dark and black
thing there may be some hearts that are attracted by it, but I believe there are
more flies caught with honey than with vinegar, and that there are more people
led to think about their souls by grateful Christians than by the murmuring of
believers.

I am inclined to believe that in the minds of a great many it is a very
important question, whether religion does make men happy; and when they see it
does, and they see us thankful and happy, then they say, "We will find out the
secret that makes these people happy; we will go with them that we may share in
their blessedness." And I think this leads the sinner to think all the better of
God. I should not like to keep a servant that was always very miserable, so that
everybody said, "Ah, that woman has got a bad master at home, you may depend
upon it." I should not like my horse, when he stood in the street, to be of such
a sort that those around him should say, "Whose horse is that?" "Why, it is the
minister's of the Tabernacle." "Is that how he keeps his horse? Why, you can see
his ribs. What a master he must be to keep such a horse as that." The world
looks at professors. "This is one of your Christians, is it"? Christians! Why,
he is enough to make a tempest in the house—the very sight of his face, and if
all the world were happy and he were to step in you would suppose that every
wedding had changed into a funeral.." I think the world would say, "Oh, they
serve a bad master, you may depend upon it. The God they profess to believe in
gives them a very few consolations." I think they say, "We are happy, you know;
we can be happy." But they forget the future and only think of the present, and
they think their position to be much superior to that of the mournful Christian.
Don't let them say that, beloved, but, on the contrary, let us say to-night, "I
will offer the sacrifice of thanksgiving." That my soul is resolved to do.


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  CHAPTER 9: 08. THE CHRISTIAN'S BADGE
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VIII. The Christian's Badge For the Lord's portion is His people; Jacob is the
lot of His inheritance.—(Deuteronomy 32:9.)

Moses, I have no doubt, had in his mind's eye the division of the land of Canaan
among the tribes. After they had crossed the Jordan and had entered into the
promised land, the land was marked off, so much for Reuben, so much for Simeon,
so much for Judah, so much for Ephraim, and so much for Manasseh, so that each
one of the tribes had his own peculiar portion. Moses represents the whole world
as lying, as it were, like a map before the eye of the eternal God, and the Lord
strikes out for Himself a portion which is to be the lot of His inheritance.
That portion was in Israel's day the nation of Israel. The Lord's portion of
ancient Israel—the nation—typified the spiritual seed of God, the children of
Abraham who are descendants of the Father of the faithful. These, the chosen of
God, the called of God, the regenerated, sanctified believing people of
God—these are God's portion.

Now, in certain respects the whole of Canaan belonged to every Israelite. As
soon as ever he crossed the border, he was in his own native country. But yet
there was a special sense in which a part of the promised land belonged to each
tribe. The man of the tribe of Simeon said, wherever he might be in Canaan, "I
am in my own land," but when he reached the peculiar possession of his tribe,
then he said, "This land especially belongs to me." So the whole world belongs
to God; the earth is the Lord's and the fulness thereof, the world and they that
dwell therein; but yet there are peculiar people in the world whom God calls
specially His own, and of whom He says by the mouth of an ancient prophet, "They
shall be Mine, saith the Lord, in that day when I make up My jewels." All things
are God's, but His people are especially His. Just as a man may possess large
estates, broad acres and abundance of gold and silver and cattle and herds and
crops, but he possesses his own children in a different sense from that. He
says, "All these things are mine, but still my children are peculiarly my own."
And so we are to understand the text. "The Lord's portion is His people; Jacob
is the lot of His inheritance." Out of all the world besides, God condescends to
call His people His own possession.

We will dwell a few minutes upon the fact, then upon the privilege which it
brings us, and then upon the duty which it binds upon us.

I.

Now, first, upon the fact. We must make this fact of God's people being His
portion run parallel with the figure—the figure of Canaan being divided into
portions. So we notice, first, that the portion of any one tribe was peculiarly
its own. Judah said, "This land is mine." Simeon said, "This land is mine." So
also God saith of His people, "They are peculiarly Mine." I have already
mentioned this fact in the outset, but I want you to realise it. It is not so
much a thing to preach about as to think over, to mark, learn, and inwardly
digest. You, O believer in Jesus, are peculiarly God's portion. There is about
His possession of you a speciality. Will you think of this? You are in yourself
an inconsiderable member of a vast community; you are unworthy in your own
esteem; if you judge rightly, you are as nothing and less than nothing; and yet
you are not so to God. To Him you are a precious thing. "Since thou wast
precious in My sight," saith He, "thou hast been honourable." God has an esteem
for you. Though the multitudes of men would pass you by and forget you, and
though some of the great ones of the earth would look down upon you, yet the
Lord hath remembered the low estate of His handmaiden and looked upon you, my
sister, with an eye of love. And you, my brother, though you feel you were but
as a beggar upon a dunghill, He has taken you to be His, and in so doing He has
set you among princes, even the princes of His people. One sits down and rolls
this under his tongue as a sweet morsel:—"The Lord hath regard for me; He views
me with a careful eye. He watches over me. He hath designs and purposes of love
towards me. He will watch over me till life's latest hour and will bring me to
Himself, because I am His. He has given Himself to me to be my Father and my
God, but He has also taken me to be a part and parcel of what He calls His own
inheritance." I cannot dilate upon that thought, for time would fail me, but I
do want you to get it, that you may have the sweet enjoyment of it, for ye are
Christ's and Christ is God's. "Ye are a chosen generation, a peculiar people."
You belong especially to the Lord, as many of you as have believed in Christ
Jesus unto eternal life.

Note, next, in this fact, that each tribe had to conquer the inheritance which
belonged to itself. There was the land marked out upon the map, but they had to
go up and take it, for it was possessed by the Hivites and the Perizzites, and
these must be driven out. Even so the Lord's portion is His people, but He has
had to conquer us; for when He began with us what were we but a prey to divers
lusts and evil powers? Satan ruled us, indwelling sin had dominion over us; the
world rode rough-shod over us. We were evil. There was none of us that did good,
no, not one. But, blessed be the name of the Lord, He has conquered us. It was a
hard fight in the case of some of us, for we were exceeding strong against the
God of grace. Why, there are those here to whom earnest sermons were only like
paper pellets against a granite wall. A mother's tears fell on them and never
melted them, and yet they are mighty things. For them a father's exhortations
were in vain; for them a shipwreck and a battle and a fever and a lying upon the
borders of the grave—all these were fruitless.. They remained still
incorrigible. Their sins were like those Canaanites that had chariots of iron,
and it did seem as if the land could never be conquered for God. But He has done
it, glory be to His name! He has subdued our wills. He has brought us to the
foot of the Cross. He has made us love what once we hated, and prize beyond all
worth what once we despised. The Lord's portion is His people, and therefore by
His mighty reigning grace He overcomes them and puts them under dominion beneath
the feet of His mercy. Give glory unto the conqueror, my brethren. Bow down
willingly. Held in the silken fetters of love, bow before the Prince of Peace,
and hail Him as your King. And then the tribes, after they had conquered the
land, had another task to do, namely, to extirpate the old inhabitants. For they
were not merely to bring them under subjection, so that Judah or Reuben might
possess his land, but they were to slay them utterly, for their sins had been
great, and God had doomed them to die and the Israelites were to be their
executioners. Now, this is what God has to do in each one of His people, viz.,
to exterminate our sins. O brethren, what a battle that would be for us! Why,
our sins, when we attack them single-handed, soon overcome us. Why, the very
weakest sin that is in any one of us would be our downfall if we were let alone;
and as for our stronger passions, if opportunity and temptation should come
together and then our evil desires should leap up at the same time, who among us
could stand in such a conflict? And yet, as surely as God has undertaken the
work of our salvation, He means to take up root and branch all our sins. Can you
realise it? O my brethren, who are daily fighting with inward sin, can you
realise it, that the day will, come when you will have no tendencies to sin,
when all your powers will go towards righteousness and to righteousness only?
Can you grasp it? "Oh," say you, "it is a heavenly thought." Yes, and in Heaven
it will be realised, and you will have more and more of Heaven here below in
proportion as it is realised here. Holiness is the royal road to happiness. The
death of sin is the life of joy. At the root of every sin there is the
bitterness of sorrow. Sin is the root of bitterness. When God shall tear up
every one of these roots of bitterness, it will be a blessed thing for us, but
this He will do. The quick-tempered brother shall no longer be liable to bursts
of passion; the sluggish-minded shall no longer be tempted to indolence; the man
of imperious pride shall bow as humbly as the seraph who veils himself with his
wings; there shall be in us every propensity to good and no inclination to evil.

O sacred hour, O blest abode!

I shall be near, and like my God, And flesh and sense no more assail The solid
pleasures of my soul.

I shall be for ever free from that which brings me sorrow, and shall possess
that which brings me joy. The Lord's portion is His people, and He will not
leave a Canaanite in the land. He will cut them up altogether.

II.

Run on the parallel with the fact, and you get another thought. After the people
had conquered their own portions, they had to cultivate them, and they did
cultivate them well till the very tops of the hills were covered with vines, and
the valleys laughed with joyous harvests. Now the Lord will cultivate His
Church. We are as yet poor, barren soil; but the Lord knows how to plough us,
and to till us, till we shall yet bring forth a hundred-fold to His glory. We
hear sometimes of high culture. I would not be envious of the highest mental
culture which the university would yield; but I envy above all things the
spiritual culture of the Holy Ghost. "Ye shall be sown and ploughed," saith the
Lord, and blessed be they that can come under the divine tillage! "He will make
her wilderness like Eden, and her desert like the garden of the Lord." Rest
assured that any portion God undertakes to till, He will be first in it. None
shall be such a husbandman as our Father. He is the Husbandman, and He will get
better harvests out of us than by any other means could be produced. We are in
good hands. Sorry soil we are, but yet He will produce unto Himself harvests
that shall be for His eternal honour. Let us have good hope and confidence since
this is the fact. And the people had not only to till the soil, but they had to
protect it, for around them were many robber tribes that assailed them, and,
therefore, they had, while they cultivated the ground, often to beat their
ploughshares into swords and their pruning hooks into spears. And God will do
that for us. The everlasting arm will well protect that which it has so dearly
won. Jesus, who bought us with His blood, will not lose us. The Holy Spirit, who
redeemed us by His power and brought us unto Himself, will not suffer the
adversary to overcome Him. He will preserve our souls, and present them
unblemished and complete at the last. "The Lord's portion is His people," and as
the tribes held their heritage, so will God beyond the mighty, and in the teeth
of all our adversaries keep every one of His people—every inch of His
inheritance—to the end.

One other thought only upon this, and that is, the tribes, having had to fight
for their country and till it and defend it, expected to enjoy it. They expected
to sit every man under his own vine and fig tree. They expected to drink of the
rivers that flowed with milk and honey; and they did so. And God expects from
His people to obtain joy. Can God receive joy? Well, perhaps, as abstract truth
He cannot, for He is unspeakably and infinitely blessed apart from us, but yet
He is pleased to reveal Himself as a Father. A father hath joy in his children,
and God hath joy in His children. And, indeed, it lies in the very marrow of the
metaphor now before us. A man hath joy in his portion; so hath the Lord joy in
His people. And you know that memorable passage; I scarcely ever dare to quote
it without deep emotion, so wonderful a passage is it: "He shall rest in His
love"—as if God found rest in loving His people—" He will joy over thee with
singing." It is a wonderful passage. Have we not before told you that when God
created the world the angels sang for joy. God did not sing: He said, "It is
very good." He spoke, and expressed His approbation, but I hear of no song. But
now, in the new creation, when He sees His dear ones chosen before all worlds,
for whom the only-begotten poured out His life-blood—when the Spirit of God sees
His workmanship, it is written, "He shall joy over thee with singing." God
singing! Can you catch the thought? This is sweeter than the angels' song or
than the song of all the beatified that surround the crystal throne. It is
Jehovah Himself that sings—like a husband rejoicing over his bride, or a mother
singing over her child. For God hath joy in His people; Christ findeth
satisfaction in the fruit of His agonies, and the Holy Spirit takes delight to
view the soul that He Himself hath formed anew. This is unspeakably precious,
but it is true; the Lord finds delight in His people and enjoys them, for "the
Lord's portion is His people." And I believe, brethren, that the fruit that God
looks for from us is our love. You do not expect your children to do anything
for you, but you do expect them to love you, and you expect their gratitude.
When their eyes sparkle, and their little lips almost incoherently tell you how
thankful they are to you for your kindness, you rejoice in that. And praise is
pleasant to God. He delights in the love of His people and in their
thanksgiving. And, moreover, fellowship with God is sweet to Him. For it is said
of Jesus, "His delights were with the sons of men," and all through the Song of
Solomon the spouse represents Himself as ravished with the love of His beloved.
Christ always speaks there of His Church as being able to communicate joy to Him
by the sight of her fair face, and the words of her lips. He says, '' Let Me see
thy face! Let Me hear thy voice; for sweet is thy face, and thy countenance is
comely "—sweet to Him and comely to Him. Oh, clear children of God, rob not God
of His fruit that comes of His portion. Give Him your love; give Him your
fellowship; walk with Him as Enoch did; for this is Christ's joy—that you should
have joy in Him. But now a few words only about the privilege which all this
implies. "The Lord's portion is His people." This implies great honour; for to
be God's above other men is to have special honour upon one. Better than to be a
Knight of the Golden Fleece, or of the Order of the Garter, is it to be one in
whom God takes delight. This is the highest honour, before which imperial
dignities must lose their lustre—the dignity of belonging to the King of kings.
It brings honour. It brings, brethren, with it security, for if we be the Lord's
portion, He will preserve us. One of the crests of our nobility has upon it, "I
will maintain it"; and rest assured, God has said of His Church, "I will
maintain it "; "I give unto My sheep eternal life, and they shall never perish,
neither shall any pluck them out of My hand." If I belonged to an angel, I might
be lost, but if I belong to God, God will not lose His own. There is the
privilege of honour and security. And there is the privilege of His presence.
The tribes dwelt in their portion, so will God dwell in His Church. "The Lord's
portion is His people." That explains the question which an apostle asked of his
Master, "Lord, how is it that Thou wilt manifest Thyself to us, and not unto the
world? "A man in his own garden takes his ease; a prince in his own province
feels at home. And God has made His Church to be His peculiar dwelling-place
where He shines forth in all the majesty of His love. Brethren, if this be our
privilege, let us enjoy it. What a shame it is that many of us are worth
thousands a year, and live like beggars—I mean, that we might have God's
presence, but, through our carelessness, we live at a distance from Him and are
unhappy. Enoch's God is my God, and if I seek grace enough, I may live Enoch's
life. You may, my dear brother, enjoy the presence of God in unbroken
continuity, evermore abiding in Him, and as Christ Himself did, if you will but
seek it with all your heart. God grant you may so seek it as to find it. For
this privilege gives us another privilege, namely, that of delight. Where God
is, there is sure to be happiness.

My God, the spring of all my joys, The life of my delights.

We can truly call Him by that name—

'Midst darkest shades, if He appear, Our Eden is begun.

We only want God's presence, and we have got all the happiness our soul asks
for. Take our God away, and the bursting barn is famine and the overflowing wine
vats yield no joy. Friends cannot make us otherwise than friendless if God
desert us, and all the helps of the creature leave us helpless if the Creator
turn aside. All our fresh springs are in God; and, since He dwells in His
portion, we are a happy and a blessed people.

Truly the privilege, if we had time to think upon it, has much in it that would
comfort us, especially in one aspect of it, for it opens up to us a glorious
future. If we are God's portion, then depend upon it, He means to do something
great with us. It is the honour of a king to make his country famous and
illustrious; it will be to the honour of God to make His Church something far
nobler than she is to-day. He will come by-and-bye, and He will take us away
from this land of our banishment to our own country. We dwell here as in tents,
sojourners as all our fathers were. Wait awhile, for the hour cometh when He
will translate us to the city that hath foundations, whose builder and whose
maker is God. Farewell, ye scenes of earth with your attempts at joy; we go unto
the land where joy for ever blooms and bliss never fades; for the Lord's portion
is His people, and He won't let us lie out in the field for ever. When the wheat
is ready, He will gather it into the garner. We are His gems to-day, but we
still lie in the mire. He has brought some of us up from the mine and polished
us somewhat, but He will take us from the lapidary's wheel with all its
cuttings; He will set us in His royal crown, and we shall be unto Him a joy and
a glory for ever and for ever. Thus, you see, there is a great deal of comfort
to be drawn from the privilege which the text implies.

III.

Now, brethren, I hasten on, because the sands of time drop so hastily, to notice
the duty which is wrapped up in all this. "The Lord's portion is His people."
What, then? Why, let us own the blessed claim. Let each Christian here say—

'Tis done! The great transaction's done!

I am my Lord's, and He is mine;

He drew me, and I followed on, Charmed to confess the Voice Divine.

Look back, some of you, to the years when first you gave yourself to God. I do
remember well when I felt that I was bought with Christ's blood, how it seemed
the most natural thing in all the world to say, "My God, I am Thine for ever—my
body, my soul, my spirit, my time, my substance, my house, if Thou shalt give me
one, and whatever of talent I may possess." I hope you meant it when you thus
gave yourself wholly up to God. I ask you to repeat the dedication to-night.
There have been some Christians who have written out a covenant with God—I think
Dr. Doddridge did this, and then signed it with his blood. But such things are
very apt to bring the soul into bondage. They are not prescribed in Scripture,
and we had better not do anything of our own head: we had better leave such
things alone. Yet still, as a matter of fact, I hope we should be prepared to
sign it with our blood. If I saw before me a deed engrossed in which I was
proclaimed to be God's chattel—all that I am and all I have to be God's for
Him—to do what He liked with me, I would sign it and bless the God of grace that
permitted me to give myself over to Him. And yet, dear brethren, though I know
you would sign it, too, there are times when it comes to suffering for Christ,
and are you not a little put to it? And perhaps you have long and severe pains,
and then you begin to start back from the surrender, and can hardly feel
resigned to the divine will. Come, let us now again go to our God and say,
"Whereas we have sometimes drawn back as though we would no longer be Thine, we
do to-night desire to confess that we are Thy portion; that we are not our own;
that we are bought with a price; we would renew our vow in Thy presence! O Lord,
I am Thy servant; I am Thy servant and the son of Thine handmaid. Thou hast
loosed my bonds." And, next, let us recollect that every man's portion is
separated from everybody else's. Judah's portion was separated from Simeon's,
and Simeon's from Ephraim's. Now, if we are God's, let us maintain the separated
life. I do not know any practical truth that wants preaching more to-day than
this—that God's saints must be separated from the world. Now, nonconformity—you
may say what you will of that, but one thing is certain, that nonconformity to
the world is the badge of the Christian. "Be not conformed to this world, but be
ye transformed." I wish that all Nonconformists were more non-conforming to the
world. And oh, that all professors of religion were more 'distinct from the rest
of the world! Whenever you make the lines of demarcation between the Church and
the world to be indistinct, you do both the Church and the world a serious
damage. The Flood was probably brought upon this world because the sons of God
saw the daughters of men that they were fair, and so there was a blending of the
two, and the distinction ceased. Then God swept the whole population away. "Ye
are the salt of the earth." "Ye are the light of the world." "What communion
hath light with darkness?" "What concord hath Christ with Belial?" How can you
eat at the table of the Lord and then eat at the table of the devil? How can you
be Christians and yet be worldlings? "Ye cannot serve God and Mammon." There
must be the separation, for "no man can serve two masters: either he will love
the one and hate the other, or else he will despise the one and cleave to the
other." "Ye cannot," says Christ, "serve God and Mammon. Come ye out from among
them. Be ye separate. Touch not the unclean thing, and I will be a father unto
you; and ye shall be My sons and daughters, saith the Lord God Almighty." So
with that I shall conclude. If ye be indeed God's portion, I exhort you, my dear
brethren and sisters, to render yourselves up more and more to God from this
day; serve Him with all your might; serve the Lord with gladness; lay yourselves
out for His service; watch for opportunities of bringing Him glory; and never be
content with what you have done. Be seeking still to do more and more for that
God of grace who says that you are His portion and the lot of His inheritance.

IV. This sermon, I fear me, has not been addressed to all of you. There are
those in this house to-night to whom there is no voice in the text, because
whatever people you may be, you are not His people, and whose ever heritage you
may be, you to remember that truth? You are prayerless, Christless, graceless.
You have never believed in Jesus Christ, and though you sit with God's people
and belong to a godly family, yet when the Lord cometh, if you are then as you
are now, He will say to you, "I never knew you: you are none of Mine. You loved
the world and belonged to it. You loved sin; you shall have its wages. You
neglected the great salvation; how shall you escape?" Do I hear you say, "But
may there not be a change in me? May I not become one of His people?" Oh, happy
enquiry! Only ask it sincerely, and I will answer you thus: "Let the wicked
forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts, and let him return unto
the Lord, for He will have mercy upon him, and to our God, for He will
abundantly pardon." "Whosoever believeth on the Son of God hath everlasting
life." And if, as a guilty sinner, you shall come to Jesus and take Him to be
your only hope and trust, you are saved; your sins, which are many, are, in a
moment, forgiven you, and you are the Lord's. But living and dying without faith
in God, your baptism will not save you; your confirmation will not save you;
your attention to sacraments will not save you. "Ye must be born again." May God
bring us to a saving faith in a precious Saviour, and may our names be written
in the Lamb's book of life. And when He calls for His chosen, may we be able to
answer to our names; in that day when the sheep pass under the hand of Him that
telleth them may every one of you be there, and God shall have the glory. Amen
and amen.


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  CHAPTER 10: 09. FROM GLOOM TO GLORY
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IX. From Gloom to Glory Man that is born of a woman is of few days and full of
trouble.—(Job 14:1.)

"A very mournful text," says one: "we would prefer to have something cheerful."
Well, certainly, the bell has a very solemn sound, but it was cast in Heaven's
own foundry, and there is a reason for it. God has hung it in the belfry of
inspiration, and He meant it to be rung. It is sometimes of very great service
to us to have to think of solemn things. But, then, I would remind you that the
bell that tolls the funeral knell needs but to be sounded in another way, and it
can give forth the most delightful sounds. And so, truths which are even
terrible and dreadful under some aspects may be bright and comforting under
others. The trumpet may have a different sound to one person from what it will
have to another. They used to sound trumpets when the judges came into an assize
town, and if the prisoners heard those trumpets, they would either be sweet or
sad to them, according to their character. He who knew he was to be tried for
murder and was guilty of that crime, would hear in the sound of the trumpets the
most mournful tidings, but he who had a clear conscience would be glad to think
that he was about to receive an acquittal at the hand of righteousness. I should
not wonder but what these words, "Man that is born of a woman is of few days and
full of trouble," while they may sound mournfully to many hearts, will also have
a ring of the joy note in your ears, so that out of this eater shall come forth
meat, and honey shall be found even in this lion-like text. The statement here
made is one of the most sweeping character. It says, "Man that is born of a
woman is of few days, and full of trouble." That is to say, every man, for there
was but one man who would not come under this description—the father of us all.
But as for the rest, we are all born of a woman, and therefore all of them have
few days and full of trouble. It is applicable to kings upon their thrones quite
as much as to the prisoners who are in the dungeon. It is certainly as true of
the stalwart guardsman as of the poor, pining, consumptive girl. Each one that
is of woman born must speedily to the dust return, and meanwhile must find the
way to the grave to be rough with sorrows. The text is sweeping, and at the same
time by using the term, "Man that is born of a woman," it uplifts the veil a
little why it is so. Who can bring a clean thing out of an unclean! Who shall
bring strength out of weakness? Who shall bring immortality out of mortality?
Who shall produce men of iron when they have to be born from women of clay? It
is because of our first birth and the sin—the transgression that comes in with
it—that therefore we are of few days. We say, "short and sweet," but here we
have brief and bitter. The sin that we inherit causes us also to inherit the
fewness of the days and the fulness of the trouble. And this statement is true
in all ages since it was uttered. I suppose that even to the antediluvian men
life seemed to be of few (days. Though to us their age seems extremely long, yet
it may not have been so to them, for we well know that our days grow shorter as
we grow older. A period of time which seems immense to the child, and tolerably
long to a young man, becomes short to a man of middle life, and to the aged man
appears to be as nothing at all. The astounding rapidity with which life flies
often staggers me. I remember when a day, a week, a month seemed something, but:
now Sabbaths fly round and one seems no sooner to have left the pulpit than to
have to be ready to go into it again. Time flies the more rapidly as life
advances. But in all the periods of time since men have been upon the earth this
is indeed true, and we must none of us expect to escape from the general rule.
This is true to you young people; you will be "of few days and full of trouble."
Take not the word from my lips; take it from the Holy Spirit Himself. This is
true to you strong men who are now in the vigour of life; you will be "of few
days and full of trouble." You of grey heads, whose strength has survived these
many years, who lean upon your staff—you will be of few days; and, as you have
had trouble, you must expect it to the last. You are not out of gun-shot of
Satan yet, not beyond the temptations of the corrupt nature yet, not beyond the
trials of life yet. He that has come into the safe harvest of competence, and
dreams of spending a long period of time in retirement, may still remember that
trouble will follow him, even in his rural retreat, and that he may not reckon
upon many days, for he is of few days, God hath said, and of few days he shall
be. Let each man quietly turn over this word of God in the stillness of his own
soul, "I, like my brother, am of few days and full of trouble."

Now, take the first statement, and then the second, and then blend the two.

I.

Take the first statement: "Man that is born of a woman is of few days." It does
not say "of few years." It is as if his years were almost too few even to be
thought of, and as if man ought-never to live by the year. I do not remember a
passage of Scripture which says, "Teach us to number our years "; neither do I
recollect a prayer in which we are to ask for yearly bread; but I remember that
we are to ask to be taught to number our days and to say, "Give us day by day
our daily bread." Now, our days do seem to be many. There are three hundred and
sixty-five days in each year, and then we look for a considerable number of
years, and according to our thoughtless calculation it would appear as if our
days were, after all, rather considerable. But the text says, "No! Man that is
born of a woman is of few days." And this is true, if you compare man's life,
first of all with the life of God. It seems scarcely to be spoken of—fitter for
contemplation than for speech. When as yet this universe was not, there was God.
Long ages before He began to create sun, or moon, or stars, there was God. And
when all things that now are shall pass away like a vestment worn out to be put
aside, there shall still be God—no older, for there can be no age with Him; no
further advanced in years, for He hath no years. It is now with Him—no past, no
future.

He fills His own eternal vow, And sees our ages pass.

"Of few days," indeed! Why, we are but of yesterday. Fly back a moment to the
time when Christ was hanging on the cross. Where were you then? Think of the
times of Solomon and David. Where were you? A thing unthought of. And in that
day when Jehovah walked the glades of Eden and communed with our unfallen
parents, where were we! We are infants; we are not worthy to be mentioned. We
are "of few days."

Why, we are even of few days as compared with the world in which we live, and
yet that is but a novel thing. It was but yesterday this world flew like a spark
from off the anvil of eternal omnipotence; yet to us it seems ages indeed. Yon
mountains, with their snows, seem hoary with age, and yonder deep, which has
swallowed so many of the navies that mortal ambition has built—how old it seems
compared with us; yet those things are mere novelties. Then what are we? We seem
only to have sprung up like grass in the summer, and like grass we already feel
the mower's scythe. We are "of few days."

We are of few days as compared with what our days might have been; for, had not
our first parents sinned, I know not that we should have lived here for ever,
but certainly we should not have died. There is, according to some teaching, no
absolutely physical reason why the human body should not continue to live on. At
any rate, if there be reasons now why the body should at such and such a period
begin to decay, then probably there were no such reasons in the conformation of
the first man. Perhaps that tree of life in the garden might have furnished Adam
with food for perpetual youth, so that he would have renewed his strength like
the eagles, and we too, his children, might have lived in perpetual happiness
here. Well, the dream is gone: it shall not be realised. Still, compared with
what they might have been, sin has made our days few.

Compared again—and this is a far sweeter thought—compared with what they shall
be, our days are few, for, O, beloved, when this life's toil and trouble shall
all be over our immortal spirits—what shall be their duration? We shall receive
a life coeval with the life of God, and no more be capable of death than God
Himself. As many as have believed in Christ Jesus shall enter into a felicity
that shall know no bounds. Ay! and this corruptible shall put on incorruption,
and this mortal shall put on immortality. And even that of us which to-day
draweth down to the worm and to the dust—the rottenness—shall rise in power and
glory and be spiritually fashioned in the glorious image of the second Adam.
Blessed be God, the life on earth is nothing compared with the life to come. A
mere handful of days we have here; but there, with the Ancient of Days, we shall
dwell for ever and ever.

Now, this being the truth, what then? Let us ring the bell a minute and listen
to it.

First, then, if our days are few, how earnest ought each one of us to be that he
should find reconciliation with God and eternal salvation, and find it at once!
I have spoken to some of you many hundreds of times about your souls and you
have never quarrelled with any statements of truth that I have made. I almost
wish you had. You have said, "Yes, that is important. Yes, we are sinful. Yes,
we do need a Saviour." But while you have said you were sinful, you have not
repented nor confessed your sin to God. Though you know you need a Saviour, yet
you have not found Him. When do you mean to attend to these things?
"By-and-bye," say you? "Man that is born of a woman is of few days." You have
had a few days already; perhaps you have had all you will ever have. If you
could see the sand-glass of your lives, some of you—if I could see mine—there
may be far fewer sermons to be uttered below than we had dreamed. The thread
that we think to be so long may almost be at an end. Dear heart, do you intend
to die impenitent? Do you mean to pass into another world without a Saviour? Can
you be so mad as that? No, I know that is the last thing in your thoughts. You
are intending and you are resolving well. And you resolved ten years ago, did
you not? Do you remember that impressive sermon? How you trembled! Perhaps it
was twenty years ago. You recollect that sickness, that cholera in the City, and
how you resolved and re-resolved? And yet you are just the same as you were
then. Are not the probabilities very strong that you will continue the same as
you now are, and that you will open your eyes where it will be too late to open
them—like the rich man of whom it is said, "In hell he lift up his eyes "? It
were far better to lift them up here than to lift them up there, where you will
see no hope, no Saviour on a throne of mercy. God grant to us to snatch the
present day. The most important of all interests cannot be postponed until
to-morrow. He who was slain with a dagger had a warning, as you know; but he
said he would attend to it by-and-bye, and he went to the Senate house and fell
beneath the daggers of his foes. You have a warning to-night; this very text has
spoken it to you. Perhaps tomorrow you will have to rue, and rue for ever, that
you postponed the thoughts of the things of eternity.

II.

Another lesson comes from this, and it is for those who are already saved—the
people of God. Dear brothers and sisters, our one desire is to glorify God. Now,
we shall glorify Him for ever and ever; but there is a particular form of
service which only belongs to this life. Are you not anxious—very anxious—that
you should honour Christ here and do as much as you can? Well, you have few
days—but few days. Oh, one could almost wish to live to be as old as Methuselah
for the sake of winning men's souls and bringing sinners to Christ. But it
cannot be. Oh, how we ought to work for Jesus, seeing He is such a Master, and
deserves to have so much from His servants. And yet there is so short a space to
do it in. If we are painting for eternity, oh, let us move our hands with skill
and with rapidity as hearing the chariot wheels of eternity behind us. Can we
afford to waste hours or even minutes? I have heard of a Puritan who used to
rise and study at five in the morning. But one day he heard a smith's hammer
while he was getting up, and he said, "Shall a smith work harder than a minister
of God? Shall he give to his hard service more time than I give to my Lord and
Master?" And he would thus chide himself, though he was one of the most
industrious of men. Remember, dear friends, that you are born of woman, and that
you have but few days—few days in which to bring sons and daughters to the
Saviour, few days in which to save that Sabbath school class, few days, oh,
preacher, in which to make this place ring with salvation, few days in which to
be a shepherd to the people of God—a few days in which to call sinners and to
warn backsliders. Let us live, while we live, brethren, to the utmost power and
capacity of our manhood, for we are of few days.

Now, let us ring that bell again, and hear whether there is not sweet music in
it.

Well, then, if we are "of few days," our troubles will the sooner be over. If we
are of few days, we have but a short time in which to bear the labour and the
suffering, the weakness and the want which are often our lot and our portion.

"Of few days," then the sooner we shall be in Heaven. So much the nearer are yon
gates of pearl; so much the sooner yon streets of gold to be trodden by our
feet; so much the sooner shall the crown encircle these brows. It seems to me
that the bell rings out a marriage peal, the very bridal of our souls with
Christ in the new Jerusalem. Man that is born of a woman, banished from his
Saviour, is banished but for a few days. Man that is born of a woman, being
twice-born through the Holy Spirit, is but a little while in the furnace; he
shall be for ever in the paradise of God. Who wishes to lengthen out a life
which detains us from a face-to-face view of Christ? There are reasons for
wishing it long—reasons of self-denying service, but, oh—

Our heart is with Him on His throne, And ill can brook delay;

Each moment listening for the voice, "Make haste and come away."

As the bride desireth the marriage day, our soul desireth the bridegroom, even
Jesus. As the child longeth for the home-bringing when the school days are done,
arid the rest-hours of home are come, so our hearts, when in a right mind, long
for the coming of the Lord. Glory be to His name, for it is true, "Man is of few
days." And one other thought comes over my mind here, and it is this: Ought not
this to make us feel the more deeply indebted to the matchless love of God that,
though we are of few days, the love which deals with us is not? It never had a
beginning; it never will have an end. From everlasting to everlasting God loved
His people. Oh that everlasting love should be set upon a mortal man! Oh that
the long ages ere this world was made should yet be witness to our names! Think
of it. Ere suns began to shine, or the day-star knew its place, we were even
then dear to the heart of God. Christ loved us then; for has He not said, "As
the Father hath loved Me, so have I loved you," and that is without beginning,
without end, without measure, without limit, without bounds, without change. Oh,
then to think that we should be objects of such love as that makes the few days
of this mortal life glow with glory as the bush in Horeb glowed with the
presence of Deity.

Now, let us take the second half of our text, and that briefly. "Man that is
born of a woman is of few days and full of trouble." "Full of trouble." Is not
that a doleful sound? And alas! the fact is as dolorous as the sound; for if you
turn over the experience of good men and all men you shall find that there is no
lack of trouble. The roll of trouble is like Ezekiel's roll, written within and
without full of lamentations and mourning and woe. Sometimes we have troubles of
the country, and wars and rumours of war, or poverty and famine, or sin and
wickedness in our streets. Then we have the troubles of the Church, the heresy,
the schism, the divisions among brethren, the heart-burnings against each other,
the coldness towards God, the lukewarmness to Christ. And then we meet with
troubles outside in the world, the battling for existence with some, the trouble
of getting the trouble of spending, the trouble of keeping, the trouble of
losing, troubles on all sides, in the shop and in the field, troubles that come
to us in the bed-chamber, that walk arm-in-arm with us in the streets and follow
us to the retirement of the woods. There is no place free from them. A good old
Puritan divides the troubles thus: ''There are troubles in doing our duty,
troubles for doing our duty, troubles in not doing what is our duty, and
troubles in doing what is not our duty." And truly every man has met with
these—troubles in doing our duty, striving against flesh and blood, fighting
against inward temptations and Satan and defying the world; troubles for doing
our duty, coldness and ill-treatment, crosses and losses that come necessarily
to those who walk uprightly. And then troubles for not doing our duty, which are
far sharper and which come upon God's servants for omissions and commissions,
for the Master's will, known and not obeyed, for the Master's will not known and
not obeyed—many stripes and few stripes, but still stripes all the journey
through. And then troubles for doing what is not our duty, viz., running into
this or that which is aside from the straight path of the upright. How many
troubles do we bring upon ourselves in that way? There are troubles within and
troubles without, troubles that come to you while you are active, troubles that
besiege you while you lie passive upon the bed of pain—the troubles of our
childhood, which I believe are not quite so light as some think them to be.
There is a fiction that children have the happiest days: I know I had not. I do
not know how many are able to bear witness to the same. There are troubles of
youth, troubles of manhood, and troubles of old age. In fact, "the Christian
man," as John Bunyan says in his quaint ballad—

... is seldom long at ease, When one trouble's gone, another doth him seize.

Temptations of all sorts and sizes await the followers of the Lamb of God. If
others can be without trouble, they shall not be, because they are God's people.
God had one Son without sin; He never had a son without affliction, and He never
will have.

III.

What is the lesson from all this? If we are full of trouble, let us reflect that
there is plenty of weaning going on, and this we ought to be glad of. We are so
fond of the nest here that we should never fly from it, only thorns are getting
numerous, and we shall fly soon. Here are knives that cut the ropes that hold
us. We shall begin to mount, for God's grace has made us buoyant. Only let us
get loose, and we will go away to our own company in the skies. If we are
getting settled on our lees, let us thank God because we have abundance of
trouble. Then the joy is that we shall have abundance of consolation, for it is
a well-known rule of the kingdom that, as our troubles abound, even so shall our
consolations abound by Jesus Christ. Who would not be glad to have the trouble
for the sake of the consolation; for the precious Balm of Gilead not only heals
and takes away the pain, but it gives positive pleasure. We always gain by our
losses when we walk with God. We get richer through being poorer, and healthier
through being sick. So, be willing to have rough winds, for they shall bring us
soft winds. When God intends to send His servant a diamond more valuable than
usual, He does it up in a black envelope. At first it alarms us, and we think it
something terrible, but, when we open it, we find such a sparkling love token
that our fears disappear. Here is the comfort of it: we have fuller
opportunities of experiencing the truth of the promises of God. Some promises
would not be worth a farthing to us if we were in circumstances that did not
require them to be fulfilled. Half the Bible would be useless to us if we never
had to meet a temptation. Doctor Affliction is the best expositor of Scripture.
I can recommend you Dr. Gill and Dr. Adam Clarke and many others, but if you
want to understand the Word of God you must go to the school of trial. They say
you can see the stars when you are down a well when you cannot see them up
above, and many a starry promise shines out to a soul that is down in the deeps
if affliction. Sympathetic ink does not show a bit till it is held to the fire,
and often the promises are written in such ink: you must hold them to the fire
of trial, and then the meaning appears, and you rejoice in it.

Once more—and I think this is a sweet note from, such a harsh-sounding bell—if
we are full of trouble, we are full of opportunities for understanding our
suffering Lord; we are full of occasions for knowing the heights and depths of
His love that passeth knowledge. If I were to go to Heaven without ever having a
trouble, why, how strangely ignorant must I be there! I should hear the sacred
ones speaking to one another of the sufferings of their Lord, and I should have
to say, "What do they mean? I never had these sufferings."' I hear them speaking
of pain, and I say, "Pain! I never knew pain! "I hear them talk about poverty
and want and depression of spirit and about crying, "My God, My God, why hast
Thou forsaken Me? '' and I stand and look on in wonder and say, "What does it
all mean?" But now the blessed scholars of the school of affliction, as they
come to heaven, are entrapped by the angels and asked what it means, and they
tell unto the principalities and powers in heavenly places the manifold wisdom
of God. We have fellowship with Christ in His sufferings, and who does not wish
to have full fellowship with Christ in them? Hence I feel very little sympathy
with brethren who do not wish to die. I am ready to do what the Lord wills, but
I would rather die, bearing on this forehead the death-seal, even as the Master
did, that up there I may be amongst those risen from the dead, as He was, and
have fellowship with Him who is the first-born from the dead. Certainly, those
that are alive and remain shall have no preference, but I think that those who
fall asleep will have a preference beyond them in that respect at any rate. Well
then, let us rejoice and glory in tribulation also, and write down amongst the
good things of God's gift in the covenant, amongst the things present and the
things to come which are ours, our trials and the troubles of which our life is
full.

Now, let us close by noticing the two together. I should like to hear these two
bells ring together. If there is any roughness in one of them apart, ring them
together, and you take it off. For instance, "Man that is born of a woman is of
few days." Well, who wants to be of many days if they are full of trouble? Now,
take it the other way: "Man that is full of trouble is of few days." Supposing
it be thus, "Man is of few days and full of joy." What a clash! What a clash! A
man says, "Then let me live." Full of joy! How it damps it all! Let a fight end
as soon as you will, but a feast—let it continue. Must that lamp which shines so
brightly go out soon and leave nothing but a smell of smoking flax? Ah! then the
light itself is dimmed because it burns so short a time. But shortness of life
becomes a blessing if it is full of trouble, and when life is short trouble
itself Seemeth to be congruous with it because it is so great a mercy that we
are not to live for ever in the land of trouble. I like the two together. And
then when I contrast them with the next life, man that is born of the Spirit is
of eternal immortality and full of joy, the heart comes away from the gloomy
text like a wedding guest at a banquet full of rejoicing, blessing the name of
the Lord, and so do you too, brethren, every one of you, for Christ's sake.
Amen.


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  CHAPTER 11: 10. THE GLORY OF THE GRACE OF GOD
========================================================================

X. The Glory of the Grace of God The glory of His grace.—(Ephesians 1:6.)

Grace! It is the subject of the Bible all through. You will tell me that the
Bible speaks of the Fall of Man. Yes, and it does so that it may put a black
foil for the bright jewel of grace. You will remind me that the Scripture speaks
of the depravity of the human heart and of the corruptions of the various
portions of our race.. Most true again. I would say it treats of the disease
that it might employ the remedy. Sin and depravity are brought to light in order
that we may see what grace it is that forgives sin and overcomes the depravity
of our nature. This whole Book is a volume upon grace. You cannot find a single
part of it that does not more or less bear upon that subject. It is true that it
treats of the law, but the law is our schoolmaster to bring us to the school of
grace, and while the commandment is exceeding broad and strict it only shows how
great is the grace of God which forgives so many sins, and which, at the same
time, works in us to will and to do according to God's good pleasure. Yes, the
subject of the Bible is grace. Up in Heaven they sing of His grace, and here
below on earth we have no sweeter song than that which tells us of the glory of
the grace of God. I have a subject which cheers my own heart to speak upon; if
there should be no eloquence and even little fluency, the subject is itself
eloquent, and he that feels it in his heart will be sure to know how sweetly
living waters flow from it.

Now let us speak of the glory of God's grace, first noticing the qualities of
that grace in which its glory may be seen. We will dwell on that first. There
are certain qualities in divine grace which are its glory. And surely the first
is its freeness. We are accustomed to say "free grace," and I have heard some
quarrel with it because it is a redundancy. If it is grace it must be free. That
is very true; but there are certain gentlemen that have a kind of grace that is
not free. Therefore I go in for the redundancy, and I venture to say "free
grace," that there may be no mistake about it. We sometimes, in common language,
speak of a thing as "free, gratis, and for nothing." Well, I will even take the
triplet and say that of the grace of God—that it is free, gratis, and for
nothing, and that is the glory of it—the freeness of the grace of God. Why, see
how free it is. It comes to men that never sought it. It came to any of us, who
received it, long before we sought it or could seek it, for it came to us before
we were born. Christ Jesus died for sinners before they lived on earth, many of
them. We were certainly redeemed by the precious blood before we had actually
fallen into sin, so that grace had the start of our existence—much more of our
seeking it. But indeed, brethren, when we sought the Lord, though we did not
know it, the Lord had sought us long before. There had been a work of His Spirit
upon our hearts when we did not know it. We thought that we said, "I will arise
and go unto my Father." So we did; but there was another parable, if you
remember, before the one that speaks of the return of the prodigal son, and that
tells us of a piece of money that was lost, which could not find itself, and the
house had to be swept and the candle to be lit that it might be found; we are
told of a sheep that never thought of coming back, as sheep seldom do, but the
shepherd had to go after it and find it and lay it upon his shoulder. Yes, in
all cases when we come to God it is because God first came to us. And the
freeness of this grace is manifested from the fact that it comes to very
unlikely persons. That verse was most truthful—

It is Thy boast, Into unlikeliest hearts to come, The glory of Thy light to find
In darkest spots a home.

Why, the grace of God has come to persons who have been abandoned in character,
and it has reclaimed them. It has come to those who have been blasphemous and
profane, and yet it has renewed their hearts. It has come to persecutors, to
those desperately set on mischief and arrested them in their madness, sobered
and renewed them and made them to be servants of the very Master whom once they
opposed. It is free indeed when it comes to such as these. And I count it very
free indeed that it should have come to me, for though, perhaps, I might put
myself, as many of you would, among those whose outward lives could not have
been considered to be so desperately wicked, yet, what with the pride of our
hearts, the self-righteousness of our natures, and the stubbornness of our wills
and the reluctancy of our souls to close in with Christ, having sinned against
so much light and so much knowledge, the wonder is that God did not leave us to
choose our own delusion. It was a marvel of grace that we should have become the
subjects of it! And I think I speak the mind of my brethren and sisters in
Christ if I say that if there were no other instance on record of the
sovereignty of divine grace, each one of us would claim to be a record in the
matter. It was sovereign grace that chose us and looked upon us.

I.

Now I am so glad to have this to say, because I do not see why the grace of God
should not look on some here to-night—some of the most unlikely people. Did you
come here to get something to laugh at? The grace of God may send you away
weeping for your sins. I pray it may. Did you come in here after having misspent
the rest of the day and many previous Sabbaths too, and do you think you are
never likely to be converted? Come, Thou eternal Spirit, come. As the
lightning's flash strikes the loftiest oak, come Thou and split the heart in
twain with irresistible force! O God of love, Thou hast but to stretch out Thy
sceptre and the most rebellious heart must yield to Thee. Let it be so, and
glory shall be given to Thy grace. The first point, then, is its freeness. But
the next is its omnipotence, for, wherever the grace of God comes it is
omnipotent grace. I do not say it is always put forth omnipotently, for the
Spirit of God sometimes works without putting forth all His strength and then
men resist Him, ay, and successfully resist Him too. "Ye do always resist the
Holy Spirit, as did also your fathers," said Stephen of old. There is such a
thing as striving against Him; and He will not always strive with men. But when
the Spirit of God comes forth with the power of divine grace, then there is no
longer any resistance. It is not that the man could not still resist if he
would, but it is that he would not if he could, for when grace comes it changes
the nature and transforms the heart. I suppose it operates somewhat in this way:
the man is prejudiced, but when grace comes if takes away his prejudice. His
understanding is darkened: he thinks that bitter is sweet and sweet bitter;
grace comes and he sees clearly, knows the bitter to be bitter and the sweet to
be sweet. Then at once, his understanding being enlightened, his will becomes
affected, for a man does not naturally will towards that which he feels will be
to himself evil; but now, knowing that such a thing would be evil he wills to
leave it, and knowing now that such a thing is good, being taught by the Spirit,
he wills to seek that which he knows to be good to himself. The will thus
becomes tutored and trained. The bit is put into the mouth of the will—the most
stubborn of all things. No sword can come at some men's wills. They are like
Leviathans: they laugh at the spear: the sword comes not at them, but when the
Eternal lays to His mighty sword, how he drives through Leviathan's scales and
brings down his pride and glory. We have seen some great sinners that never
trembled before shake like aspen leaves when the wind of the Eternal Spirit has
blown upon them. There is nothing that the power of eternal grace cannot
overcome. And when the will is subdued the affections go in a different channel.

If some traveller were to come home some day and tell us that while looking at
the waters of Niagara he had suddenly seen the waters leap upward, instead of
down, and the whole of the rivers began to flow towards the lakes, we should not
credit it. But if it were true, it would not be so great a miracle as when a
man's entire nature that has been rushing down to the sea of destruction with
great leaps, with cataracts of evil, is suddenly turned the other way and made
to seek God, the God from whom he so impetuously fled. Yes, the grace of God can
do that, and that is one of the glories of grace. If a man be so bad that only
the devil himself is worse, yet the grace of God can renew him. If his heart be
as cold as an iceberg and as hard as an adamant stone, yet can the grace of God
thaw him and break him; and though his nature be as a dreary Sahara with its
burning sand, if Death has marched over it and destroyed whatever of life may
once have been in it, yet God's Spirit may come and make the desert to blossom
like Sharon, ay, like the garden of the Lord. This is, then, another part of the
glory of that grace: it is free: it is omnipotent.

Another part of its glory lies in this, that it is always consistent with the
other attributes of God. The grace of God never interferes with any other of the
great characteristics of the Most High. You have heard some blunderers say that
if God does not pardon sin without an atonement there is no grace in it. Poor
fools! It is grace the more transcendently displayed, because, in the wisdom of
God, grace full-orbed is not permitted to eclipse any other attribute of Deity.
Observe, God is just.. God might be merciful at the expense of justice, but I
question whether it would be mercy, for it is not mercy to a community to let
off a criminal. I am not sure that our lives are any safer because certain
murderers of late, for whom I could not see any reason for mercy, have been
exempted from the rights of justice. I am not sure your houses would be more
safe at night or our brethren in the street if the judges were to suffer the
burglars and garroters to go free without punishment. It would be a mercy to
them, perhaps, but not to us. Now, God's mercy is mercy and truly so, and does
not interfere with justice, for God is as just in the case of every forgiven
sinner as He would have been if that sinner had been cast into hell. The
vengeance on that sinner has been borne by Jesus Christ. The Son of God has paid
the debt, and therefore the sinner is discharged. It was grace that gave the
sinner such a Saviour; but it is the very glory of grace that it is perfectly
consistent with the sternest justice. So is the grace of God consistent with
divine truth. If God had to take back a word He had ever spoken in order to save
men, it would be a great misfortune; for God cannot be suspected of falsehood or
of suffering His word to fall to the ground. If He were, the foundations of
society would be loosened, and the world would be greatly the loser by it,
however much the mercy might be praised up by some. But there is no threatening
of God's justice violated; there is no single word which has gone forth out of
His mouth but which has been met by its fulfilment. The laws, like the laws of
the Medes and Persians, have never been altered, but a new law has come in over
the rest of which God, without interfering with the former, has certainly been
true. And certainly it is consistent with holiness.. If you meet with a man who
says, "I have the grace of God, and therefore live in such and such a sin," the
man speaks falsely. The grace of God never was the father of any sin, ay, and
never will be! The apostle says of some who declared that they lived in sin that
grace might abound that their damnation was just—as if he meant to say,
"Everybody knows, and everybody can see with half an eye that their damnation is
strict justice." No, the grace of God has never in this world caused a man to do
wrong to his fellow-men, nor to do wrong towards his God. It has a holy
influence wherever it comes, and when it has full-play it sanctifies the heart
that comes under its power and makes it perfect—taking it away to Heaven. And
let me say that the grace of God is always consistent with divine goodness. I
mean this, that though the grace of God does not come alike to all men, that
there are some men who receive it and are saved by it while others perish in
their sins—yet the grace of God never has done an injustice to any man. There
will be no man at God's bar at last that will be able to charge Him with
partialities. It is very easy to fling that word about now, but it shall not be
so then. There shall be no sinner with a valid excuse. There shall be no sinner
that can lay his sin on God's back or his ruin at the feet of the Most High.
Every soul saved shall glorify the grace of God, but there will not be in the
salvation of that soul a single infringement upon the benevolence of God or His
strict justice towards the sons of men. He knows how that may be done. We may
not be able to justify His ways to men: we are content to give Paul's answer,
"Nay but, O man, who art thou that repliest against God?"

II.

Now, another point. It is a part, as I believe, of the glory of divine grace
that it is immutable.. Certain brethren think that God's grace comes to men and
then leaves them. We have not so learned Christ. Where the grace of God
begins—effectually begins and the heart of the man is really changed, the work
which has been begun will be completed. There will be much opposition to that
completion from the flesh and from temptations from without and from Satan; but
he that began to build is not a vain builder who cannot finish. He that goeth
out to this war is not one whose forces are too weak to encounter the gigantic
enemy. Bless the Lord, O my soul! Thou hast to deal with an immutable Jehovah!
"I am God! I change not; therefore ye sons of Jacob are not consumed." The grace
that can be lost is a grace well lost. The only grace worth having is the grace
which, when it takes hold of us, never lets us go, but lands us safely in glory,
according to that ancient promise, "The Lord will give grace and glory. No good
thing will He withhold from them that walk uprightly."

One other feature of this grace is its all-sufficiency. It is the glory of grace
that it meets every want of the sinner. If the sinner is dead, it gives him
life; if he be filthy, it gives him washing; if he be naked, it gives him
clothing. Is the sinner hungry? It feeds him. Is he thirsty? It gives him drink.
Do the sinner's wants grow even larger after he becomes a saint, or has he a
deeper apprehension of them? Then the supplies are just as deep as his
necessity. Bottomless mkies are the treasures of divine grace:—

Deep as our helpless miseries are, And boundless as our sins.

You will never get to a point where grace will fail you—never come to an
extremity where you will have to say, "Here, at last, the arm of grace is
palsied, and I must look elsewhere for succour." Oh, no, from this spot to the
brink of Jordan and through the Jordan and up to the great white throne of
judgment, and through the judgment, and until body and soul, re-married in a
splendid marriage for eternity, shall sit down at the wedding feast above—till
then there shall be no failures in grace, nor shall we ever have to think of it
as otherwise than all-sufficient.

Thus we have briefly run over a few of the characteristics which are the glory
of divine grace. Who would not have such grace as this? And now, secondly, only
a few minutes, we want to talk a little about where the glory of God's grace may
be best seen. I think there are two or three places I could take you to. One is
in the new convert. Just look at him. You see how joyous he is, full of
gladness, and that gladness runs down his cheeks in glistening floods of tears.
Do you know that man? A little while ago that man was wretched and unhappy. A
little farther back than that he was happy, but it was a happiness like the
crackling of a burning thorn: it blazes and it is gone. He used to enjoy the
company of those who talked lasciviously. Possibly he was licentious himself. He
loved the settle in the ale-house; he would be found amongst those who broke the
Sabbath and profaned God's name. Look at him now! He tells you he is pardoned;
he has looked to Christ, and his soul has been lightened, and you can see by the
very look of the man that a very strange change has come over him. He is a new
creature in Christ Jesus. I recollect when such a change came over me. Do not
many of you remember that time? And oh I what the glory of God's grace was to
you! You had been on the brink of hell, and you were saved; you had felt a
sentence of condemnation in your own conscience, and there you were absolved.
Every sin was gone; you were clean as the driven snow; you were accepted in the
Beloved as much as if you had been a saint all our days, instead of a sinner,
and you were perfectly saved by the simple act of faith—faith in the bleeding
Saviour. Oh, there was glory in God's grace that day! And now I will take you to
another spot. The glory of God's grace may often be seen in believers. I have
seen it in believers in their poverty—when they have had to bear much hardship,
but they have not repined but thanked God for what they had. I have seen it in
Christians in their temptations, when, like Joseph, they have said, "How can I
do this great wickedness and sin against God?" I have seen it in believers when
under very heavy trials. Their children have died; perhaps the wife or the
husband has died also, and the one left behind has said, "The Lord gave, and the
Lord hath taken away," and, though it choked them almost to say it, they have
added, "blessed be the name of the Lord." "Though He slay me, yet will I trust
in Him."

Now, that was the glory of God's grace, and I have seen this often, and I trust
you have and felt it too. And how that glory has been seen in the hour of death!
Many and many a time one has stood by the dying bed and envied the departing
saint—envied him, because, though the bones were ready to start through the
skin, he certainly had a happier portion than we had who were in health and
strength. His mind was more resting upon Christ and more in peace, and he seemed
more full of ecstasy and joy. I have heard things from the lips of dying saints
which I never heard from living ones—I mean never anything so choice. Poets have
never been able to rival the mysterious utterances of departing believers when
Heaven has shone right in upon their faces, and they have begun to hear the
singing of the everlasting choirs. Oh yes, grace has been glorious there! And
you read, in the Book of Martyrs, and in other works, how the saints of God have
died—have died on the rack, have died in the dungeon, or have died at the stake,
and yet with all that have gloried in the God of their salvation. Are not these
things written in the Book of the wars of the Lord! There can ye see what He
hath done, making them strong and for the timid in making them brave. Recollect
the name of Anne Askew, sitting down on cold damp slabs, when they had racked
her till there was not a single bone in her frame but was full of pain.

I am not she that list My anchor to let fall For every drizzling mist; My ship's
substantial.

She felt that God was in her heart. She called the rack and all its mockeries
but a drizzling mist, not storm enough; she felt such scorn for the cruelties
they were able to put upon her. Yes, there is glory in God's grace in such a
case as that. But now I wish I had the power of a Dante or a Milton, and could
bear you into the air away into the region where the Prince of Darkness holds
his court. I would take you away at least to the brink of that drear pit, that
awful prison-house of souls condemned by the justice of the Most High. If you
could stand, and but for a moment see the smoke of their torment and hear the
cries and moans of spirits for ever withered by the breath of justice, I should
then say to you, "That would have been my fate and yours if it had not been for
the grace of God." And as we started back from that dread abyss and dare not
look upon it, and closed our ears to those terrific sounds, we should feel, "O
God! how boundless is Thy grace that has kept us from those dark abodes of woe!"
And then, if some seraph could bear us up to the seventh heaven, and place us
there upon the sea of glass commingled with fire, and we could stand awhile upon
that placid but lustrous deep and hear the harpers harping with their harps, and
receive our own harp and have our own crown put upon our head, as surely we
shall if the grace of God has looked upon us—if we could bow amongst them there
and chant Emmanuel's praise, then too would this thought come into our souls,
"Oh, the glory of this grace that lifts up spirits that might have been damned
to become glorified, and makes immortals that might have been immortal in their
agony to become immortal in their bliss. O glorious grace! Where are the words
with which we can speak of thee! We want our harps, our golden harps, to sing
thy praise; we want the freedom of a spirit that is perfected and gloried in
order to be able to express thy majesty."

III. And now we must close by just a few practical words, in the last place, as
to how we can manifest the glory of this grace. And I would say to every
believer here, the first thing is, let us take care to ascribe our salvation
always to the grace of God. I am always glad when God's people can speak
plainly; there are some of them that can't. I know they are my brethren and
sisters, and I love them for all that, but I don't like to hear them go
stammering and stuttering about the house as some of them do. For there are some
people that cannot say "Grace," but somehow or other there is a sound of "Law"
gets in it. They cannot say "Grace" outright; they mix up the Old Covenant along
with the New. Some seem to know Christ after Moses, and mistake Moses's rod for
Christ's cross. It is a very different thing. I believe in studying theology;
the great necessity for a student is to know the difference between Sinai and
Zion, between Sarah and Hagar, between Jerusalem and Arabia. I want to know what
grace is and what works may be; but you cannot mix them. They are like oil and
water; they won't mix together. If it is of works, it is all works, if it is of
grace, it is all grace. If I am to get to Heaven by my own merit, I must get
there purely and simply by my own merit: I cannot get there partly by merit and
partly by grace. And if grace, it is all grace. A man may trust partly in works
and partly in grace, but he has, as it were, one foot on land and one on sea,
and he will go down certainly. He is between two stools and must go to the
ground. It is grace to begin, grace to go on with and grace to end with, or else
you must not try grace at all, but must try your own works and try to work you
way to Heaven, which you will never do. It will be a grievous failure. Try to
ascribe everything to your God. There are some of God's people who never will do
that till they go to the college where Jonah went to study. A strange college it
was in a lonely region in the depths of the sea. He was in a whale's belly; and
there it was that he became a Calvinist, for he said, "Salvation is of the
Lord." If we could send some of our friends to the same academy, it would be a
great mercy to them. Do try to ascribe salvation—everything—to grace.

Next, let us glory in the grace of God before other people. Don't be ashamed to
tell what God has done for you. Don't be ashamed to own that you know what grace
is, and to tell it out plainly by your lives as well as by your talk; and if you
want to bring glory to the grace of God, live in the energy of it. I am afraid
we are all getting into a sleepy state again. We did have a more lively time.
Some little while ago revivals were pretty common. They were not all of them
good for much, but some of them were, and the Church did seem to pray and be
awake. But now there is a spirit of slumber almost everywhere. There are happy
exceptions, but I am afraid they are few. If we want to glorify God's grace, we
must glorify it in action. We must pray mightily that He will bring in thousands
and tens of thousands into the Christian Church; for Infidelity is opening its
mouth very wide. So, also, Ritualism is doing its very best, and what is wanted
as an answer to both Rationalism and Ritualism is that the grace of God might be
displayed in its mighty power. Oh, that the Lord would save some big sinner,
some great member of Parliament, some priest, some man who has preached false
doctrine! Would God that He would save some big sinner—I repeat the word—some
thief, some drunkard and bring in some whose conversion would astound the sons
of man and make them say, "This is the finger of God." The Lord send it, and He
shall have the praise. But may we all live to the praise of the glory of His
grace.

One thing more, and that is, if we would see the glory of God's grace, let us
believe the truth, let us trust ourselves to it, let us cast our souls upon it.
Sinner, if you will come to Christ, He will not reject you. If you were to come
to God pleading your own works, you must be driven from His presence, but if you
will come and appeal to His mercy and rely upon His grace, He cannot and will
not reject you. He delighteth in mercy. God is more glad to give it than you
will be to have it. It is His heart's joy to bless the sons of men. Seek mercy
to-night through Jesus Christ, and you shall have it. Go to your chamber and cry
mightily. Yea, on the spot may God incline you to put your trust in Jesus, and
you shall find that grace most rich and free will come to you. Even at this
moment perfect pardon for a life of sin is to be had for one look at the
crucified Saviour.

God give us that look, that we may give that look to Christ. Amen and amen!


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  CHAPTER 12: 11. WHEN GOD SPEAKS
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XI. When God Speaks

I will hear what God, the Lord, will speak; for He will speak peace unto His
people, and to His saints; but let them not turn again to folly.—(Psalms 85:8.)

It would be difficult to say how low a true Christian might fall as to inward
grace and as to consolation. I hope none of us will ever make the experiment;
but certain it is that there are times with some Christians when they walk so
carelessly that by-and-bye the joy of their religion departs from them, the
confidence of their faith becomes weakened, their love becomes so dim as to be
like an expiring spark, and they themselves walk in darkness and see no light.
We have known them at such times entertain doubts as to whether they ever had
any religion, whether, after all, they have not been deceived, if not deceivers;
and then at such times their conscience will grievously lash them, reminding
them of the joys they once possessed, of the days when the candle of the Lord
shone round about them, and if they have been highly favoured saints before, so
much the greater will be their anguish of spirit when they seem to hear the Lord
saying, "I will go and return unto My place until they confess their
transgressions. Surely in the days of their affliction they will seek Me
earnestly."

It may be even, and it often is so, and it is a blessing it is so, too, that
while the heart is thus brought down with anguish the hand of God also goes out
against His erring child in providence. We have known the backsliding
Christian's business begin to slack and to fail him. We have known, at the same
moment, sickness come into his family, children have died, the wife has
sickened. Or, perhaps, the hand of God has gone out against his body; there has
been some disease in his person or some damage to his limbs; he has known what
wearisome days and sleepless nights mean. Now, when two seas of inward trial and
of outward affliction meet, the Christian will be awakened to cry unto his God.
If he can continue to sleep then, ay, and if he become provoked against the Most
High, and be led to go from one sin to another and from bad to worse, there will
be in that man a sign of reprobation, not of election; but if he be a child of
God when he feels first of all his own heart smiting him—that is a hard blow—and
then feels God's chastisements smiting him at the same time, he will discover
that he is in a very evil case, and he will lift his eyes up towards his God to
know what he may do to be delivered therefrom. The mercy is that out of this
state there is a way of escape. No child of God ought to sit down contented in
it. It is for every Christian that has lost his first love to seek it again, for
every believer who has descended from his former lofty estate to pine and sigh
and cry until the Lord shall bring him up again, yea, and lift him up to yet a
loftier position than he occupied before. It is not the Lord's will that His
children should be in bondage: it is not at His desire that they are brought
low. Even their affliction He sends unwillingly, for "He doth not grieve the
children of men for nought."

Now, this evening's text will be mainly useful to those who are in the condition
I have indicated; but some of you who are not in that state may lay it by in
store for the possibilities which you may have, and, perhaps, the word spoken
to-night may be in readiness against some evil time which may be drawing near.

Notice that the text divides itself very naturally into three parts. The first
part we shall call the resolution of wisdom :—" I will hear what God the Lord
will speak." The second part is an expectation of confidence:—"For He will speak
peace unto His people and to His saints." But the third is a warning of
prudence:—"But let them not turn again to folly."

I.

First, then, we have before us in the text a resolution of wisdom on the part of
one who desires revival, feeling that he is wandering from God and is suffering
in soul. Notice the resolution:—" I will hear what God the Lord will speak." It
is the man brought up to a dead stand. He has wandered; he has lost his way; he
is in the thick darkness and he stands still. His soul had before been gadding
abroad, and wandering after a thousand objects, but now in his deep distress he
says, "I will wait upon my God. I will hear what God Jehovah will speak.."

There is evidently upon the mind here a sense both of divine majesty, which awes
him, and also of divine faithfulness, which encourages and attracts him. "I will
hear what God the Lord shall speak." I ought to hear what He speaks. Is He not
God? Is He not the self-existent Jehovah, the I Am That I Am? My heart, thou
hast got into this low estate by listening to other voices; thou hast deprived
thyself of comfort by forgetting His promises; thou hast brought thyself into
sin by being unmindful of His commands; thou hast been negligent of His voice of
love and of His voice of rebuke. Stand still now, and be ashamed of thyself, and
be humbled, and from this time close thine ear to all other sounds and resolve
to hear what God the Lord shall speak. You see it is a sense of the authority of
the divine voice that comes over the soul, and therefore it resolves that to
whatever else it shall be deaf it will certainly listen to the voice of God. And
then that same authority seems to prompt the spirit of confidence, for it saith
within itself, "Now I am in this condition—that none can help me but God. No
voice but God's can direct me; no voice but His has power in it to deliver me,
therefore for this very reason I will not wait to hear what anyone else may say,
but I will go direct to God and hear what He has to say. Perhaps if I wait upon
the preacher he may not understand my experience, or he may come without being
sent, and what are a mortal's words if there be no God at the back to inspire
him? I will not run to Christian friends and ask their advice; that may be
useful at some other time, but I have come to this position that nothing will
suit me now but the voice of God. When I have wandered so far, no brother's
voice can call me back: the Father Himself must call me. When I have sunk so low
as to be like Lazarus in his grave, no disciple's voice can call me forth to
newness of life; the Master Himself must speak. Therefore I will hear what God
the Lord shall speak."

Oh, there is great wisdom in this resolution to anyone at any time, but
especially to anyone who knows that he has come into a low state of grace. Dear
brother, dear sister, I know you desire to get out of that condition. Now,
sitting in the pew, let this be your resolve—and may grace sustain you in the
carrying of it out—"I will now hasten to my God; my spirit shall say to Him,
'Speak, Lord, for Thy servant heareth.' I will get me to my first husband,
though I have wandered, for it was better with me then than it is now. I will go
back to my Noah, to my rest, as the dove did, which, though it flew over the
waste of waters, could find no resting place for the sole of its foot. I will go
back to that ark. I will go back to my God. I will hear what God the Lord will
speak." That seems to me the first point in the resolution—the prominence that
it gives to the divine authority and the implicit, though unexpressed,
confidence which is placed in the voice of God, if it be but heard.

Now, let us note, dear brethren and sisters, in trying to carry out this
resolution, that: God speaks to us in various ways, and if we will hear what God
the Lord shall speak we must be attentive to the many voices. Of course, He
speaks to us in His Word. This is the surest light of prophecy, and we do well
to take heed to it. This is the chart of every Christian mariner. These are the
commands of the great captain of our Holy War, and we ought to be more diligent
in reading the Bible—not only in reading more of it—perhaps we do not err
there—but in reading it more solemnly—not reading it with the eyes, as some do,
but reading it with the very soul, sucking in the Scripture as the sponge drinks
in the water, being filled with it to the very full, with holy spiritual thought
after the Word of God.. If you have backslidden, my dear brother, you cannot do
better than become a more constant searcher of Scripture. Say, "I will hear what
God the Lord shall speak. Perhaps I have become discouraged because I did not
hear His promises; perhaps I have grown careless because I did not hear His
admonition; perhaps I have grown weak because I did not receive strength through
feeding upon the manna of His Word: I will, therefore, go to Scripture again and
hear what God the Lord shall speak."

And, beloved, you must also hear that word as it is spoken by God's servants.
Alas, I am afraid there are many Christians who do not care to hear God's word
in the pulpit. I mean this, that in the choice of a ministry they seek after
that which may be fashionable, or attractive, or pleasing to the ear, whereas
the true gauge of a ministry is, Does God speak through it to the soul? If not,
beware of it. Though it be called your own Parish Church, it is no better to be
starved in a Parish Church than anywhere else. Though it may be the meeting
house your fathers always attended, it is no better for your soul to be famished
in the family meeting house than anywhere else. Seek not after the best
garnished, not that which most charms your ear, but that which feeds your soul.
Be resolved that Sundays are too precious to be wasted in listening to displays
of oratory and say, "I will hear what God the Lord shall speak." "Take heed what
you hear," and "Take heed how you hear," for both precepts are equally valuable.
May that be our resolve that we will hear God's voice as it speaks to us from
the ministry. But then the Lord speaks to His people in another way, viz,, in
providence, and I wish we had an ear to hear there. Christians with little
troubles should hear the twigs of the rod, for those that won't hear the twigs
will have to hear the harder part of the rod. If we would hear God whisper we
should not need to hear God thunder. No doubt many of our trials come upon us
severely because lesser trials are of no service. A good physician does not
administer to a patient the most violent drug at first, but, if there must be
medicine, he begins with that which is weaker, for, perhaps, that may meet the
case. But, if not, sooner than the patient should die, he will be sure to give
the most violent medicines he can. And it is so with God. He dealeth tenderly
with us. "Be not as the horse or as the mule which have no understanding, whose
mouth must be held in with bit and bridle lest they come near unto thee." For
many sorrows must be with the wicked. If we were not so prone to go with the
wicked our sorrows might be less. Let us ask God in every providence, "Lord,
what dost Thou mean by this?" for providence is like a hieroglyphic from
God—only some eyes can make out the meaning. God writes to us in everything that
happens to us through the day. Not without God doth anything happen, and God
doth nothing without a meaning. Now, very frequently, if a man would read, he
might read his sin in his chastisement. He might discover wherein he had erred
by the very form of the chastisements that came upon him. May we have grace,
then, since there are ways of understanding God's meaning, to find it out and to
profit by it. "I will hear what God the Lord will speak."

Besides that, God has a voice in our hearts. There is a voice in His withdrawing
from us. Have you lost the light of God's countenance? He need not speak: there
is a voice in that. What doth He say but this, "I cannot walk with thee, for
thou dost not walk with Me aright. Have I not said, 'With the forward I will
show Myself forward? Can two walk together except they be agreed?' "The Lord, in
leaving you to yourself, is paying, "Thou hast trusted too much to thyself. Thou
didst try to do without Me. Now see how thou canst! I leave thee to thyself that
thou mayest discover how weak a thing is an arm of flesh." And truly there may
be often heard in the heart, if we listen to it, the voice of God's Spirit
suggesting many things. I do believe the Spirit of God brings constantly to our
view all the things within us and all the things of Christ for us; but, alas!
there are some spirits that do not seem to be susceptible to the motions of the
Holy Spirit at all. The Lord deliver us from that spiritual hardness of heart!
"I will hear what God the Lord shall speak."

Now, as God speaks in different ways, so He also speaks in different tones, and
it should be ours to desire to hear His voice in whatever tones He addresses us.
Sometimes it is with rebuke, "My child, thou hast erred; thou hast gone astray;
thou hast grieved My Spirit." Hear it! Hear it! Though the sound pierce through
your heart, hear it. Who is there among you that desireth to be negligent at the
rebuking voice of God? For if you are so, you will go into greater evil, and
then, instead of rebukes, the Lord will have to use His rod to thee. It is
always well for us to be willing to read and hear that which searches and tries
us rather than that which continually comforts us. I know some hearers who
always want sweet promises to be expounded. These are like little children that
must always have sweets in their mouths, but wise men know that this is not the
best of health. A tonic often does us good, and a soul-searching ministry is
that which our soul should seek after. Be willing to hear God speak, though He
speak no sweet things, but sharp things that go through and through your soul.
At the same time the Lord does speak very encouragingly and sweetly, and we
ought to be just as willing to hear. You say, "Of course, we are," but I reply
that there are some who are not; for there are children of God in a certain
state who always put all encouragements away. Their soul abhorreth all manner of
meat. If it be encouraging, "Oh," they say, "it can't be for me! It's too good
to be true." Say not so, dear brother, but, rather, resolve, "I will hear what
God the Lord will speak. As I would have heard Him had He spoken roughly to me,
much more if He speaks sweetly to me will I give my ear and my heart to Him: let
Him say what he will." And we ought especially to hear the Lord when we are in a
sad condition if He speaks in a directing, teaching manner. No doubt many
believers might rise into a refreshed state and again enjoy light and liberty,
if they minded the directions of the Gospel. Sometimes a forgotten duty will be
just like a decayed bone in the system, or a sin—perhaps a sin not known to be a
sin—will be like a thorn in the foot which had not been perceived until it lamed
the traveller. None of us know how much we may lose every day through neglecting
to do the Lord's will in some point which we have considered to be
non-essential. Every Christian duty is essential, not to salvation, but to
consolation, and the omission of any known, aye, and I will say any unknown duty
may involve great loss to us. It is ours, therefore, always to be saying, "Lord,
tell me what I ought to be in any other point, and I will hear what Thou shalt
have to say to me."

Now, I must note for a second or two how we ought to hear what God speaks to us.
When the Psalmist said, "I will hear what God the Lord will speak," he did not
mean, "I will casually hear it, as men hear a story in the streets," but, "I
will hear it attentively, incline my ear to it, drink it in, hear it
distinctively. I will detect the difference between man's voice and God's voice.
I will not be misled by the human gloss, but I will hear the divine text; I will
hear, separating as a sieve the chaff from the wheat, the precious from the
vile, and I will hear with discrimination, and when I have heard it I will hear
it with submission. If it be God's voice, I will not cavil at it. If the Lord
shall say it, it shall not be for me to question. Has He said it? It must be
right. And then I will hear it obediently. Whatever His word is, by His grace I
will do as He bids me. If He saith, 'Go!' I will go; if He saith, 'Stay!' I will
stay."

I tell you, brethren and sisters, a man is not far from a very gracious state of
soul-revival when he can use the words of the text in the sense which I have put
upon them. If he be resolved now henceforth to be obedient unto the Word of God,
it is not long before his brightness shall break forth as the morning and His
glory as a lamp that burneth. He that stands in the thick darkness in the midst
of a tempest in the mire, the deep waters all around him, yet standeth in a
blessed and a hopeful state, if upon his heart and upon his tongue there are
these gracious words, "I will hear what God the Lord shall speak," May that be
the resolve of everyone here, for it is a personal resolve—"I will hear, if
others do not: if there shall be no general revival of religion, no desire after
it, yet I will hear what God the Lord shall speak. I will not be a mere talker;
I will not merely enter into Christian conversation; I will not even work on
with a deaf ear, but I will submit myself in quiet and bow before my Saviour.
With Mary, I will sit at the Master's feet. This shall be my happy choice
henceforth." So much for this wise resolve.

II.

Now, secondly, we have in our text an expectation of confidence—"For He will
speak peace unto His people and to His saints." What a charming sentence that
is! How full of joy! How it makes the heart leap! "I will hear what God the Lord
will speak, for He will speak peace." No dreadful things after all! Though He
speak rebukingly, though He speak in tones of thunder, yet the sum and
substance, the drift and end of what He will have to say shall be peace to His
people and to His saints.

I find that the word here might be rendered "prosperity." We will render it so,
putting "peace" with it. "God will speak peace and prosperity to His saints ere
long." And, dear brethren, is not this certain? Must not God speak peace to His
people, for is it not their portion? Is not peace given to them in the covenant?
Let us go back again to where we were. Then God must give peace and prosperity
to His children because it is guaranteed to them in the covenant of grace. Jesus
Christ left it to them as a legacy, "Peace I leave with you; My peace I give
unto you: not as the world giveth give I unto you." And I cannot believe that
the Holy Father will hold back from His people the legacy which His own Son has
given to them. Oh, no, every drop of the blood of Jesus pleads for peace. All
His wounds speak and plead for the prosperity of His people; and, therefore,
surely, the Lord will visit us again and bring us up even from the depths of the
sea.

Moreover, is it not God's will that His people should be full of peace and
happiness? Think you He delights to see His people cast down and unhappy and
declining and back sliding? Far from it. As a father delights in the healthiness
of his son, so does our Father delight in our prosperity. In asking, therefore,
for that which we know it will be His delight to give, we may ask with perfect
confidence. "He will speak peace unto His people." And is it not for His own
glory? Can it ever be for God's glory for His people to go downcast and weak and
trembling, to lead useless and doubtful lives and to have "Ichabod" written upon
the walls of His Church? And shall His mighty Zion, which ought to be the glory
of all lands, become dishonoured, and His mighty name blasphemed thereby? No,
beloved, it is for God's glory that His people shall arise and shine. The dead
shall not praise God; those that go down into the pit shall not give Him thanks.
If He deliver the soul of His turtle-dove to his adversaries, those adversaries
will not praise Him. If He forsake His people that will not enrich Him; if He
withdraw His mercy, that will not honour Him. On the contrary, to lift up the
hands that hang down, and to confirm the feeble knees, will produce many a
joyous song of praise and fill both earth and heaven with hallelujahs.
Therefore, since it is for God's glory, we may rest assured He will speak peace
unto His people.

Now, Satan will be saying to some of you who have gone astray and backslidden,
"The Lord will never have another good word for you. You have left Him, forsaken
Him: His wrath is hot against you." Beloved, believe not every spirit, and
especially believe not the evil spirit, for, be assured of this one thing, that
the Lord who loved His people once loves them once for all. They say, "If a
woman leave her husband and commit adultery, shall he return unto her again?
Shall not the land be polluted?" These are the words of God Himself. "Yet,"
saith he "Return!" Oh, glorious grace! He represents the soul of His servant as
having committed the foulest of transgressions, and yet He says, "I am married
unto thee, saith the Lord. Return, ye backsliding children! "

Oh, may we feel that there is hope; that however low we may have fallen, there
still is hope. Surely, if God meant to cast away His servants, He would have
cast away some of us long ago; but He has restored our souls, and He will
restore your soul and lead it in the way of righteousness, for His name's sake.
Go to Him, go to Him with the resolve of our text, "I will hear what God the
Lord shall speak," and He will speak to you—not words that shall say, "Depart,
ye cursed," but He will put words into your mouth, and teach you to confess your
sin and to humble yourself before Him, and then He will apply His promise with
power to your soul.

III.

Now a third point of the text is a caution to prudence: "But let them not turn
again to folly." Should your Lord visit you again, drive Him not away. Should
you ever be restored to your former joy and peace, it will behove you to walk
very carefully and guard your restored treasure with a double jealousy. It was
folly, first of all, when you turned to sin. Sin is always folly. Now and then,
men in business think that to do wrong will be a prudent thing under the
circumstances; but sin is always folly. Sometimes it looks as if to lower the
rigid standard of duty might, perhaps, be prudent for the occasion; but sin is
always folly—always folly—and they that sin find it to be so. When their God is
gone, when the light of the Saviour's love is hidden, when the Spirit of God no
longer quickens them to joy and strength, then they know that sin is folly. But
let not the man that is restored from that folly go back to it again. When a
child has eaten something which it has found in the fields which looked like a
sweet berry and turns out to be poisoning, if after weeks of sickness it is
still saved, even that child would have wisdom not to go back again to that.
Master Bunyan represents young Matthew and others as eating some plums which
grew in the devil's garden. The boughs hung over the wall where the pilgrims
went, and he tells us how sick he was and long ill. We do not find that he went
to eat of those plums again. "Let him not turn again to folly." We say, "a burnt
child dreads the fire." There are some that burn their fingers first, and go and
burn their arms afterwards. I know some professors who smarted under a sin at
the beginning, and began to feel they were sliding little by little, and yet
they have gone into it worse and worse, pursued it farther and farther, not only
turning again to folly, but, as it were, being two fools in one, for he who,
being a fool once, has learnt he was a fool, and then goes back to play the fool
again is a fool with an emphasis. May we be delivered from ever turning again to
such folly. But I think I hear one of you say, "If ever I am restored and
brought into full liberty, ever once again sit at the banquet of wine with the
King and lean my head upon His bosom, I will never turn to folly again." "Thou
art already foolish; thou speakest as one of the foolish women speak!" as job
said to his wife. Why, man, if God were to catch thee up into the third heaven,
and then put thee down on earth again and leave thee one minute to thyself, thou
wouldst play the fool with the worst of beings. There is no sin of which men
would not be capable, if the Lord left them to themselves. The caution is
needed: "Let them not turn again to folly." Nay," says one, "I am cured of one
sin; I shall never go into that." It is where thou thinkest thyself to be best
cured that disease is most likely to break out again. Wherever thou canst say,
"I am safe," be sure thou art in danger. Where thou hast a fear and trembling,
there thou art probably secure, but where thou art carnally secured there it is
that the evil comes. "Whereas thou sayest, I am rich and increased in goods,
thou art naked and poor and miserable." From the very fact that thou boastest,
thy glorying is not good, but is folly. "Let him not turn again to1 folly." But
there might be something plaintive in this in the dear Redeemer. When His sheep
has gone astray, and He has gone weary miles to find it and brings it back upon
His shoulders and puts it down, He might well say, "My sheep, turn not again to
wander." To the prodigal restored to his father's house with a ring upon his
finger and with shoes upon his feet, surely it might be said by a father's
affectionate and anxious heart, "My son, turn not again to folly. Already thy
follies have grieved thy Lord, have grieved His Church, have caused His name to
be blasphemed, have robbed thee of the light of God's countenance and brought
grey hairs upon thee here and there and spiritual debility. Wilt thou turn again
to folly? Thou hast tasted the poisoned cup and thou knowest there is bitterness
in the dregs thereof: wilt thou turn again to folly?"

I feel as if I could stand here and plead with the tears in my own eyes with
some members of Christian churches who did once run well, and then slipped, but
have been set up again and persevered for a long time, but begin to be slack
again. Was not once enough? Why, the times past, before your conversion, might
have sufficed thee to have wrought the will of the flesh: why wilt thou go back
to work that will a second time? Having been forgiven, wilt thou turn again to
folly? "Thus saith the Lord, What hast thou to do in the way of Egypt to drink
the waters of Sihor, or what hast thou to do in the way of Assyria to drink the
waters of the river? Turn thou unto the Lord, for He shall give thee to drink of
the waters of life, clear as crystal! Why gaddest thou about so much to change
thy ways? Go to them not, but follow Him, and keep close in the footprints of
thy Saviour." "Let him not turn again to folly."

What was the folly? I will hope it was not some gross folly, some sin of the
flesh. Oh, by the blood of Jesus, be thou clean from that! And if it was thy
pride, if it was thy angry temper that broke loose, if it was thy self-reliance,
if it was thy worldliness, if it was thy love of dress—whatever it was (I will
not go into details)—turn not again to folly. Oh, mark that sin! mark that sin.
It has cost thee too much already. Turn not to that again. Thou wilt not a
second time plead that thou wast deceived. "Surely in vain is the net spread in
the sight of any bird." Will the game come into the trap which it knows to be a
trap? The very birds seem wiser than ourselves, if we turn again to folly; and
yet, dear friends, we need to turn this into a prayer, and while God saith to
us, "Let him not turn again to folly," we have need to say it again, altering
only one word, "Let me not turn to folly." Oh, how grievious it is to think that
those of us who have borne an honourable character for twenty, thirty, or forty
years may, in five minutes, blast it all, though we may have lived in the esteem
of Christian brethren. One folly like a fly in a pot of ointment may make the
sweetest nard of the apothecary to stink in the nostrils of men. "Hold Thou me
up and I shall be safe!" Infinite Jehovah, preserve Thy servants I We will hear
what Thou speakest. Thou wilt speak prosperity to our souls. Oh, let us not turn
again to folly!

We ask it for Jesus' sake. Amen!


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  CHAPTER 13: 12. IN GOD'S GARDEN OF REST
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XII. In God's Garden of Rest For we which have believed do enter into
rest.—(Hebrews 4:3.)

"Rest" is a blessed golden word. It is the one thing, surely, which the world
seeks after. It may be true that every man seeks after happiness; I question if
it be not equally true that each man seeks after rest. There are some few fiery
spirits who wish not to rest, who seem to be like thunderbolts that must speed
on in their predestinated pathway, and only an incessant and morbid activity
suits them at all; but for the majority of us the expectation of rest is very
sweet, and the enjoyment of it now in the poor measure in which we can get it is
one of our greatest refreshments. The present age needs rest abundantly. Our
fathers travelled by the broad-wheeled waggon, but we are not content, or
scarcely content even with the steam engine. "Faster and faster and faster "the
demands of this world's commerce seem to be. What we have done we must do again,
though it strained us once, and we must do twice as much, and then twice as much
as that. All around us there seem to be louder cries and fiercer demands for yet
greater speed. This it is, I do not doubt, that has filled our lunatic asylums,
that sends many to a premature grave. We have forgotten our resting place, and
become like a rolling thing before a whirlwind that does not rest, and I scarce
know a greater curse that can fall on an age than this. A great many things we
are proud of are by no means improvements. If somebody would contrive an engine
that would do as much and do as well and let us sleep a little longer and rest a
little longer it might be just as well for the general good of poor flesh and
blood. Mental rest the world craves after, for now-a-days everything seems
unsettled. Moorings have been shifted, vessels that seemed to ride at anchor and
had lain there many a day have found their anchorage yielding, and they are
drifting out to sea. New lights, instead of old, are constantly being demanded,
and he that used to teach out of the old Book is now requested not to do
anything of the kind, but to think out of his own head and to give something
better than God's thoughts, plucking up the common flowers of earth and
presenting them to men instead of the stars of heaven, setting up the calf
molten in his own furnace and saying, "These be thy gods, O Israel." Bondage!

Everywhere there is the same unrest. As for spiritual unrest, it is discoverable
by all those who really give any attention to it. Certain grosser minds neglect
their spiritual needs, but those who think and seek after that which is high,
that which is eternal, that which is divinely pure, these are crying still for
rest. Noah's dove was one, but the others fly as a cloud, these doves that seek
rest and find none, and never will find it till they come back to the ark of the
covenant and to the hand of that Noah who is God's rest as well as ours. Do not
we find in men's minds now the belief that they shall get rest somewhere or
other? To speak of common matters, when we are yet young we consider our
schoolboy days to be full of slavery to books. We reckon that when we shall
escape from those we shall get some rest. We have been long undeceived
concerning that, and have found that the cares and business of life make us
almost envy the days when we underwent the drudgery of the school.

I. And now, it may be, we are looking forward. Many a merchant expects when he
has laid by sufficient, a competence being realised, that he shall retire to
some villa in the country, and there get his rest. And yet we meet with aged men
in that condition, and do not find that, after all, they rest; while many never
reach that mature old age in which they expect to go beside the still waters.
Those who do are still complaining, still murmuring, wanting something else; and
still, when their own cares are over, find the cares of children and of
grandchildren depriving them of rest. The notion of some has been that rest was
to be found in a country life. Get away from the noise of traffic, from the
multitudinous habitations of men; get away where nature was still in her virgin
simplicity; and there would be rest; and peasants have been painted to us as
being the very models and portraits of almost beatific bliss. If you go there
and hear their own story you will soon be disenchanted of all idea of any rest
being found there.

Others with, perhaps, somewhat more practical sense, have said, "No, not among
the lowly and poor with very many wants, shall we find rest; but in the higher
circles—there where incomes are counted by thousands, and broad acres can
scarcely be numbered. There is rest." It has not been found to be so, for the
biographies of wealthy men, famous men, learned men, statesmen, have gone far to
show that they were no more restful after their greatest success than they were
before, and that still they cried, "Who will show us any good?" Still their
soul, like the horseleech in the Proverbs, cried "Give, give, give." Insatiable
as the grave, their spirit never could be satisfied with any of these things.

Peradventure there are some here to-night who particularly ask for rest, for
they seem to be inundated with trouble. Wave upon wave, they have been tossed to
and fro. They seem to have only gone from one trial to another. "Rest," say
they, "when is it to come? Working hard from morning to night to earn a scant
pittance, when shall I escape from this drudgery? "

Now, my text is a word of consolation, for, first, it gives the good news. It
tells you that there are some who have rest; and on the strength of it I feel
permitted to give you advice, namely, to urge many here, and to direct them as
well, to the place where they can find rest for their souls. Very briefly
indeed.

First, here is good news. There are some persons that have found rest. "For we
which have believed do enter into rest." Who are these persons? The reply is,
they are not strangers; they are not persons in some remote country; they are
not a people in some ancient golden age long since past; nor are they the sort
of persons who are to walk in the millennial period. No, there are persons here
who have believed and have entered into rest—persons of your age, and your
station in life, and your capacity of mind, persons once guilty of your sins and
still subject to your infirmities. In many cases, let me add, these persons who
have entered into rest are your own relatives. Some of you have a father who has
believed and entered into rest. Many of you have mothers in that happy
condition, and brothers and sisters and kinsfolk of all degrees. They have
believed and have entered into rest. And they are not enthusiastic persons who
tell you what is not true, not fanatical persons whose imagination supplies them
with facts. You know them and esteem them. You live with them; you know that
they are persons of credit; you place every confidence in them; in fact, you
love them. And they will tell you to-night, when you reach home, if you wish to
hear the story—and I trust you may—that they have believed and have entered into
rest. There are many of us now present who without any exaggeration can declare
that since the dear hour which brought us to the Saviour's feet, when grace
enabled us to look to Him and trust in Him, we have, in very deed and of a
truth,, entered into rest.

Now, our text tells us that these people "entered." It points to the gateway,
the pearly gate of this golden garden of the Hesperides. It tells the way to
enter into this Paradise of rest. "We that have believed do enter into rest."
The way to perfect peace with God, with conscience, and with our fellow-men, is
the way of faith; faith in God, faith in what God has revealed, especially faith
in His Son Jesus Christ. He that will have rest must come to the cross-foot,
must there confess his sin and leave it there, must look up and see the
streaming wounds of Emmanuel, and accept the substitutionary sacrifice of the
dying Son of God. He that has done that has entered into rest. He that shall dp
that shall enter into rest. Moses cannot show you the gateway into rest. He can
show you the gate through which Adam was driven when the flaming sword in the
Cherubim's hands guarded the way. That Cherubim stands there still, and his
sword is not sheathed. By the way of works no man can enter into rest, since the
works of all men are deficient, imperfect, and fall short of the demands of God.
But, by the way of trusting, there is an accessible road.

I am sure many here ought to be thankful indeed that there is such a way into
rest, for had it been by the way of works they could not have entered; but by
the way of faith even the sinner can enter and, however defiled he may have
been, he can approach unto the throne of God by the exercise of faith in the
righteousness of another, even the Son of God. It is by believing that we get
rest—by no other means, not by scheming and plotting and planning and thinking
and criticising and judging and doubting and questioning, but by believing—the
submission of the soul to God's truth, the yielding of the heart to God's
salvation. This once done we lie down in green pastures, and are led beside the
still waters.

II.

Now, I have thus spoken of the persons who have found rest, and of the gate by
which they enter the golden garden. They shall tell you—and I will be their
spokesman—something of the walks of that garden, something of those beds of
spices whence they get the fragrance of rest. They will tell you that they find
much of their rest in what they have experienced. They have experienced the
complete pardon of sin, for those who have believed in Jesus are forgiven. A
free pardon is issued from the King of Heaven to every believer in Jesus. Now,
if sin be pardoned we are secure. Even death has no sting. Besides, that is a
precious walk in the garden of rest. Once get sin pardoned, beloved, and how can
you help resting? Your spirit must rejoice when Jesus Christ has washed your
sins away. They have, since that, experienced acceptance in the Beloved, for
whoever believes in Jesus is acceptable to God. God looks upon him with
complacency; He deals with him as a righteous person. And this is no small
privilege—to be acceptable with God. Oh, this is a delightfully cool walk in the
garden of rest, and happy is the man who can walk up and down in it. Pardoned of
sin and accepted in the righteousness of Christ—that man has now experienced an
acquiescence in the divine will. He feels now that the Lord may do what He likes
with him. If He has forgiven him, He may do whatsoever He pleases with him. Now
will he say, "Strike, Lord, for Thou hast forgiven me. I will have no
questionings with Thee, since I have had such proofs of Thy love." And when the
mind is perfectly willing that God should do as He pleases, it cannot but rest.
Now this is no small blessing to have been brought into peace with God through
the forgiveness of sin, through the clothing of the soul with righteousness, and
by the spirit being made cheerfully to submit to the ruling will of God. Blessed
walks are these in this golden garden. And then they tell you that they find
much peace from what they know by faith. Here are some of their secrets. They
who have believed know by faith that God loved them before the world began. They
believe in eternal love—love which never had a beginning. They rejoice to know
they were chosen in Christ from before the foundations of the world. If you knew
that, would not that give you rest? Well, it gives believers rest. They know
also by faith that God loves them immutably; that He cannot love them more and
will not love them less; that His love never changes, and cannot be removed from
its present objects. The people of His choice He cannot, will not cast away.
They know this; they know that change as they may they have an unchangeable God
to deal with. Think you, does not this give them rest?

They also know that the work which saves their soul is a finished work—that it
is not half done, but all done. They are saved. For their pardon there is no
need for a fresh ounce of suffering; for their clothing there is no need of a
fresh thread of righteousness. They are complete in Christ—completely saved, and
they know that, come what may, they never shall be lost. "For there is therefore
now no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus." He has given to His sheep
"eternal life, and they shall never perish, neither shall any pluck them out of
His hands." Do not these things give them rest, think you? Surely if they did
not rest they must be acting inconsistently with the nature and with the reason
of things. They also know by faith that they are one with Christ, joined to Him
as the wife is to the husband, in bonds that never can be snapped, joined to Him
as the member is to the head, for we are members of His body, of His flesh and
of His bones. Oh, what joy there is in this truth! Surely he that knows it to be
true of himself by faith cannot but enter into rest. How could it be that he
should be disturbed in spirit? So I have shown you the things they experience
and one or two of the things they know by which they enter into rest. And there
are some things implanted into believers' minds that make them enter into rest;
for, unless you change a man's nature, he won't rest, if you put him where you
will. After all, our happiness more depends upon our own hearts than upon
anything else. The believer has a new heart; he has a contented heart; he has a
heart submissive to the divine will; he has a heart that does not live in the
present, but lives in the future; he has a heart that looks across the river of
Death, a soul that rejoices to live upon invisible things and eternal things.
Scant may be his table here, but he eats the bread of angels; wretched may be
his garments, but he wears about him robes of royalty. He may be despised of
men, but he knows he is a son of God. He may not have a foot of land, a freehold
of his own, but he knows that the whole of Heaven is his from its Dan to its
Beersheba. Such a mind as that cannot but be restful—as a mind made to conform
to God and to rejoice in Him. Such a man must have rest; it cannot be otherwise.

III.

Note again that these persons, though they have entered into rest, have to say
to you, "We have only entered into rest; we don't profess to know all about
it—we have only entered it." They may have entered into rest, but they are still
as it were in the first part of the garden. They believe that there are inner
walks where the fruit is more luscious, where the fountains are more cool, where
the brooks flow with milk and honey more plentifully. They have entered into
rest. They bless God for that, but they have only entered it. And this is one
reason why you sometimes find Christians disturbed. They have not got far enough
into the garden of rest to lose the sound of dogs outside. They can hear the
howling of the hell-dogs at the garden gates, though they have come into rest.
They are like men in one of our ships covered with impenetrable armour, shot at
still; and though they are not fatally wounded they can hear the balls strike on
the iron outside and they are troubled somewhat. And there are times when they
don't live by faith as they ought, and then they lose their rest; for it is only
as they believe that they enter into rest.

I know there are some Christians who do not believe about daily bread and are
worried about it. There are some who cannot believe. They get wanting to drive
their own horses instead of sitting in the chariot and allowing the Lord to
drive. They lose their rest. I know there are some who want to carve for
themselves, but they cut their fingers and get but a small slice upon their
plates; whereas if they left it all to God and did their part to it, namely,
were obedient to God's will and left the rest to Him, they would fare far
better. They do not believe, and, therefore, do not rest; but you shall always
find that in proportion as they believe they rest. Did you ever hear of a more
restful man than George Müller, of Bristol?—a perfectly happy man with the care
of an establishment with more than two thousand children—no care at all because
he believes his Father about it and he leaves the Lord to manage the orphanage.
I often wish I could do that. Don't you wish so, too? Who are you that should
say, "I have cast my burden on the Lord," and then go back and take it again?
How is it you can talk of leaving it with Him, ana then, after all, try and bear
it yourself? But he that believes has entered into rest.

I do not say that the believer's life is all peace, for his condition is
peculiar in this way. When the children of Israel entered into Canaan they were
a portrait of a saint entering into rest. First, they had to cross the Jordan:
the believer has to cross the Jordan of his sin. That is dried up, and he
marches through by divine grace. Then there stand, inside the promised land, the
walls of Jericho, namely, his own corruptions and his own sinful nature. It
takes time to bring them to the ground, but after that, when the walls are
levelled, there are Canaanites still in the land. Canaan was not a good type of
Heaven, for they were always fighting in Canaan, always having to war against
the adversary. That is a good type of the rest to which believers come. They do
rest. They know that Heaven is theirs; that they are saved; that all their
troubles work for their good; that they are God's people. Still they have to
fight against sin, and that is no more inconsistent with their being at rest
than it was inconsistent with the fact of the holy land belonging to the
Israelites, though they had still to go on fighting against the Canaanites. We
are like those at sea; the vessel is tossed but not wrecked, and never shall be.
There is a great deal of water outside the vessel that tosses her to and fro,
but we are clean pumped out. We bless God that we can know the meaning of that
text, "Let not your heart be troubled." The trouble is outside; it does not get
into the heart. The Lord has helped us to get rid of that: we have laid our
burden of sin and grief and woe at Jesus' feet, and now that we have believed do
enter into rest.

IV.

I have, therefore, now to close with the good advice I would wish to give; and
it is this. The rest is to be. had by those that seek it in the right way. It is
to be had by believing. I know you have been for months trying to get rest from
the burden of sin. Young men, you may have rest to-night if you believe in
Jesus. At this very moment you may have complete rest. But if you refuse this,
and go about and try to mend your ways, and to find salvation for yourself by
your own doings, you will never have rest. You that wish to climb to Heaven by
the way of Sinai had better look to the flames that Moses saw, and shrink and
tremble and despair. Calvary is an easier mount to climb. When God gives grace
to believe, rest is immediately obtained. Oh, that the Lord would make some
rambler end his ramblings now at the foot of the cross and find perfect peace!

Remember that the door to this sacred garden is an open one. To believe in Jesus
is not a matter that needs a great explanation from me. "If ye be willing and
obedient, ye shall eat the good of the land." If ye would have it, "hearken
diligently unto Me, and eat ye that which is good, and let your soul delight
itself in fatness." "Faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the Word of God."

You have heard the Word of God, for this is the testimony of God, that He has
given His Son Jesus to be a propitiation for sin, and whosoever believes in Him,
that is, trusts in Him, rests upon Him, leans upon Him, depends upon Him for
this faith—whosoever does that is pardoned, is a child of God, is accepted, is
saved. He shall never be lost; he shall enter Heaven as surely as he lives. It
is Christ's business to keep him and to perfect him, and to present him
faultless before the presence of the Father with exceeding joy. There is the
door of faith. Sinner, will you enter? If you refuse to enter, know this, there
is no other name given under Heaven among men whereby you can be saved or find
rest. Do you say, "I am unfit to enter "? It is for the unfit that Jesus died.
He died for the ungodly. Remember that! He "came into the world to save
sinners." Catch at that precious word, and let your unworthiness rather console
you than depress you, since your unworthiness is your claim to the promise
through God's grace. He came to save sinners—even the very chief.

"Oh that I had rest," saith one. Why have ye it not? Turn not away from it. Put
not away your own salvation, but may God, by His sweet restful Spirit, lead you
now to repose in Christ, and yours shall be the rest, and His shall be the glory
for ever and ever. Amen.


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  CHAPTER 14: 13. THE DAY OF ATONEMENT AND THE FEAST OF TABERNACLES
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XIII. The Day of Atonement and the Feast of Tabernacles

Also on the tenth day of this seventh month there shall be a day of atonement:
it shall be a holy convocation unto you; and ye shall afflict your souls, and
offer an offering made by fire unto the Lord. And ye shall do no work in that
same day, etc.—(Leviticus 23:27-40.)

These two festivals were both exceedingly instructive. Take either of them and
you shall find them full of the richest meaning. Without any extravagance of
spiritual ideas, or endeavouring to find teaching in every single detail, there
is very much to be learnt from each of these; and, perhaps, the greatest lesson
of all is this—that the Day of Atonement comes first with its sorrow for sin,
and then the Feast of Tabernacles comes afterwards with its sacred joys and
devout exhilaration. We shall have to speak of each of these as we go on.

And, first, let us speak awhile on the Day of Atonement—the Day of Atonement
attended with soul affliction; and then afterwards the Feast of Tabernacles
attended with its exceeding great joy.

I.

First, then, the Day of Atonement. The object was to set forth to all Israel
that sin was a great evil, that God could not endure it, and that it must be put
away. Once a year there must be a great demonstration of the putting away of sin
before God. The first thing to be done on that occasion was that there should be
brought a sacrifice, and a sacrifice by blood, for of all truths the most
important for us to learn is that without shedding of blood there is no
remission of sin. There never was a sin pardoned in this world by God apart from
atonement by blood, and there never will be. Heaven and earth may pass away, but
this rule shall always stand—"Without shedding of blood there is no remission of
sin." God is merciful, but then He is also just, and unless His justice can be
satisfied His mercy cannot exercise its function. It is of the nature of God
that all His characteristics should be full-orbed and all-perfect. We know with
regard to men that often one of their virtues will eclipse the rest. No man can
be in character perfectly balanced; there is always something in excess. We have
known many a man whose straightforwardness has overcome his courtesy and
tenderness, and many another man whose tenderness has been exhibited at the
expense of his honesty and of his love of the right. To have all the parts of
one's character balanced would be, of course, to be perfect; and that is what
God is, and He would never allow one of His attributes to be glorified at the
expense of another. God has devised a way in which He can be merciful without
the violation of His justice, and that way is simply wrapped up in the person of
Jesus Christ. Jesus bears the penalty due for sin. Mercy steps in and gives us
Jesus. The love of the infinite Father gives Jesus out of His bosom. Mercy,
therefore, has the widest possible scope in giving the unspeakable gift; and
justice has full play after it sacrifices Christ for sin. The question is, how
could it sacrifice Christ for sins that were not His own? and the answer is a
very easy one. Adam was the head of our race and sinned for us. Jesus Christ is
the second head, and His people are one with Him. It was right, when they were
in debt, that He should pay, for He was married to them. It was right that when
they had sinned He should be punished, for He was their representative, and they
were in Him. At His hand the evil was required, not because He had done it, but
because He was the legal representative of those who had offended; and it was
just and legal that He should suffer in their stead. He has done so. On the Day
of Atonement the priest killed the bullock and the goat, and went with their
blood into the mysterious presence of God within the veil and sprinkled the
blood there. Dear friends, all our hope of pardoned sin must lie in Jesus, the
great High Priest, having carried His blood within the veil. He was within the
veil, I might say, in that thick darkness which hung over Calvary when He was
pouring out His soul unto death on the cross. There in that inner circle of
blackness and of agony where none could come at Him, for He was altogether
alone—there it was that He made expiation, and sprinkled o'er the eternal
throne. Let us bless and magnify Him to-night as we think over the Atonement.
But then the next part of the ceremony of the Day of Atonement was the bringing
out of the scapegoat. It was not killed. Killing it was not a part of the type,
but sin was confessed over its head, and then the fit man led the goat out into
the wilderness. There was a picture some time ago in the Academy of the death of
the scapegoat. It ought not to have been painted. Whether the scapegoat died or
not, however, has nothing to do with this. The whole of the meaning of this is
that it was taken out into the wilderness and lost, and the sin was lost. There
was no heed to go farther. The goat was gone, and the sin of the people was gone
too. Now, when Jesus Christ was taken down from the cross, being dead, our sins
were gone. He cast them into His own tomb, and they are buried there, never to
have a resurrection.

Brethren, it is most important that we should have well ground into our spirit
these two truths—first, that our atonement, our salvation, is by the
substitutionary death of Christ. No man is saved by what he does, but by what
Christ has suffered. And it is equally needful we should know that, if we have
believed in Jesus, Jesus took our sins, and our sins have ceased to be. They are
no more to trouble us, for they do not exist. What saith the Scripture? "He hath
finished transgression." What stranger term than that could be used? "And made
an end of sin." Oh, what a magnificent expression—"made an end of sin"! It is
gone. It is not possible for it to be laid to the charge of God's people any
longer, for it does not exist—has no being. It is a nonexistent thing. A person
is in debt: the debt is paid. Where is that debt? There is no debt. He cannot be
summoned for it, or called to account. It is paid, and the moment it was paid it
ceased to be. And our liability as sinners before the eternal God ceased to be
when Jesus Christ "bore our sins in His own body on the tree." Oh, happy is that
man who knows that his sins were borne there, and that he had a part in that
great sacrifice when Christ laid down His life for His sheep. A further part of
the ceremony of the Day of Atonement lay in the burning of the relics of the
goat and of the bullock whose blood had been carried into the holy place. A part
of the fat had been put upon the altar, but the skin and bone and offal still
remained. All these were taken away, and carried right out of the camp—a
distance of some miles in so large a camp, and then taken to a lone place, the
place of the lepers, the place of the unclean; and there these things were
utterly consumed by fire. Furthermore, to set out to us how Jesus Christ, when
He took our sins, became obnoxious before the Lord as our representative, He had
to be taken outside of the gate of Jerusalem to the unclean place, the Tyburn,
the Old Bailey, of Jerusalem, where the malefactors were ordinarily put to
death, and there He had to suffer. And He had to suffer, moreover, away from His
God, for He cried, "My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me? "—a most
instructive picture to us as well as to the Jews of old of how the Lord hates
sin—that even when He sees sin upon His own Son He smites Him with the blows of
a cruel one. "It pleased the Father to bruise Him. He hath put Him to grief:"

I may also remind you that a part of the ceremony consisted in a very
significant change of garment of the high priest that day. The high priest had
to put off the robes of glory and stand in the place of the sinner; he had to
put on the humblest array to appear before the Lord, just like our Lord, of Whom
it is written, "He made Himself of no reputation, but, being found in fashion as
a man, He humbled Himself unto death, even the death of the cross." And then,
after the atonement was made by blood, the priest put on his beautiful garments
again, just as our dear Master, having bowed to the humiliation of this mortal
life and the agonies of death, has now resumed the garments of His glory. John
in the Revelation, when he saw Him, saw Him with His countenance as the sun,
girt with a golden girdle about the paps, and so lustrous and fair that our eyes
have longed ever since to behold the glory of that vision, the beatific sight.
The atonement is made; therefore He has gone into His glory. One sacrifice for
ever, offered up by Him, put away all the sins of His people. Their sins have
ceased to be, and therefore He puts on the robes of glory and rests from His
toil. But the great point I want you to notice is that during the Day of
Atonement, the time set apart for these ceremonies, every Israelite was
commanded to afflict his soul. Read the 27th verse: "Ye shall afflict your
souls, and offer an offering made by fire unto the Lord. Whatsoever soul it be
that shall not be afflicted in that same day, he shall be cut off from among his
people." That is to say, no man ever receives the atonement of Christ unless sin
be loathsome to him. I dare not preach, as I have heard some do—I think they err
greatly in so doing—a faith that is apart from repentance. I am persuaded there
is no faith that can save a soul which is not accompanied by affliction of soul
for sin. Can it be possible that Christ took my sin and suffered for it, and yet
I can think of sin without any detestation of it. Do you believe that man to be
a pardoned man who was never a repentant man? Does he ever know, or can he ever
know, the joy of the Lord who has not first of all felt the godly sorrow on
account of his transgression? And, dear brethren, every one of us, when we come
to the cross again, should come with an afflicted soul. I know some will think I
mean they ought to doubt whether they are ever saved. I do not mean that. The
Israelite was to afflict his soul when he knew that he was forgiven; and it is
for that very reason the soul ought to be afflicted because it knows it is
forgiven.

Now, the legalist won't understand this. He will say, "If my sins are forgiven
there is no need for me to repent." I tell thee, soul, thou canst not repent
aright unless thou hast, at any rate, some faith in thy forgiveness, for it is
when we are forgiven that we begin to feel the smart of sin.

I know they are forgiven, But now the pain to me Is all the grief and anguish
They laid, my Lord, on Thee.

"On Thee." To have transgressed against One who is so good and kind, and who has
already forgiven me—this is the bitterness.

My sins, my sins, my Saviour, Their guilt I never knew, Till, with Thee in the
garden, I near Thy passion drew.

We must see the sweat drops bloody, and mark the wounds in His dear flesh, and
see what it cost Him to redeem us, before we shall have, in very deed and truth,
in an evangelical manner afflicted our soul. Why, it is a bitter and a sweet
thing to be always repenting. Do not imagine that we have done with repenting
when we begin believing, for the more we believe the more we repent; and in our
dying moments, it is probable, our repentance for having committed sin will be
deeper and more pure than ever it was in our lives before; not conviction of
sin, mark you—not terror of conscience—not doubts and fears, but a true
childlike faith and grace, to think that one could have offended against so good
and gracious a God. You would never see the atonement so well as through your
tears. Believe me, John Bunyan was right when he put Mr. Wet-eyes to go with the
petition from the town of Mansoul to Prince Emmanuel; and I believe that Mr.
Wet-eyes is clearer-sighted than most, and when the teardrop is in the eye it
acts like a telescopic glass.

Oh, let me weep for naught but sin, And after none but Thee! And then I would
(oh, that I might!) A constant weeper be.

At some time on the Day of Atonement the Jews added to this affliction of their
soul a cessation from all work. I will read the 28th verse: "Ye shall do no work
in that same day''; and in the 30th verse: ''And whatsoever soul it he that
doeth any work that same day, the same soul will I destroy from among his
people." When we come to Christ we see all the work is done. When we behold His
atonement and see the High Priest come out in all His golden garments we know
that it is finished; and if it be finished there is nothing more for us to do,
and we cease from all our legal works. Now, those that will work for salvation
may take what comfort they can out of the solemn verse I read just now. That
soul shall be cut off from Israel. By the works of the law there shall no flesh
be justified, for "by the law is the knowledge of sin." I believe that verse in
one of our Revival hymns is perfectly true:—

Doing is a deadly thing, Doing ends in death,

if it be with a view to obtaining the favour of God, or the blotting out of
sin.. There may be as much doing as you like out of motives of gratitude because
you are saved; but to do anything by way of merit to salvation is to destroy
your soul. You give up God's way of salvation: you set up a way of salvation of
your own: you will perish in your impertinent rebellion against God. Now, he who
receives the atonement ceases from all servile work and rests in Christ, so that
though there was an affliction on that day there was a measure of joy at the
same time.

But, then, notice that though they ceased from servile work, it is said, "Ye
shall offer a sacrifice by fire unto the Lord" (27 v.). That is what the child
of God does. He knows his Father, and he now brings his sacrifice willingly and
cheerfully; he brings his own heart, body, soul and spirit, which are but a
reasonable sacrifice. "lam redeemed," saith he. "I am not therefore my own, but
I belong to God. Now, since I have seen my sin put away by my Substitute, for
the love I bear His name, He shall have all I have and all I am and all I hope
to be, and I will spend and be spent in His service." That the child of God does
do, but it is a very different thing from servile work. Altogether, the Day of
Atonement, though it was a day of affliction, was a day of Sabbatic rest. It is
said, "Thou shalt keep it as a Sabbath unto the Lord." O, dear hearers, do you
know anything about this Sabbatic rest? Did you ever enjoy it? Did you ever come
to this: "Now I have seen my sin laid on the Son of God; I have seen the Son of
God bearing all the punishment of that sin, and now for me there remains no fear
of hell"? "There is therefore now no condemnation to him that is in Christ
Jesus," so the old version of the Bible runs, and correctly enough. He has no
fear of being cast away from the Divine presence. "I will be their God, and they
shall be My people" has put it beyond all fear of that, and he has come into a
state of perfect contentment—a restful state, in which he finds Christ to be his
all—all that he can desire and even more.

Now, if you ever came there, I know how you came there. You came there by the
work of God's Spirit leading you to look right away from yourself to the dear
Saviour standing in your stead. And if you have never come there, I will tell
you this: you have missed the greatest joy this side of Heaven; you are in a
state of danger, and as long as you live as you are, be you who you may, the
most moral and the most amiable persons in the world, there is but a step
between you and death and between you and hell. God is angry with you every day,
and as you have not believed in Christ you are condemned already, because you
have not believed on the Son of God. God gives you this testimony, that He has
given unto us eternal life, and this life is in His Son. If you accept not His
Son and trust not in Him, you make God a liar because you have not believed His
testimony concerning His Son. You cannot have peace. You may have just now a
flush of joy because your conscience is not awakened, but if it ever should be
you will be full of anguish, and I pray you may be, that your soul being
afflicted you may fly to the atoning sacrifice. But mark this word: if you
should die without that atoning sacrifice, "There is none other name given under
Heaven among men whereby we must be saved. If he that despised Moses' law
perished without mercy, how much sorer''—mark the extraordinary
question—"punishment shall he be counted worthy who hath trampled under foot the
precious blood of the Son of God." Bear that in mind, for you trample on it when
you seek some other way. This much concerning the Day of Atonement.

II.

Now, secondly, let us turn to the Feast of Tabernacles. When the Day of
Atonement was over Israel was commanded to gather in the fruit of the land. And
they were to take boughs of trees and willows and make themselves booths in
which they were to dwell so many days, and make themselves as merry as they
could be. After the atonement is over, then comes the joy. After the soul has
seen its sin put away, then comes the blessed mirth which is wrapped up in that
expression of Christ, "My joy shall be in you, that your joy may be full."

Now, why did they bring these booths? They were to remember that they dwelt in
booths when they first came out of Egypt to Succoth. So God would have His
people when they receive their pardon in the precious blood. Already, if you
have only been saved the last hour you have much to look back upon for what God
has done for you in bringing you out of the House of Bondage and setting you
free. Your gratitude ought to cause you joy. Has the Lord done so much for us,
and shall we not be glad? We will be, till those round about shall say, "The
Lord hath done great things for them whereof they are glad," and we shall say,
"He hath done great things for us." It was, then, a remembrance of mercy
received. But the booths were also a token of the peace they felt. Men in times
of war dwell in castles and fenced cities; they do not go in fields and dwell in
booths. None dared to make them afraid. They were quiet and happy. That is just
the same under the atonement. Now each sitteth under his vine and fig tree; his
doubts and fears are all over; he is not afraid of sudden death, hell, nor
anything. Why should he fear? The Lord is reconciled to him, and he can sing, "I
will praise Thee every day now thine anger is turned away." That, I think, is
another reason for their dwelling in booths. And then, again, this feast was
connected with harvest. It came at harvest time, so it was a time of plenty, a
time when they could afford feasts beyond any period of the year. And so the
child of God, when pardoned, finds plenty of grace. The fruits of joy and love
are very plentiful in his spirit, for he is enjoying the love of his espousals,
and therefore it is that he is exceeding happy and the Feast of Tabernacles,
after the atonement, has with it a harvest of thanksgiving. I am told, too, that
this time of the Feast of Tabernacles was in September, a season of the year
which in the East is uncertain, subject to disorder, and therefore they had some
discomforts while they were in these tabernacles. But that was to remind them
that that was not their rest. Now, to the sinner that is a very comfortable
idea.. He wishes it might be his rest. But the child of God, when he has
received the atonement, knows he is living in a booth, not in a house, and knows
that if this earthly tabernacle be dissolved he has a house not made with hands,
eternal in the heavens. I believe—and I think there is good reason for believing
it—that our Lord Jesus Christ was born on the day of the Feast of Tabernacles,
or somewhere in that month of September. There is no earthly reason for
believing that He was born in December, but there are a thousand reasons for
believing that it was in September He was born. There are reasons that may be
gathered from His age and from the whole circumstance of the Jewish festivals
that He was born about this time. And if so, right well might they keep the
Feast of Tabernacles, when He was come—the Word made flesh and tabernacled among
us, and we beheld His glory as of the only begotten Son of God full of grace and
truth. No doubt their dwelling in tabernacles would lead those who were
instructed believers among them to think of Christ's coming in the flesh, to
think of the time when the tabernacle of God should be among men, and "how
amiable," I may say of Christ's body, "how amiable was Thy tabernacle, O Lord
God of Hosts, my king and my God!" And I have no doubt that the booths would
carry forward the minds of those who were believers to that happier period which
is prophesied as yet to come—the Millennial time, when it shall be said in very
deed and truth, "The tabernacles of God are with men, and He doth dwell among
them." These tabernacles would make them think of the day when He shall wipe
away all tears from our eyes, and lead us unto living fountains of waters, and
this earth shall have upon it the New Jerusalem which shall come down out of
Heaven in all its glory; the earth itself shall shake off the curse, and the
mantle of mist which sin hath spread shall be rolled up, and put away, and this
planet shall shine in its pristine lustre. There is one thing about this Feast
of Tabernacles I would mention in closing, and that is this: it does not appear
ever to have been celebrated from the days of Joshua to the days of Nehemiah. I
do not understand it, but if you will read in Nehemiah you will find the people
who returned from captivity kept the Feast of Tabernacles, and it is said it had
not been kept since the days of Joshua, the son of Nun. What was David and what
was Solomon about, and all the others that this rich festival was forgotten?
There must have been great wrong about that. But it seems to me to be typical of
this fact that there are many believers in Christ who have received the Feast of
Atonement who don't ever care to keep the Feast of Tabernacles. I mean they are
saved but do not rejoice. I wish they did.. God meant they should, and it is
their own fault that they do not. There are many believers resting in Christ who
have a cloudy notion about the atonement. They do not believe that He was
literally their substitute. If they did, they would be as happy as the days of
summer. If they did but know their sin was gone and never could return; that as
far as the East is removed from the West God hath removed transgression from
them, surely they would begin to rejoice, and they would sing some of those
noble psalms and some of those grand utterances of Paul would be upon their
lips. They might even get so far as that hymn which we have at Communion :—

My name from the palms of His hands Eternity cannot erase;

Impressed on His heart it remains In marks of indelible grace. The terrors of
law and of God With me can have nothing to do, My Saviour's atonement and blood
Hide all my transgressions from view.

Yes, I to the end shall endure, As sure as the earnest is given, More happy, but
not more secure Are the glorified spirits in heaven.

That is the way to keep the Feast of Tabernacles. God grant that we may come to
keep it now, with all our hearts and souls glorying in that atoning sacrifice
that was not offered in vain, that precious blood that was not spilt in vain. I
believe all Christ died for He will have. Nothing was paid for by Him but what
He will have. I cannot understand the Son of God pleading all that He has
suffered in our stead in vain. God cannot cast into hell a soul whose sins were
visited upon His own Son. Oh rejoice, and be glad ye that believe in Him and
keep the feast this day. Go from the Tabernacle to the Temple and keep the feast
of your dear Redeemer.


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  CHAPTER 15: 14. HELD AND KEPT
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XIV. Held and Kept

Nevertheless I am not ashamed; for I know whom I have believed, and am persuaded
that He is able to keep that which I have committed unto Him against that
day.—(2 Timothy 1:12.) An interpretation has been put upon this passage which I
think is not its meaning, but still, it may be. Paul had been speaking to
Timothy of the trust which had been committed to him, namely, the preaching of
the Gospel, and the word here used might be rendered, "I know that He is able to
keep my deposit." The Gospel was a deposit put into the hands of Paul. He was
very careful of it, and anxious about it. Just then he was persecuted, and was
likely to die. All the fury of the Roman Emperor was put forth to crush
Christianity; but Paul said, "I know that Christ is able to keep my deposit; He
is able to keep that Gospel which He has committed to my charge. I shall not
labour in vain. Though I be cut off, others will be raised up to continue the
good work. Christ's cause is safe enough in His own hands, for He is able to
preserve it, and He will."

Now, we certainly have the same consolation at all times. We meet with persons
who say that Popery is coming back, and that there are coming all sorts of evil
days. Well, I believe that Christ is able to keep His own Gospel alive in the
world; that He is stronger than Satan, and that the victory is not doubtful. The
day shall surely come when, in spite of the efforts of adversaries of truth,
King Jesus shall reign throughout the earth. Let us banish our dark suspicions
and be of good courage.

Still, I do think that that is a far-fetched meaning, and that it would not
strike a reader. It seems to me that the Bible was intended for common people's
reading, and that its meaning lies generally upon the surface, except where the
truth taught is exceedingly deep and mysterious. Would it not occur to anybody
reading this that Paul meant that he himself, his body and soul, had been
committed by himself in faith to the hands of Christ, and that he felt quite
safe there; that, whatever occurred, Jesus was able to keep him until that day.
Well, we will take that as the meaning, and we shall notice in our text, first,
what the apostle had done: he-had committed his soul to the keeping of Christ;
and then, secondly, what he knew—he knew whom he had believed; and then,
thirdly, what he was sure of—that Christ was able to keep him, and, fourthly,
what, therefore, he was—he was. not ashamed.

I.

First, what Paul had done. He had committed himself to the keeping of Christ. He
felt that his soul was very precious. Do you all feel that? Do we, any of us,
feel the preciousness of our immortal natures as we should? Are we not too often
asking, "What shall we eat, and what shall we drink, and wherewithal shall we be
clothed?" as if spirits whose existence is coeval with that of God, that shall
live throughout eternity, were to make these the main enquiries, eating and
drinking and clothing. I am afraid we do not, any of us, value our souls as we
should. Still, if by grace we have been taught as Paul was, we do value them: we
want to see them in safe keeping. But Paul knew that his soul was in danger.. He
perceived the evil within him and the temptations outside of him. Do we feel
that as we should? Are we aware of our many dangers? Some men act as if they
were not in an enemy's country at all, but as if the temptations of the world
which would destroy them were really their friends, as if sin were no injury,
and to bring upon one's self the anger of God were no peril whatever. Paul,
however, saw that his spirit was in danger, and, valuing it much, he desired to
see it safely housed. He felt also that he could not keep it. Alas! how many
think they can. Where the apostle trembled, there are some that will presume.
They feel as if they could well enough preserve themselves without divine help;
but ah! it is not so. Left alone, the priceless treasure of our soul will'
assuredly be lost: it will become the prey of Satan. How shall a man be able to
preserve his own soul? Paul, knowing all this, had, therefore, gone and
committed his soul as a sacred deposit into the sure keeping of the Lord Jesus
Christ the Saviour. This is the great act of faith. This is what some of us
did—what all of us did when we were first brought to Christ. We had done
henceforth with trusting in ourselves, and we trusted in Him. And this is what
we are doing every day, if we are believers. I love every morning to put myself
again into the dear hands of the Crucified with all that concerns me and all
that belongs to me, for when I feel that everything is there, this church there,
and all the work of God there, then I feel it is safe. But 'tis ill to live an
hour as your own keeper, or to have anything that you are to keep yourself. It
is sweet and blessed and happy living when you have left everything in the hand
of Christ Jesus, and are, therefore, free to serve Him, and joyfully to go about
doing His will. I suppose, if Paul had to explain what he meant, he would tell
us that he left himself in Christ's hands, as a sick man leaves himself in the
hands of the physician. "There," saith he, "my disease is grievous, and I do not
understand it, but, good Master, Thou hast much skill in anatomy and also in
medicine: do as Thou wilt with me." This is what a Christian has done—he has
left himself as a sick soul in the hands of the Good Physician.

Then, mark you, he takes the Good Physician's medicine. Some divorce faith from
works in such a way that it is not faith at all. For if I trust a physician I
take his medicine, I follow his prescriptions. My soul is left with Christ as a
physician, and I desire, therefore, to do what He bids me. Our soul will be
healed assuredly if we are really thus trusting to the Great Physician's care.

Paul meant that he trusted himself again as one trusts all his needs in the
hands of another—as the sheep trusts itself with the shepherd. It is not the
sheep's business to provide for itself; the shepherd does that. So do we. If we
are as we should be, we are trusting ourselves as to all our soul's needs in the
hands of Jesus, He is our shepherd, and we shall not want. But you know the
sheep follow the shepherd whithersoever he goeth. They keep at his heels. And so
must we (if our faith be true and real) keep close to the dear Redeemer and
follow where He leads the way. If we have not truly committed ourselves to His
keeping; if we pick and choose our own pathway and run hither and thither, we
are self-willed, but if we have indeed the desire to follow closely where He
guides us we have committed ourselves to Him as to a shepherd.

Then Paul had committed himself to Jesus as a captain commits his vessel to a
pilot. "This is a new river to me," says he. "I have never traversed it. There
are shoals and narrow channels. Pilot, thou knowest the way up to the city. Take
the helm and steer my vessel safely." So amidst the shoals and quicksands of
this mortal life we know not our way, but we leave ourselves in our great
Pilot's hands—the Pilot of the Lake of Galilee, the Lord High Admiral of the
Seas, with whom there were many other ships in the day of storm. He guides us
and leads the way. Then in trusting Him we do His bidding—reef sail and do
whatsoever He commands us; and we are not truly trusting if we are not also
obedient in the trust.

And, brethren, we have committed ourselves to Jesus in the same way as a person
who has a case in law committs himself to his advocate. If he be a wise man and
hath a good advocate he never interferes. You have heard, I know, the story of
Erskine. When he was pleading for a man upon a capital charge, the man wrote
upon a piece of paper—"I'll be hanged if I don't plead for myself," and Erskine
simply wrote upon the paper, "You'll be hanged if you do." This is much the case
with us. Jesus Christ pleads for us and, if we think we can plead for ourselves,
we shall lose our souls, but if we leave Him to speak for us, He knows how to
baffle all the devices of Satan. The Lord that hath redeemed us will rebuke our
adversary, and we shall come clearly out of every suit before the bar of God, if
we leave our souls in the hands of Christ Jesus.

We have also left ourselves there as a defenceless nation may leave itself in
the guardian care of a great captain and his soldiery. We cannot resist our
spiritual foes. If we go out against them, we shall be as stubble to the flame.
Our shield is God's anointed, and the breaker is gone up before us. He clears
the way and smites our foes hip and thigh with a great slaughter, and though
they come against us like a flood, His blood-stained hand uplifts the cross and
backward they fall before Him. For who can stand against the Christ of God?
Committing our souls, then, to His keeping as the defenceless to the care of the
guardian, the great act of faith is done. But then the defenceless abide in
their city. They are obedient to those who protect them. And such must our faith
be if it be at all the faith of the Apostle Paul.

I should like to ask of all my audience to-night—as I have already asked of my
own heart—each one, "Have you trusted your soul in the hands of Jesus? Have you
committed it to Him to keep as a sacred deposit? "If you have not, I pray that
you may do it this night, ere your eyes be closed in sleep. But if you have done
so, do it again and continue still to do it. You will, if you have done so
before, have learnt already how sweet a thing it is. Do it again, and trust your
Lord with all that has to do with you. Cast your burden upon Him—your little
burdens as well as your great ones. Commit all your wants and all your cares,
for time as well as for eternity; commit your body and your soul, your children
and your goods and all that you have into the same hands; for where your
treasure is there your heart will be. If you will trust all with Christ, you
will love Christ better than all, and all you love you will love because He
keeps all for you. You will, if you be rich, find Christ in all, and if you be
poor you will find all in Christ, 'and the difference is not much. Only commit
all to that dear, faithful hand. This is what the Apostle did.

II.

Now, the second thing is what the Apostle knew. "I know," said he, "whom I have
believed." How often we hear Scripture misquoted! For instance, we hear persons
say, "I know in whom I have believed." That is not Scripture. What do you want
to put in that little word "in" for? It is "I know whom I have believed "; and
there is a difference there. It is not to know that we trust in Christ, but to
know Christ Himself. That is the great thing. Paul did not trust in an unknown
Saviour. He knew the Christ he trusted in; He was a personal acquaintance of
his. Do we know Christ? For you may say you trust Christ, but that is not the
faith that will save. It is really trusting; it is trusting in Him as one you
know to be real—a real Christ, a real Saviour. How did Paul know Christ? He knew
Him, first, "because Christ had met with him on the way to Damascus. Christ has
never met with us precisely in that way and spoken to us out of Heaven, but
there was a time when He met us.

Dost mind the place, the spot of ground Where Jesus did thee meet?

Yes, peradventure, you know it well to-night. You remember when first He
unveiled His lovely face, and you saw lines of love in that dear countenance.

Paul knew the Saviour, next, because no doubt he had gathered all he could about
Him; he had intimate acquaintance with Luke; he had the means of knowing—did
know—Mark, and no doubt he spoke with Matthew; and with John he was familiar.
Though Paul had not been with our Lord in the days of His flesh, yet he
treasured up all the incidents which he might have heard from others; and with
such as might have written in his day he was no doubt familiar. Well, even in
this way, we know whom we have believed. I hope you are close students of God's
Word, beloved, if you have trusted Christ. Try and know all you can about Him
Whom you trust. You must trust Christ because He is revealed in Scripture; but,
the more you know Him, the more easy it will be for you to trust Him. The
employment of a Christian should be to make his acquaintance with Christ more
full. Knowing something of Him, he should every day add something to what he
knows, till he can with greater emphasis say, "I know whom I have believed." For
Paul knew the Lord, next, by personal communion with Him. Many and many a time
had the Lord spoken with Paul. In his secret chamber, in prayer, Paul had risen
up to the heights of communion with Jesus. In sacred praise and rapt devotion I
have no doubt that of times the Apostle felt that whether in the body he could
not tell or whether out of the body, for Jesus Christ had revealed Himself so
fully to him.

Dear Christian brethren, I am afraid we do not give time enough for communion
with Christ in these days. Our Puritan forefathers had their hours of devotion
every day. We are so busy now—so very busy! Is it not a busy sort of idleness
that neglects the Saviour? We are getting rich, perhaps; but is that a true
richness which does not make us rich towards God? We seem to know everybody
now-a-days but Christ. And there are some Christians that I wot of who know
doctrines but do not seem to know Christ. They can a hair divide between the
west and north-west side in theology, but yet in their spirit they seem as if
they had no love, and, therefore, do not, cannot know Him. And some there are
that know biographies, and know about the various sects of the Church, and know
the history of the Church, and know I know not what besides. But the main thing
is to know Him. It were a life-long study to gaze upon His blessed person, and
to know Him as God the Man, to know Him from head to foot, from glory to shame,
to know Him in Bethlehem, and to know Him on Calvary, to know Him in glory and
to know Him in His second advent. This is the sciences of sciences, the highest
of all attainments. Would God we stuck to this. The Christian should make Christ
his classics, Christ his crowning study. Christ should be the very soul of
poetry, the very-essence of philosophy—to know Him. How can this be except we
have more fellowship with Him? The Apostle knew Christ, moreover, by experience.
He had tried Him and had tested Him, and there is nothing like this. "I know
whom I believe. I remember," the Apostle might have said, "when I was in the
deeps and the ship was near being wrecked. I know how the Lord stood by me in
the chill midnight. I know Him: He forsook me not. I know how He cheered my
heart on the way to Rome when He sent the brethren to meet me at Appii Forum. I
know He stood by me when I faced the lion-like emperor, and how I was able to
speak the right word, and so my life was then preserved." Such a one as Paul the
aged shivering in his loathsome dungeon, yet with his heart warm with love to
his Master, writing his epistle and bowing his knee every now and then unto the
God and Father of his Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, feeling that his dungeon
glowed till it was infinitely brighter than the golden house of Nero with the
glory of the Crucified'—he knew his Master; he knew He was a firm friend, knew
He kept His word, knew that that sweet word, "Lo! I am with you alway, even to
the end of the world," was fulfilled, and therefore he said, "I know Whom I have
believed."

Now I speak to a great many that have believed in Christ. I hope the most of you
have; but do you know Him? Do you know Him? It is not necessary when you trust
your money to a banker that you should know the banker. If he is a man of good
repute, it does not matter about personal knowledge, though I daresay, if you
knew him personally, you would feel all the more confidence. But in the matter
of Christ Jesus an unknown Saviour is to a great extent a doubting Saviour. Your
faith will lack force, it will be sure to become weak, unless ignorance be
chased away and you know your Lord. "I know Whom I have believed." Do seek to
know Him; and may this table to-night help you to know Him better. When we eat
of the bread and drink of the cup, may those instructive emblems bring Jesus
near to us, and may we know Him even better than we have known Him at the best
before.

III. And now, thirdly—here is the point—what the Apostle was sure of. He was
sure that Christ was able to keep that which he had committed to Him. And I
suppose Apostle was sure of. He was sure that Christ was able to keep that which
he had committed to Him. And I suppose every one of us would say that we are
sure of it, too. But we act sometimes as if we were not so sure. We are full of
doubts and fears and mistrust, which ought not to be.

Now mark, first, Paul knew the ability of Jesus to keep souls that were
committed to Him. He knew that He was God: who can defeat the Deity? He knows
that as Man and Mediator all power was given to Him in Heaven and earth, and, if
all power be with Christ, what power can there be that can stand against that?
Nay, what power is there, if He hath all power in Heaven and earth? He knew that
if our danger arose from our past sins Christ could meet that, for He had
offered an all-sufficient atonement. He knew that if the danger arose from the
demands of the law Christ could meet that, for He is "the end of the law for
righteousness to everyone that believeth."

He knew, moreover, that Christ was so infinitely wise that He could foresee and
remove all dangers. If it was Paul's lot to be sifted in a sieve, he knew that
Christ would pray for him that his faith fail not. The prescient eye of our
great High Priest foresees the evil, and provides for it ere it comes. He is
able to save us in a thousand dangers, and He is able to keep far from us all
foes. The keys of death and hell swing at His girdle, and the government is upon
His shoulder. We need not fear, therefore, all our enemies, whether they be men
or fallen angels, or death itself. Christ, having all power, is able to keep us
against all such dangers. This Paul knew; but the point about it was not only
that he knew Christ could keep souls, but "that He is able to keep that which I
have committed to Him." You remember Bunyan's expression where he says, "These
are but generals: come to particulars, man." And, oh, it is grand to come to
particulars in the Gospel. It is a general fact that Christ can keep souls, but
it is a particular fact and a precious fact for me to know that He is able to
keep that which I have committed to Him. I can believe for everybody sometimes;
but faith to believe for myself—that springs out of personal knowledge of
Christ, for he that can say, "I know Whom I have believed," can say, "I am
persuaded that He is able to keep that which I have committed to Him." Your
soul, whatever its peculiarities, your case whatever its dangers, is safe-enough
in the hands of Jesus. Do you believe this?

If so, note again, the Apostle believed that Jesus was able to keep him
then—"that He is able to keep that which I have-committed to Him"—able now—now
that I am in this, dungeon, now that I shall soon have to be executed: He is
able to keep me. Do you know it is so easy to say that He-was able to keep us
years ago, and so easy to hope that He will be able to keep us by-and-bye, but
to rest on Him now, to believe that this billow will not swamp the ship, that
this fire will not consume me, to look at this present trial and to feel that.
now by God's grace one could "break through a troop, or leap over a wall"—this
is the grand thing.

I used to know a countryman who told me this. He was an aged man, and he said,
"Sir, all through the winter I wish I could have a job at reaping. I feel that
if I had an opportunity I could reap against any man in the country. But
somehow," said he, "when the autumn times comes and I get my sickle I find that
Tom is an old man." And so oftentimes it is with us. We think we have got no end
of faith—perhaps a little to spare—but to have the faith when you have the
trouble—there is the point. The good practical faith is that which believes
whatever the circumstances may be, that "He is able to keep that which I have
committed to Him." But then he also knew—that Christ was able to keep him "till
that day." I often marvel at the unbelief of old people. When I think of some of
them getting on to seventy and having doubts and fears, after having known the
Lord for fifty years perhaps, and having been kept by Him all that time, I am
indeed surprised. How long do you expect to live? Cannot you trust Him the other
ten? Has the Master carried you so long and can you doubt Him now? Surely all
those years ought to rise up and upbraid you for unbelief. When I see an aged
Christian close on the borders of the grave, sitting on the banks of Jordan with
his feet in the stream and saying, "I do not know yet whether I am saved," I
hope I shall not be in that condition. I pray God I may not. It must be a very
wretched state, for He that has kept you so long surely can be trusted to keep
you to the end. It is a bad example for young people for you that are growing
old to be getting doubts and fears. But may not a man be an excellent Christian
and have doubts and fears? He may be a Christian: I won't say anything about his
excellence. Is assurance a necessary thing as a Christian? Well, brethren, a man
may be alive that cannot speak, but I think speaking is a necessary thing to a
man for all that. That is to say, it is generally necessary—necessary to his
comfort, and I should not like to be without ft. I will say this much to-night,
if I did not know in whom I have believed, and if I were not persuaded that He
is able to keep that which I have committed to Him, I would not dare go to sleep
this night till I did know it; or if I must' through weariness fall asleep the
first work of the morning should be to cry out to the living God till I knew I
had passed from death unto life. I can understand your being doubters, but I
cannot understand your being comfortable doubters and continuous doubters. The
natural condition of a child of God should be that of full confidence in Christ
Whom he has trusted, a joyous assurance that all is right because the hand that
keeps us is a hand that never wearies, a hand that never palsies. If you have
not trusted your soul to Christ, well then, come now as a lost soul; but if you
have, why fret and worry and question and dispute? You must be safe: you are
safe now and you shall be safe if that is where you are trusting. How can you
doubt your Lord? How can you mistrust that hand that holds up Heaven and earth?
Oh, go and repent of this great sin and rest in that dear Saviour from this time
forth, even for evermore.

IV.

Now, the last thing was what the Apostle was. He was not ashamed, he says, for
he knew whom he had believed. By this he meant to teach us first that he felt
happy. He was a prisoner, despised, calumniated, but he was not ashamed of that.
He knew Christ, and knew how safe he was with Christ, and, therefore, he was not
ashamed. If some people I know of that hide their colours and seem to go
sneaking to Heaven did but know Christ a little better they would be happier in
their souls and then they would be braver in their actions. It was a happy sight
to see Paul expecting to die and yet not regretting that he brought himself to
death by preaching Christ—nothing to alter, no wish to go back and retrace his
steps and be a Jew and a pupil of Gamaliel to save his life. No, not he! And so
if we have been resting in Jesus, we have no wish to go back to the beggarly
elements of the world. Therefore, I pray you trust Him better so that you may be
happier in Him and less likely to be ashamed in Him. We want now-a-days more of
Paul's courage. You working men, I know, have to work in shops where religion is
at a great discount. If a man in some of our large factories be known even to
attend a place of worship, he becomes at once a speckled bird. Well, I hope that
you who belong to this Church, at anyrate if you be ridiculed for Christ, will
not only bear it patiently, but joyfully. What is there, after all, to be
ashamed of in it? The shame is on the other side. Reply boldly, though meekly.
Give a reason for the hope that is in you, and inflict upon every person who
ridicules the penance of hearing what the Gospel is. They will be less slow to
ridicule when they see you are the braver in confessing the more they persecute
you. Oh, for a generation of lions once again. Swifter than eagles may they be
in strong passionate love for Christ, and braver than lions with a determination
to avow Him and to fight for Him to the death. Let none of us, whether we be
poor or rich, illiterate or educated, ever from this hour think of concealing
one sentiment we hold, or ever think of keeping back the fact that with the
Crucified we take our part in the shame and spitting that we may take our part
in the glory with Him hereafter.

I will close with a story. There was once a king who sent his son into a
province of his dominions that had revolted; and this son came there not in
princely robe, but dressed as a common peasant of the country. And the men of
that land despitefully used him, and they set him in the pillory. While he stood
in that pillory of scorn, there came one who stood at his side, and when the
filth from ungracious hands fell on the prince it fell also upon him. He stood
there seeking to screen the prince, if he could, glad to bear contempt and share
it with him. All men counted him mad; but there was a day in after times when
the great king of that land held his levee, and the courtiers were gathered
round about his throne, and the prince that day, returned from the land where he
had received such treatment, put on his silken robes of glory and of beauty. And
there stood amidst the throng in the palace halls many princes of great estate,
peers of the realm, and nobles of the blood. But the prince, when he had come to
his glory, looked over the whole scene and, spying out the man that had stood
side by side with him in the pillory of shame he said, "Make way, princes and
peers, for this man was with me in my dishonour: he shall now be with me in my
glory."

It shall be so at the last when Christ shall sit upon His throne. Do you know
the interpretation of the parable? He shall cast His eye over Cherubim and
Seraphim and the glittering ranks of angels and see the man that was despised
for His sake, and He shall say, "Make way, ye angels!" and they shall; "Make
way, ye cherubs!" and they shall; "Make way, ye seraphs!'' and they shall; and
there shall come the once despised and persecuted man and Christ shall meet him
and say, "Thou shalt sit upon My throne, even as I have overcome and am set down
with My Father upon His throne." May that be your case and be mine! Amen.


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  CHAPTER 16: 15. A COMPREHENSIVE PRAYER
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XV. A Comprehensive Prayer Behold, O God our shield, and look upon the face of
Thine anointed.—(Psalms 84:9.)

David longed to be in the courts of the Lord's house, and he conceives himself
to be already there. His wishes seem to have carried him upon their wings: at
any rate, he acts as if he were there, and he falls to offering prayer. He feels
as if he had already come near to God, whether he had come to the tabernacle or
not; and, therefore, he pours out his prayer into the ear of Him Whom he knew to
be present and ready to hear. Peradventure this may serve us for a prayer
to-night. Indeed, I think it should; for there is scarcely any condition of
heart which this prayer would not suit, if that condition of heart be at all
right, or if there be a longing to be right.

I think we may regard these words as a prayer in three ways. They appear to be,
first of all, a prayer for king David; then they might be read, I think, as a
prayer for all the saints; but then, mainly and lastly—and, in truth, though
last in order, this is first in importance—they are a prayer concerning our
blessed Lord.

I.

First, then, they are a prayer of David. "Behold, O God our shield, and look
upon the face of Thine anointed."

David pens these words for the people to pray for their king. God is the true
shield of Israel, and hence the verse may be read thus: "Behold, O thou God Who
art our shield, and look upon the face of Thine anointed." There are some
critics who hold that that is the true reading; and, indeed, whether it be the
true reading of the place or not, it is a truth. God is the shield of His
people—their only true shield. From all evil doth He defend them. They are badly
defended, nay, they are exposed to a thousand perils if they rely upon any other
defence. But should they be defenceless apart from God He is their castle and
their impregnable tower of defence, and they are secure in Him. Therefore, the
prayer is, "O Thou Who art our shield, look down upon our king, and cover him in
the day of battle! Shield him, and shield Thy people." Or, if the reading should
be, "Behold, O God our shield," and by the term "shield" a person is intended
who is afterwards called the "anointed," then it is true in the secondary sense
that kings become the shields of the nation; and such a king as David was, in
the hand of God, a shield to the people Israel. It was for Israel to cry to God
for David, as it is for us to cry to God on the behalf of any through whom we
receive blessings from the Most High. The text says, "Look upon the face of
Thine anointed." Does it not mean, "Comfort and cheer the king: support and
strengthen him; let him have a sense of Thy favour. Hear his prayers; give him
acceptance with Thee. Enlighten his countenance. Let him see the brightness of
Thy face that his own face may shine."

It is a large and comprehensive prayer of a people for a king who is well
beloved; and, brethren, it teaches us just this, that we ought to pray for those
who are in authority over us. We too often forget the duty. I am well persuaded
that if we had for a short time a taste either of despotism or of anarchy we
should prize the blessings which we now enjoy, and should be more mindful of
that Christian statute that prayers should be made for kings and all who are in
authority. But, indeed, it is not kings merely, but God makes other men to be a
shield to us, and He anoints them for certain ends. Are not all God-sent pastors
in very deed the shields of the Church of God; and are they not anointed to
preach glad tidings—anointed of God to bear His messages? Indeed, what is their
ministry worth, if it be not in the unction of the Holy One? What power is there
in it unless it be the power of the anointing of the Holy Ghost, Who shall be
with them? Pray, therefore, for our brethren whom God may call and set apart to
be teachers for Him, and to be His mouth to the people. Pray for us. Pray for
all godly ministers, and say, "Behold, O God our shield, and look upon the face
of Thine anointed."

How much better we might preach if our people prayed more for us! I stand here
to confess frankly that from my inmost heart I attribute the large prosperity
which God has given to this Church vastly more to the prayers of the people than
to anything that God may have given to me. I know it is so. I am sometimes—I
hope not superstitious, but I do think I am sensitively conscious of the amount
of prayer there is in this Church. I seem to feel—I know not how it is, but the
Spirit of God that worketh in us makes us feel—when you are prayerful, and to
feel when the spirit of prayer begins to grow at all dull among us. Oh, never
let us slacken in prayer! Do plead that everyone whom God anoints to any service
may have strength given him. Take up the case of those of God's servants who are
not successful. They need much to be upheld in labouring, perhaps where their
non-success is no fault of theirs. Pray for them; and pray that the time of
their sowing may not last for ever, but may it be followed by a blessed reaping.
If we could but once get the entire Church to pray we might rest quite assured
that God would bless the entire country. We often wish to see enquirers, but we
must be enquirers ourselves first. "For this will I be enquired of by the House
of Israel to do it for them." A prayerful Church is a powerful Church. I think
there will be less fault to find with the ministry when there shall be less
fault to find with believers in their closets. You shall find yourselves edified
when you have brought your quota of prayerful anxiety with you to enrich the
Church of God.

I will leave, then, this first thought. It is a prayer for David, which may be a
prayer for all who are anointed to rule and all those who are anointed to preach
the Gospel. Lord, send an answer of peace to the prayer in that form.

II.

Secondly, shall I strain the text if I say that it appears to me to be a prayer
for all saints, or may be so used at any rate, for all saints are anointed of
God? Is it not said of our Lord that He was anointed with the oil of gladness
above His fellows? It follows, therefore, that His fellows were anointed, too,
in some measure, though He was anointed above them. Is it not most certainly
said, "Ye have an unction from the Holy One, and know all things"? Brethren,
doth not the anointing which was poured upon the head of Christ descend even to
the skirts of His garments, as the sacred ointment went to the skirts of Aaron's
robe, and we who are, as it were, the skirts of the robe of Christ have
participated in the divine anointing, and we rejoice in it to-day. His name is
as ointment poured forth, and in the sweetness of that name we have a share.

Well, then, may we not ask that all the anointed of God may have a look from
God? Behold them, O God! Look upon the faces of all Thine anointed. Some of them
want a look of sympathy. They are suffering in secret, pining in obscurity. If
somebody would say half a word to them they would be cheered. If but some
brother in a happier condition would but whisper a word of consolation they
would be rejoiced. But, oh, if God shall look upon them, and they shall know
it—if they shall understand the sympathy of Christ, and that He is touched with
the feeling of their infirmities, and feels at His heart all their sighs and
their groans, will it not be a great joy to them? Remember those that are in
bonds, as bound with them; and remember them by praying devoutly to-night, as
you think over their separate cases, "Lord, look upon Thine anointed! "

They want not only a look of sympathy, but they need to receive from God a look
of love. Oh, the love-looks of the Eternal! Do not some of us know what they
mean? We have been in doubt, fearing, trembling, scarcely knowing whether we
were saved or not. We could not find that love in our hearts which we desired to
find there, and we began to doubt whether He loved us. But some promise has been
laid home to our soul, and that promise has been like a glance from the eternal
eye, and it has spoken to us. That eye has spoken far more clearly and sweetly
than words could do; and in our inmost soul that glance has said, "I have loved
thee with an everlasting love; therefore, with lovingkindness have I drawn
thee." What raptures all divine our spirit has experienced when the Lord has
thus looked upon His anointed! And then many of God's people need a look that
shall give them real help and strength, for there is power in the look of God.
He looked upon the Egyptians out of the cloud, and their chariot wheels were
taken off, so that they dragged them heavily. But when He looks upon His people
that same look gives power to the weak; and to them that have no might that same
look increases strength. Many of the hands that hang down, and the knees that
are feeble need to be confirmed by an omnipotent glance from the eye of the
everlasting God Who fainteth not, neither is weary. Let us pray for many of our
fainting churches—our brethren that are growing weary in the ways of God, that
they may be helped, supported, sustained, invigorated by a look. And surely,
dear brethren, we should pray for all the Lord's anointed in this way. We are
very apt, I am afraid, in our prayers to pray for all God's saints nominally
rather than really. "Behold, O God our shield," Thou Who art our shield, "Look
upon the face of Thine anointed," as if it were only one face. Look upon all Thy
Church as though she were what, indeed, she is in Thine eternal covenant—only
one, and make her one. And look upon her—the whole of her. Let all parts of her
be revived and refreshed. I am sure that when we live near to God we never
desire the prosperity of our denomination of Christians at the expense of
another, nor even in preference to another save only and except so far as we
believe that more truth may be there. May anything that we hold of error be
blasted with the breath of the Almighty, and anything that is held that is error
in any other church be withered and dried up as the grass before the mower's
scythe! May it fall and utterly perish. But every truth everywhere, and every
truth holding man, may they be immortal. And grace anywhere, grace everywhere,
wherever it is; if it be the grace of God, may it go on to wax stronger and
stronger, and may it conquer. I would earnestly pray for every true believer in
Christ, even if he were in the Church of Rome—pray that he might have grace to
get out of it at any rate, and out of some other churches I could mention
too—pray that he might have grace still to love and fear God and rejoice in Him,
notwithstanding all the difficulties that would surround him. Lord, if Thou hast
a child of Thine that is sitting on the very doorstep of hell, lift up the light
of Thy countenance upon him. Wherever he may be, or into whatsoever state he may
have come, and however crotchety he may be, however cross he may become, and
however often he may drive across all my notions and all my ideas, and however
objectionable a person he may be, favour him with Thy presence notwithstanding
that. So we ought to pray.

I must confess that it takes a deal of grace to pray much for some people. They
seem as if they were not a prayable people. One does not object to the hope that
one may live with them for ever in Heaven, but to live ten minutes with them
here on earth takes a deal of grace. Well, the Lord change them or change us! No
doubt sometimes our imperfections jar, and one set of imperfections may be
unsuitable to come into contact with another set of imperfections. So let us,
nevertheless, pray that God would bless the whole of His people, bringing them
to Himself, looking upon them, and shedding His light upon them.

III. But now, to detain you no longer over these secondary meanings, does it not
seem to you that the great meaning of the text is concerning our Lord Jesus
Christ? Of whom can it be properly said with emphasis that He is our shield and
the Lord's anointed—of whom, I say, but of the Lord Jesus Christ, Who stands
between us and God—Who shields us, and has been anointed of God that He might do
so?

Beloved, we will not dwell upon these two titles of our Saviour since they at
once suggest their own meaning. What shield have we from justice with its fiery
beams? What shield have we from Satan with his malicious machinations? What
shield have we from the world or the flesh, or from any of our myriad foes?
What' shield that we can stand behind with perfect security, save Jesus Christ
our Lord? Well, let us rejoice in Him as such, and feel ourselves perfectly
secure when we are hidden in Him. But He is the Lord's anointed, and there seems
to be much consolation in it. Though I will not go into the world I will just
refresh your memories; for if God has anointed Christ to save us He must accept
Him as our Saviour. If He has anointed Christ to be a priest, He must be an
acceptable priest. If he has anointed Him to stand for us the representative,
the intercessor, and the mediator, He must have whom God Himself appoints. Jesus
Christ is no amateur Saviour. He has not volunteered to take the work upon
Himself without a commission; but the Spirit of the Lord is upon Him, and He
hath anointed Him to be a preacher of righteousness and a Saviour of sinners.
Let us rejoice in this—that we use with God a name which He has Himself set
forth to be a saving name, and bring before God the remembrance of an offering
which He has Himself appointed. Thou art our shield, O Saviour, but Thou art
also God's Anointed; and this we plead when we lift up our souls in prayer to
God.

Now the desire of the prayer is that the Lord would look upon Christ. And what
does that mean? Why should we desire Jehovah to look upon Christ? Is it not in
order that He may look upon us with favour and love? Christ is to us an Elder
Brother. We are erring; we have been prodigals. Father, accept the family for
the Elder Brother's sake. He has never at any time transgressed Thy
commandments, and all that Thou hast belongs to Him. Look on Him; then look on
us; and remember Him, and for His sake regard us.

Christ is more than Elder Brother, however. He is our representative and our
head. When God looked upon Adam He saw the race in Adam; and Adam's fall was the
fall of us all. When God looks upon Christ He sees His elect in Christ, and the
standing of Christ is the standing of all believers, of all His people. In
Christ we died; in Christ we were buried; in Christ we rose again. In Christ we
are raised up together, and made to sit together in heavenly places even in Him;
so that when God looks upon Christ He is looking upon all His Church, looking
upon all His people, with the same glance with which He regards the face of His
Anointed. And then, moreover, the Lord Jesus Christ is one with us. There is a
marriage union between our souls and Christ. I must confess I often feel
overpowered when I have performed the marriage ceremony here, and then have read
that passage in the Ephesians where the apostle speaks of the husband leaving
his father and mother and becoming one flesh with the bride, and declares that
we are members of His body, of His flesh, and of His bones. It seems such an
extraordinary union, so that Paul when he speaks seems to be speaking of
marriage, and then he says, "I speak concerning Christ and His Church," as if
the same words would do for one as for the other. To think that all believers
are married to Christ—have entered into an indissoluble union in which eternal
love is the bond that never can be broken! My soul married to the Christ of God!
Oh, there is a heaven slumbering within that single thought! 'Tis enough to make
the spirit dance like David before the ark to think of being married—married so
as never to be divorced—to the Son of the Highest, even to the Christ of God.

Now, we would have the Lord look upon our Bridegroom's face. We have no
comeliness, but He gives us all His beauty. When He took us He took us as we
were, but He made us to be as He is. He took all our foulness, but He gave us
all His righteousness; and we therefore say, "Lord, when Thou lookest on the
family, do not come and look at the spouse.

Come not and look at the weaker vessel, but if Thou regardest the house look at
the house-band, the husband, the head, the lord, the master. He is our strength;
he is our representative."

IV. And now when the Lord does look upon Christ what does He see in Him? I want
you to think this over. I won't try and put it in many words, but leave it for
your own private meditation. It is a subject of that sort. I, being in Christ,
desire God the Father to look at Christ instead of me. Why? Why, because, first,
when the Lord looks at Jesus Christ He sees in Him His own self, for the Lord
Christ is God and one with the Father, and by a wonderful and mysterious union
not' to be explained; so that when He looks upon His Son He must look with
ineffable love and affection because He is looking upon the godhead—the perfect
godhead—in the person of Jesus Christ. There is something delightful in
that—that the godhead stands for me, and God in looking at my representative
sees Himself. He cannot see anything there but what shall be to Himself well
pleasing. But then He sees in Christ perfect manhood. When the Lord thinks of
manhood is not there enough to make Him feel weary at His heart of the very
name? Remember how, before the time of the Flood, it repented Him that He had
made man upon the face of the earth; and many a time, surely, if the Lord had
been as we are, we should have been destroyed. Manhood! It must be coupled in
God's mind with everything that is ungrateful, unnatural, vain, foolish, wanton,
wicked. Shocking word, the word manhood! But now when the Lord looks upon His
Son, He sees perfect manhood—manhood that never had a trace of sin about
it—manhood the same as ours with this one exception, that it has never gone
astray in thought or word or deed. God sees there what manhood can
accomplish—manhood that has obeyed His law without a single flaw—manhood that
has suffered for God's glory, suffered even unto death. And God loves man
because there is such a man as Christ Jesus—that there should be a possibility
of a creature being made like man who should be able sinlessly to suffer, which
I suppose angels could not do. God looks, therefore, upon manhood on account of
what Christ has been and is, and looks upon it still with love.

But, then, beloved, there is special relationship between Jesus Christ and His
own believing people, so when the Lord looks upon Jesus He sees in Him perfect
obedience. That is what He expected to have from His people, and He sees it in
His people's representative. Christ stands for His people, and when the Lord
calls for obedience Christ presents it: there it is. God cannot ask more from
man than Christ the man presents to God. There is everything in Christ that
satisfies God's holy attributes. It cannot be said that He is not pure in
Jehovah's sight, or that He charged Him with folly. No, but the thrice holy One
takes a delight in the obedience of His only begotten Son. And so, too, when God
looks upon Christ He sees in Him a full atonement for all the dishonour done to
His holy law. For all who have believed in Jesus there is in Christ the man, the
sufferer, a sacrifice presented to God which for ever puts away all recollection
of sin. "This Man when He had offered one sacrifice for sins for ever sat down
at the right hand of God; for He hath by one offering perfected for ever them
that are set apart." So that the remembrance of Gethsemane is to God most sweet.
The recollections of the flagellation, the shame, the spittle, are upon the mind
of the Most High, and He sees the sin of His people no more. It is washed out by
the atoning blood of Jesus Christ. The Lord looks into Christ's face, and He
sees me there. He sees in that face the memorials of Calvary. He looks upon His
hands and sees the scars; He looks upon His feet and sees the open wounds; He
looks upon His side and sees there still the gash that reached His heart; for
Jesus looks like a lamb that has been slain, even upon Mount Zion, and wears the
memories of His priesthood still. Oh, this is delightful to think of—that God
sees in Christ a perfect sacrifice, and a perfect obedience, and a perfect
nature, and a perfect man. And then, remember, He sees in Jesus Christ our
justification, for though He died for our offences He was raised again for our
justification. He sees in Christ the new life—such new life as we also have
received in our regeneration; and He sees in the resurrection of His dear Son
that He has given a pledge to us that He will save us, and preserve us and bring
us to our resurrection, too. In fact, when He looks into Christ's face the
Father sees the covenant, for has He not said, "Behold, I have given Him as a
covenant to the people"? He sees the seal, the covenant seal, the covenant
sacrifice, the blood that ratified the covenant. He sees in Christ every promise
made yea and amen and secure to all the seed. But, indeed, I cannot enlarge upon
what the Lord God sees in Christ, for, I might truly say, God alone knows all He
sees in Christ, but when He sees Him He is full of love to us because of what He
sees in Him. It is well for us to recollect that our salvation does not rest
upon our seeing Christ so much as it does upon God seeing Him. We are not saved
except we see Him, truly, but then the real foundation of our salvation lies in
God seeing Christ. The type of the passover brings that at once before us, for
the Lord said, "When I see the blood I will pass over you." The blood was not
put inside the house for them to see. It was on the door, but not on the inside
of the door: it was on the outside for God to see it—for the angel to see; and
when God saw the blood He passed over His people. And when God looks upon Christ
then it is that He hath mercy upon His people. At the same time we must not
forget that we also look unto Him and are saved. This is our realisation, but
the real fact which is the basis—the fact which we realise—is God's having
looked upon Christ, so that we say truly,

Him, and then the sinner see:

Look through Jesus' wounds on me.

Now, to gather up all in a word or two. When God the Father looks upon His Son
it is with ineffable affection; it is with intimate union; it is with infinite
delight. So when we are in Christ He looks upon us, and there is a union between
us and Him; there is a love from Him to us; yea, there is a delight in us. The
Lord delighteth in His people when He sees them in His own Son. So now I will
just entreat you present to make use of this as a prayer. Perhaps there is a
sinner here who feels his need of a Saviour, and wants to know how he is to come
before the Most High God. Beloved friend, I put this prayer into your mouth; may
God put it into your heart. Say, "O God, I am vile and sinful: look not on me,
but look on Thine anointed. I shelter in His wounds. Be not angry with me,
though I deserve it, but let Thy love to Him constrain thee to show Thy love to
me!" O sinner, if you search your nature through you can find no plea which you
can use with God; but if you take Jesus Christ's person to be your argument for
mercy you have prevailed. God will never deny His Son.

There is that in Jesus which at once brings to the sinner mercy when Jesus
Christ is pleaded before the throne. Say, "Oh, for His sake, by His agony and
bloody sweat, by His cross and passion, by His precious death and burial, by His
glorious resurrection and ascension, have mercy on me, O God! "You are heard,
sinner, if that be your prayer. Such a prayer cannot be unheard of the Most
High. But might net any backsliding child of God use just the same prayer
to-night? O wanderer, thou who hast lost all sense of life and love, come back.
Take with you words, and come to your God in this way, and say to Him, "My Lord,
I have changed, but my Redeemer has not. I have been unfaithful, but my Lord has
not. I have deserved Thy wrath, but He deserves Thy love. Behold, O God my
shield, I hide behind Him. Look upon His face, and then look upon me."
Backslider, by the love of God, I pray you, use that prayer to-night and come
back to your Saviour whose heart you have grieved so much.

V. And might not this suit any Christian here who has been hard at work for
Christ? You know, brethren, I believe those who work hardest for Christ are
those who are most conscious that their work is not fit to be accepted in
itself. If you find a man who rejoices in what he does, he does not do much; for
he that does much has such a high idea of what he would wish to do, and what he
should do, and of how he should do it, that he is always dissatisfied, and he
never brings anything in his hand of his own; but he says, "Lord, establish the
work of my hands. Bless it to sinners. Glorify Thyself. Make Jesus' dear name to
be sweet in the world. But I pray Thee hear Him, not for my sake, but look into
His face, and say does He not deserve to be honoured; does He not deserve to
have precious souls? If I have sought even in the humblest way to promote His
Kingdom am I not one with Thee in this desire? Dost Thou not will that He should
reign? Behold, then, the face of Thine anointed, and for His sake let the
blessing come upon my poor services, unworthy though they be." And might not any
child of God who is pleading for the conversion of others use this prayer? I
will suppose that you, dear wife, have been urging upon the Lord that He would
have mercy upon your husband; or you, sister, have been seeking the conversion
of your brother. You have not yet prevailed. Have you tried this argument, "O
God, look on the face of Thine anointed. Hear me by His name Who was full of
tender compassion and wept over Jerusalem; by His love Who would not let the
sinner die; by His heart which even after His death poured out a stream of blood
and water for the sins of men. Lord, hear me, and save my brother; save my
husband; save my child." Would not that be good pleading? And will not this do
when we come to die? I scarcely know a prayer that would better become our lips
when they are praying their last prayer on earth, and getting ready for their
first song in Heaven, than to say here, "Behold, O God our shield, and look upon
the face of Thine anointed," and then the moment the prayer was over to have to
say, "My God, I also have looked upon the face of Thine anointed, and now that
the beatific vision has charmed me into bliss I have forgotten all the pains of
dying; I have reached immortality and life, for I see the anointed of the Lord
Who is for ever now my shield from death."

Oh, yes, we might well die with this prayer upon our hearts, and then turn it
into a song for ever, and say to angels and Cherubim and Seraphim, "Behold our
shield, and look upon the face of God's anointed. Gather hither all ye saints
who have been redeemed by blood. Come hither all ye hosts of ministering
spirits, and ye worlds afar with all your varied races of creatures. All things
that have sense and intelligence and wit and eyes to gaze and hearts to love,
come hither, and look upon our shield, and behold the face of God's anointed.
Was ever brighter glory? Was ever more transcendent love?" And He is our brother
still. A man—a man sits on the throne of God. "Unto which of the angels said He
at any time, Thou art My son; this day have I begotten Thee." He took not on Him
the nature of angels, but He took on Him the seed of Abraham; and now between
God and man there is no gap, for the man is one with God, and the Lord may truly
say, "The man hath become one of us," and we in Him have become unto the eternal
God in communion and fellowship that shall last for aye.

God bring us there in His own good time! Amen.


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  CHAPTER 17: 16. SATAN WITH THE SONS OF GOD
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XVI. Satan with the Sons of God

There was a day when the sons of God came to present themselves before the Lord,
and Satan came also among them.—(Job 1:6.)

It is no use enquiring what day it was. The Jewish Rabbis, who like to waste
time over difficult questions—questions of no profit—say it was the Sabbath; and
that is very possible. But I am afraid that Satan does not only go abroad on
Sundays, but that he will be found in congregations that meet on weekdays, and
that when the sons of God at any time come together it will generally happen
that Satan is among them. The question has also been raised, Did Satan go into
Heaven, then? I do not see anything about Heaven in the text. The sons of God
came together. They may have been the sons of God on earth—the descendants of
them, or other godly men who were in the habit of meeting together for prayer
and praise. They may have been the angels in Heaven; and I sometimes like to
think that Sabbath is kept in Heaven, as well as on earth, and that when we come
together with special gatherings below, the saints are keeping special festival
above, for though it be always Sabbath with them, there may be a Sabbath of
Sabbaths, and they may have their high days and holidays keeping time and time
with us below, only excelling us in the volume of their praise. Satan could
present himself before God without being in Heaven. The whole universe is God's
audience-hall, and when He mounts the throne and summons all His creatures
together, they are there and then before Him, whatever their position as to
place may be. Satan seems to have intentionally, however, mingled, as far as he
could, with the sons of God, wherever those sons of God were found in the
presence of the Most High. Is not there something to be learned out of this? Let
us see if there be not some teaching in it. And the first fact, I think, which
is very clear is this—that mere coming up with God's people is of no value
whatever, for "Satan came also among them." I hope none of you have ever
received the notion, though I am afraid it is common, that if you attend a place
of worship regularly, and especially if you have a seat of your own, you have
done something exceedingly meritorious, although you should never give your
heart to God and never repent of sin or believe in Christ. Some seem to fancy
that they stand on a vantage ground because they are regular hearers. They
observe the Sabbath; they are church-goers and chapel-goers. Now, see what a
mistake such persons have made, because Satan kept this holiday, whatever it may
have been, and Satan appeared with God's saints. Satan mingled in the throng.
And it was not only once that he came, but as far as the Book of Job is
concerned, there are two days when the sons of God came together, and Satan was
there both times. He seems to have been a very regular attendant, to have been
constantly there. And yet of what service could it have been to him? And of what
service can it be to anybody unless there be spiritual worship, and unless the
heart shall be given to God? "Who hath required this at your hands that ye
should tread my courts?"

There is no value whatever in a mere bodily attendance upon the means of grace;
for, in the first place, it is certain that Satan's attendance at divine worship
could not be acceptable to God. Could anything be acceptable that that false
spirit did? Did not his polluted nature profane the whole? So in the case of
ungodly men, their attendance with the people of God cannot be acceptable with
God. Do they bow the head in prayer? If you do not pray with your hearts you do
but mock God; or if you offer the prayer of the Pharisee, and say, "God, I thank
Thee that I am not as other men," you do but provoke the Most High. You have not
brought to Him anything that He can receive. And when the song rises up to
Heaven, and no doubt some think that that is good singing which is very
musical—which is after the best style of art—yet, oh, it is not so with God.
What doth He care for your concords and your harmonies, such as delight human
ears? He reads the heart, and unless the soul blesses Him whose mercy endureth
for ever, and unless the heart adores the Creator and the Benefactor, there is
no song such as He can receive. Hosannahs fall short of Heaven if they do not
rise from our hearts. Only that praise which comes from our heart will go to
God's ear. If we do not bless Him from within, neither will He receive us.

I.

I would like some of you to think of this—that you have been twenty or thirty
years, perhaps—possibly forty or fifty—constantly attending before God, and have
never once offered any sacrifice that He can accept, for until you believe in
His Son there is nothing about you that He can look upon with pleasure. Till you
have repented of your sins, till you have trusted Jesus, till you are born
again, you are condemned already, and the condemnation which is upon you
personally is upon all that you do. Even your prayer becomes an abomination unto
God, viewed as coming from one whose heart is not right with God. Oh, do think
of this, I pray you, and henceforth never rely upon the outward use of the means
of grace. Get farther than that, or else you stop short of acceptance and
salvation.

Moreover, it is quite certain that as Satan's presence was not acceptable, so
Satan's presence there was not beneficial to himself. He never repented of any
ill that he had done. It does not appear that he ever slacked in his diligent
rebellion against God. His proud heart was not humbled; his lustful mind was
never purified. He remained the same devil after he had mixed with the sons of
God as he was before. And do recollect, I pray you, that in the mere exercise of
sitting in a pew and listening to a sermon, or joining in prayer, there is
nothing that can benefit you. "Ye must be born again." If it does not come to
that, no impression has been made. You may take the Ethiopian, and wash him as
much as you will, but unless a miracle should change his skin he will remain
black. And all the preaching in the world is no better than the washing of the
Ethiopian until the Spirit of God shall apply it to the heart, till a divine
power shall beget faith in the soul. Do remember this. I am sure there are some
who pride themselves that they attend on the Church which they believe to be the
only authorised one. Well, Satan was in a very authorised assembly, but remained
Satan still.

Some, on the other hand, will boast that they belong to the most simple sect in
the world, that their worship has nothing at all of adornment. It is as plain as
possible. Perhaps they are Baptists; perhaps they belong to the Society of
Friends. We may as readily be hypocrites in an informal worship as in a formal
one. We have as great reason to guard ourselves against trusting in our
simplicity, as others have to guard against trusting in formalities, for if we
rest in anything short of the work of the Spirit in the soul, and a real
reconciliation to God by the blood of the atonement—in fact, a new creation
within our heart and a saving faith in Jesus—we shall no more be benefited by
our hearing and our attendance than Satan was by joining with the sons of God.
It is a spiritual business. Oh, that all recollected this! In vain your
sacraments; in vain your gatherings of any sort. If God the Holy Ghost be not in
you it falleth to the ground. And note, once more, that Satan's attendance with
the sons of God even gave him an opportunity for the commission of greater sins.
So far from being accepted with God, or being benefited by his attendance, he
even went from bad to worse, for there it was that he dared challenge God with
regard to His servant Job, and go forth into the world to do more mischief than
he had done before.

I fear me there are some that grow Gospel-hardened! They have heard the Gospel
till they never mind it now. They have heard the law preached till there is no
terror in it now. Good Rowland Hill used to say they are like the blacksmith's
dog that goes to sleep under his master's anvil, though the sparks fly about
him. They have learnt to sleep when the very sparks of damnation fly about them.
It matters not how it is put; they cannot be aroused. And you know these persons
often become the raw material for making the very worst of people. When the
devil wanted to make a Judas, he was obliged to take an apostle for the raw
material, for you can always make the worst thing out of that which is akin to
the best. Those men that miss virtue, as it were by an inch, are prepared to go
out and out in all manner of vice. I do think that some could not sin as they do
if they were not well acquainted with their duty, but they are able now, having
a tender conscience, to sin greatly against conscience. Having light, they sin
greatly against light. Knowing much of God, they are able to brave that
knowledge, and to defy God more than others could do.

O dear hearers, are some of you getting worse? Am I preaching some of you into
hell? Am I rocking cradles for you that I might rock you into eternal sleep? Is
it so after all the care we take to try and adapt our discourse to your mind? Do
we only, after all, make you fitter heirs of wrath because you continue to
despise the message? I hesitate to come and speak in this pulpit when I think of
some of you, for I despair of you. I fear that, after all, you will never be
brought to Christ. You will remain as you are, and all that I shall be able to
do will be to increase your condemnation. God forbid it by His infinite mercy!
But this I am sure of, if there are any people against whom the woes which our
Lord pronounced upon Capernaum and Bethsaida will fall with a sevenfold
vengeance, it will be those people who have been plainly told their sins in
words that never minced the matter, and have been earnestly pointed to Christ,
and commanded over again in the name of God to repent and turn unto the Saviour
that they might find salvation.

Well, that first point is solemnly clear. It proves that, as Satan came up with
the assembly, the mere coming up with the people of God is just nothing; but as
his worship was not accepted, as it did not benefit him, but even gave him an
opportunity to be even yet a greater transgressor, so may it be with some who
frequent the courts of the Lord's house.

II. But how, secondly, another topic. Our text teaches us that the best
assemblies of saints are not free from evil persons. The sons of God came
together, "and Satan came also among them." What does this teach us?

First, that we should not leave the assembly of the saints because unworthy
persons happen to be there. I believe this to be a practical observation that
may be useful to some present. For instance, I have known at the communion-table
a person say, "I cannot sit down there, because in my judgment such a person is
allowed to sit down who is unworthy." Now, dear friend, your course is plain. If
you are aware of anything wrong in a church member—grievously wrong—there are
the proper authorities of the church to whom, not in a spirit of gossiping, but
in a spirit of righteous love for the purity of the church, you ought to
communicate this fact. But you are not infallible yourself, and therefore it may
happen that you have misjudged this individual, and your responsibility will
cease when you have done what you believe to be your duty in that matter. If,
then, it should seem to those who are set over the church that it is not a fault
as you think it is, or that it is not proved, or if they think it not such a
fault as should exclude the person, you have nothing further to do with it. It
is your business to come to the table of the Lord, and to observe His command,
whoever may be there; for, believe me, if you never come to a communion-table
unless you feel sure that everybody there is perfect, I think you ought to stop
away if for no other reason than this—that you are not perfect yourself. You
will make one unworthy person; and therefore do not try to carry out that rule.
Remember the first communion supper. Our Lord was there, and twelve apostles,
but one of them was a devil. I hardly dare to hope that we have a larger
proportion of true saints than Christ had among His apostles. I should not like
to say that I believe that one in twelve of all professors will turn out like
Judas, but I should feel very happy if I did not think it was more than one in
twelve. It is not for us to judge, but there are many things that cause us
justly to suspect; and therefore since Peter and James and John did not rise
from the table and say, "Master, Thou hast said that one here is a devil, and we
will no longer sit down with him," but as they continued there, and put the
warning He had given them to quite another use, I would say to you, dear
brother, dear sister, come up and meet with your Master and keep the feast, even
though you should have to feel there is someone there who ought not to be there.
And then, again, seeing that in every assembly there is some unworthy person,
turn it to the account the apostles did. Examine yourselves whether you are the
unworthy person. If one of you be a devil, all should say, "Lord, is it I?" We
cannot do better than always take the points of censure and of caution, and use
them upon ourselves. Oh, to think that there should be here a company of God's
people, and some of us should be hypocrites! Do not let us look across the
gallery and say, "I see someone there that I think is one." Look at home and
say, "Lord, am I one?" To think that we should meet around the table to
commemorate our Saviour's death, and that it should be morally certain that
there are some persons there who are as the devil is! I beseech you do not begin
to say, "I am afraid that my neighbour, So-and-so, may be such." How goes it
with your soul? What about yourself? Try your own gold. Test your own silver;
and if you be clear there you may very well leave these matters to your Master.
And do you not think, once more, that this fact, that in every holy assembly
there will be some evil person, should make us long for those blesse'd
assemblies above where Satan cannot come, and where no evil persons will ever
intrude? We have to walk with caution here, for there may be some evil eye fixed
upon us even in these sacred chambers of God's house where we act like familiar
children and unbosom ourselves; but up yonder there shall be no Judas-eye to
detect our inconsistencies, and we shall have no inconsistencies to be detected.
There shall be none to suspect and to impute wrong motives; there shall be none
there to charge us with sins of which we are guiltless. We shall be quite free
and clear from all contamination when we shall be permitted to stretch our wings
and fly to those blessed assemblies where we shall feel ourselves eternally at
home. So much upon the second topic.

III.

Now a third and more important one. It is this: You will find that whenever
God's children desire to draw near to God Satan will come among them. I believe
this is so with each individual. My experience leads me to remark that if ever
I. desire to pray more earnestly than at other times I feel temptation to be
stronger at that particular season. I am morally certain that if I want to be
quite alone the devil will send somebody to knock at my front door whom I must
see; or if he does not do that, and I can get the time to myself, then he will
come in without knocking, and begin to bring all sorts of thoughts into my mind,
stagger me with recollections of some old sins, bring before me, perhaps, quaint
and pithy passages that I would rather not recollect at all, for they are
unseasonable then, make me remember what I would fain forget, and forget what I
desire to remember. Have you never felt, when you were flying up to the throne,
your face full upon the Eternal Sun, desiring only to behold its light, and to
fly right into the fulness of its blaze, as if you have heard a mutter at your
side, and, turning round, you have seen that the heel of the dragon wing has
been equal with you in its flight? No, he seems as if he would disturb you, and
come right before you, and blot out the vision of God's presence from your eye,
and, when you are nearest to God, would come into conflict with you there? When
the people of God, the sons of God, came before the Lord, Satan came also among
them. And this is a lesson to those who are seeking to come to God for the first
time—you with troubled consciences that desire reconciliation—awakened sinners
that long that their Father should fall upon their neck and kiss them and
blot-out their sins. Now that you are trying to come to God you?. are very
likely to be subjected to temptations you never knew before. Possibly you will
be tormented with blasphemous thoughts. Many are. And you will find sin to be
more active in you than ever it was. Satan knows it is "now or never" with you.
He is afraid he shall lose you, and he stirs up all his force. I think I hear
the Black Prince say to the spirits that surround him, "Empty out your quivers,
upon that man. Spare him not. He begins to desert us. He will leave us, and he
will turn away from the pleasures of sin to follow after our enemy Christ. Now,
tell him Christ won't receive him. Tell him his sins are too many. Remind him of
his old transgressions; pierce him with your barbed shafts;. put venom into all
his blood. Torment him; make him, if you can, commit suicide, or abstain from
listening to the Gospel. Don't let Christ have him. Do keep him away from God."
When the Lord's people are coming to Him with penitence, seeking mercy, then
Satan presents himself and stands in the way to seek their destruction.

Keeping, however, to the subject closely, whenever our assemblies come together,
brethren, do you not find that Satan also comes among us? He will come with the
minister. He will come into his study, he will come with him into the pulpit;
and he incites the minister to say those things that will? strike—to put them in
very pretty language; and he will suggest, as soon as it is so stated, "How well
you put that point—uncommonly well!" Or he will say, "You were very-faithful to
the people over that head, now. You are doing your work exceedingly well."
Seldom enough does the preacher want to be told that he has done his work well.
If there is one that stands behind, that pats him patronisingly and saith to
him, "Well done! well done!" it is another voice than that which will say "Well
done!" at last. Meanwhile, if Satan is busy in the pulpit, he is busy in the
pew, too. Did he not just now make one of you recollect that sick child at home?
When there was something that might be beneficial to you he brought before your
mind where you left your keys when you came away. A thousand little things wilt
come just at the moment you do not want them.

I cannot, of course, mention these, but Satan is a great and at leading people
into distracting thoughts which prevent their worship of God. And I have known
him to go and stand at the front gate, and, if he can, make some trouble in your
coming into the pew; and when you get there something will happen that makes you
feel uncomfortable and get into a vexed state of mind. And then, when the word
is being preached, he will come and insinuate doubts about this and doubts about
the other. If there is a choice promise, just as you hope you are going to get
the flavour of it he will pluck it out from between your teeth and away with it
before you can feed upon it. And if there should happen to be a word of rebuke,
lie will tell you that that does not mean you; you are superior to the necessity
of receiving such a word as that; or he will even make you rebel against the
word when it comes home to you, as if, after all, it was not the preacher's
business to speak very pointedly to your conscience.

Oh, the ways in which Satan will spoil our best services! He is ever busy, and I
believe where there is the best spiritual meat, and God feeds His children best,
there the devil will be most active. When there is a very nice, prim, natty
sermon which is read very nicely to the people, and the devil rides down the
street, he never goes in there. He knows there will be no hurt done by that. But
if there is an earnest preacher, he says, "I must stop my chariot here," and in
he goes and begins to put forth all his strength, if by any means he may spoil
the worship of God's people and prevent the Gospel coming with power to their
hearts. Watch, dear brethren, watch and pray and resist him, for he will flee
from you. And let it be our endeavour never to come to this Tabernacle as a
matter of form, and never to go away satisfied unless we have seen Jesus, never
contented unless we have bathed our souls in Heaven, and have had the dew of the
Lord upon our foreheads.

It ought to be a wretched Sunday evening with us when we feel that we have not
worshipped and have not fed upon spiritual meat; and if there is a Sunday in
which you have not got good and done good too, you should feel, "Well, I could
lament that I have lost, not a day as Titus did, but a Sabbath day, which is ten
times worse." What a dreadful thing it is to have barren Sabbaths, formal
Sabbaths. The Lord save us from this great calamity! Satan will come and make it
so if he can; but may the Spirit of God come too, and He will soon put Satan to
the rout, and we shall worship God in His strength.

Now, if Satan comes into an assembly of saints, we may expect him to come into a
mixed assembly like this, in which there are saints and sinners too; and if
there should be a word in the sermon that is likely to be blessed to a sinner,
Satan will be sure to distract his attention if he can. I have told you several
times of that simple-hearted little boy that used to lean forward and put his
hand to his ear to catch every word the minister said, His mother said to him,
"Why are you so very attentive?" "Because, mother," said he, "the minister once
said that if there was a sentence in the sermon that had a blessing in it for
us, Satan would be sure, if he could, to prevent our attending to it; and I am
anxious not to lose a sentence that God may bless to me."

Oh for hearers like that! Beloved, there would be no fear for conversions if our
congregations were made up of people who sought for the blessing, who would take
every sentence like a cluster from the vine, and press it with anxious foot to
get the wine from it, that they might drink and be satisfied. The Lord give us
to feel that, since the enemy will distract attention if he can, we will hear,
and take heed how we hear.

Then I have known him do much mischief by suggesting criticisms of the preacher.
Many come merely for that very reason. Well, they will compare one preacher with
another preacher. "Paul, well he is very argumentative, but he has not at all
the brilliance of Apollos, and Apollos—well, he is a rhetorician. Cephas is my
man—rough, plain, blunt Cephas." And another says, "Well, Cephas is almost
vulgar. Give me Apollos. He is the man for my money." But is that the way in
which we should hear the word of God? Well, as George Herbert put it, "Judge not
the preacher; he is thy judge." If there be anything in God's ministry at all it
is not meant to be looked at, and examined, and turned over as if it were a work
of art. Sirs, I care nothing of what you should think of the hilt of my sword. I
want to strike right through your souls, and cut and wound with it; and surely I
have failed utterly to do that when you are able to think about the style of the
sermon. When anyone says, "That was a famous sermon," the preacher may conclude
that that was a sermon lost; it was a useless sermon; for that only will be
famous with God that will affect men's consciences. Oh, how busy Satan is to
engage men with the niceties of phrases, when, instead, they should be looking
at the inner sense, and receiving meekly the word of God.

Then Satan has a great art of taking off people's minds from the word of God
when it is delivered. When the seed was scattered on the stony ground the birds
of the air found it and took it away. Oh, those birds of the air! Yes, when you
get down the Tabernacle steps there will be one of those birds of the air
waiting for you. You will be taking an evening walk, and then the chat will take
away any impression that may have been produced on your mind. Oftentimes one no
sooner crosses the threshold of the door than topics are suggested for
conversation that effectually put out of memory any good thing that may have
been heard. I believe this to be one of the devices of Satan, and that he comes
into our assemblies to see in which way he may best destroy the power of the
word in men's hearts.

Brethren and sisters, pray for us. If this enemy be so busy, how much we need
the gracious spirit to be ever at work to make the truth "the power of God unto
salvation."

IV. And now, lastly, Satan came up with the people of God, but he was never more
Satan-like than he was then; and so we close with that observation, that there
is a possibility that there may be in the midst of the people of God those who
will develop their character, their evil character, all the more terribly
because of their association with worship and with the Gospel. Satan at once
began to find fault with one of God's best servants; and many who join in the
assembly of the saints amuse themselves by pulling to pieces the characters of
God's people, and if they cannot find anything to fix upon in their characters,
they usually impute motives or make suppositions as to what such persons would
be if they were in a different position. Oh, do not come into contact with God's
people merely to oppose them! He that touches them touches the apple of
Jehovah's eye. If he be a bad man, better let him alone than injure the
character of one true child of God. Touch a man's child, and you will see the
colour coming into the man's face at once. He might have forgiven a blow upon
himself; but a blow upon his child—it shall go hard with you if you provoke him
so. Never, I pray you, come up into the midst of the assembly, and there sit and
indulge hard and bitter and cruel thoughts against those that seek to follow
their Master. Satan was very satanic, for even when he had accused Job he went
away to persecute him and torment him. I pray that husband not to go home
to-night to ridicule his wife as he has often done. You can get to hell very
well and very surely without going post haste there by persecution; for if any
man wants to make his destruction infallibly sure, and his being driven from the
presence of God certain beyond all doubt, he has only got to begin to persecute
his children or his wife, or his friend because they will follow the Lord. Why,
if you do not want to go to Heaven yourself, let other people go. What is the
good of being a dog in the manger? Let them have their way: you have yours.
Wherefore should you, as an Englishman, oppose their liberty; and as a man of
sense and a man of decency, why should you attempt persecution? I speak thus
because I know there are some that have to smart very severely under the cruel
things that are said about them and against them when they reach their homes.
Satan came also among the saints, and he came there to do them mischief. It is
enough for one Satan to do that. Let none of us imitate Satan lest we should
fall into his eternal condemnation. And now I send you away, but not till I have
stated again, for the thousandth time, the simple way of salvation. Whoever in
this audience desires to be reconciled to God, whoever desires the pardon of his
sin, this is the way of salvation. It is that you stop in your career of sin and
repent of your transgression, and then listen to this word, which is the word of
His Gospel—"He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved." To believe is to
trust; and if you would know what you have to trust, hearken to these words.
"Hear, and thy soul shall live." Christ, the Son of God, became man, and as man
suffered and died upon the cross. On Him were laid the sins of all who believe
in Him, and He was punished for their sins, that so God might be just, and yet
might receive those for whom Jesus died—as many as believe in Jesus, the
Saviour; "for God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that
whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life." If you
trust Christ, then know your sin is forgiven, for it was laid on Christ; your
iniquity is put away, for Christ put it away by His death. You are pardoned and
saved. Go your way, and rejoice in such a Gospel. May the Lord grant that many
of you to-night may seek mercy through Jesus, may not delay and procrastinate,
but may seek and find now pardon through the precious blood of our redeeming
Lord! Amen,


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  CHAPTER 18: 17. PLAYING THE FOOL
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XVII. Playing the Fool And as thy servant was busy here and there, he was
gone.—(1 Kings 20:40).

It was the excuse which the man in this prophetic parable made. He had been
entrusted with a captive of great importance. He had been told to take care of
him, and that if he suffered him to go his life should pay for his life. He
accepted the charge, was put in the king's commission to take care of the
prisoner, and he suffered him to escape, his excuse being that he had other
things to do. He was busy here and there, and lo, the captive was gone.

I suppose a man must be very hard driven before he would not have some excuse.
We are, most of us, excellent hands at excuse-making, and we carry this business
of ours into religion. There, if we happen to be without God and without Christ,
we make a capital policy for ourselves. A great many persons excuse themselves
with the same plea, the same stale plea, which we have now before us—they are so
busy, they have so much to do; and one of these days when they come to die I
expect they will say that they were busy here and there, and while they were so
doing they somehow or other lost their souls. Now, this excuse is a very common
one, and I purpose for a short time to try and deal with it to-night.

I.

And, first, let us observe that it is one which a certain class of persons could
not in any conscience make. Young people cannot very well say that they are
pressed with business, and therefore cannot think of an eternity, or seek
reconciliation with God. As yet you have no business; you are not surrounded
with the thousand cares which your parents plead; all that you want is provided
for you. You have certain duties which occupy a portion of your time, at least I
hope you have, for it would be a very unfortunate circumstance for you to be
left with nothing to do, and your friends must be very unwise if they are
exposing you to that temptation; but still, you have not so much to do that you
could, even with any sort of face, say that you have no time for prayer, no time
for reading the Word of God, no time for solemn consideration, no time for
repentance, and no time for faith.

Dear young friends, you will be busy by-and-bye. Perhaps some of you are about
entering upon business for yourselves. Is it not a suggestion which your common
sense approves that now, now, the great business of life should be seen to? Have
you not a special promise that they that seek God early shall find Him? Do not
lose that by postponing the seeking of your Saviour. Is not the morning often
the very best time for solemn consideration—when the dew, as yet, has not been
brushed from the lawn, and the smoke has not yet gathered on the sky? And so is
the morning of life a sweet and fair season in which to come and give yourself
to the Saviour. We have heard many regret that they came to Christ so late, but
never once did we hear it said that any mourned that they came to Him too soon.

'Twill save us from a thousand snares To mind religion young.

I speak nere from personal experience, and I hope I shall have all the more
weight in my pleading with you. Just when I was about sixteen years of age, I
began to preach Christ Jesus, but ere that I had confessed my faith in Him by
baptism—just when I was fifteen years of age. I wish it could have been many
years before; but I bear my witness that He is a good Master, that His service
is good, and His wages are good, and Himself best of all. Might I have the
privilege of being the instrument to-night of persuading some young heart to
say, "We, too, will give our soul to Jesus lest in after-life our thoughts
should be smothered amidst the tares of a thousand cares and worldly concerns.
We will give our hearts to Jesus even now." You see, if you do not, you cannot
plead the excuse that you were so busy, for now, at least, you have the time.

Neither can some say this whose occupations are light. There are persons placed
in such a condition now (not so many as I could wish) whose hours of labour are
not grind-ingly long, and whose occupations themselves are not so altogether
absorbing to their minds that they cannot think. There is many a man who can
perform his trade with his "hands, and yet his heart can be in heaven. We have
known many such. There are handicrafts that leave the soul unfettered while the
hands are busy. I grant you that these grow fewer and fewer, and the rush of the
world's business becomes stronger and stronger every day, and like a mighty
cataract bears men's minds along with it; but there are some of you who have
good pauses, and intervals, and periods of thought. Especially you have your
Sabbaths; and those sweet Saturday evenings that some of you get when you should
prepare yourselves for the holy day; and then the long Sabbath from the first
break of 'dawn till after the sun hath gone down. Oh, these are times when the
world is shut out, and hushed, and still, when surely your spirit should say, "I
will arise and go unto my Father." God has given us these respites from toil
that we may not say that we never have a space of time in which to think of Him.
He marks out and sets apart these Sabbaths not for Himself only, but for
ourselves, that in them we may find our richest good, may commerce with the
skies, and do the great business that shall make us rich for eternity. Some of
you, then, could not say that you are so busy that you have no time to think
about your souls. And I do address, I know, to-night, a few persons who are
still unconverted who could not say this for another reason. God has spared them
now to a considerable age, and they have given up business and have retired.
Beloved friends, you used to reckon that when this time came you would set it
apart for solemn consideration. You have to be very thankful that you have been
spared to see that time. You might have been cut down as a great many others
have been. How many times, now, within these last thirty years, while you have
been in business, have you heard it said, "So-and-so is gone," and "So-and-so is
gone"? Why, if you think a minute, the persons whom you did trade with when you
first commenced—where are they now? With the exception of a few like yourself
who have been spared, they are gone, and there are new names on your ledger and
your day book now. Well, you have been spared in the mercy of God to get out of
business, and to shake off most of its toil and turmoil; and yet for all that
you are living a prayerless and a thoughtless life. Oh, I could burst into tears
over such a one as you are, because you really have seen such wonderful mercy.
When. you reflect how you have been spared, and the remarkable way in which God
has favoured you in business, and now has given you this quiet opportunity in
that retreat of yours to think of Him, are you resolved to perish? Are you
determined to be lost? Have you made a covenant with death and a league with
Satan that you will perish, despite all that,. God's providence can do for you?
Oh, I trust it is not so. And if it be, my prayer shall be that God's Spirit
would come in and disannul your league with death and break your covenant with
hell; for if not you will not be able to say in eternity, "Good Master, I was so
hurried that I could not repent; I was so pushed for it that I could not seek
Thy face; I had not time to learn the Gospel, because I had to keep my face to
the grindstone with such severe toil. I never had rest." Why, that little villa
of yours will stand up against you, and these quiet days in the autumn of your
life will all impeach you, for having been wilfully a transgressor against the
infinite love and sovereign mercy of your God. Thus, young people, and old
people, and persons placed in circumstances in which they are free from pressing
toil, will be quite unable to use such an excuse as this, though I should not.
wonder, such is the impudence of the human heart, that even they might venture
upon it.

II. But now I pass on to the second remark—that those who do make this excuse,
and think that they can well make-it, ought to remember that it is not a valid
one. I will try to show it is not. You say that you are too busy. My first reply
is, Why were you so busy? What was the reason of it? You were so busy because
you had such-and-such a quantity of money to make. But why needed you have made
that money? I do not see that it was a very important matter after all that
there should have been such a quantity of Probate-Duty paid from your estate. It
does not seem to me, whatever it may seem to you, such a mighty fine thing to be
lost for and to be damned for, and to have it said, "He died" worth £100,000."
To me it seems a mere trifle, a ridiculous thing which only shows what a fool
the man must have been to have thrown away his best part and his eternal
happiness, for the sake of paying so much more into the Exchequer, taken from
his heirs when he came to die. There are other ways of finding the revenue of
the country without finding it out of the woe of immortal souls, surely.

Oh, but you are not occupied with money-making, you say; you are occupied with
scientific studies. Certainly a somewhat nobler pursuit; but was there any great
need that we should know a little more at the expense of your soul? What have
you found out? Anything very remarkable? You have classified beetles, have you?
You have arranged ferns; you have tracked a river somewhere; you have studied
the law of storms; you have found out a new machine, have brought out another
notion that may save toil and promote domestic economy. Very well. We are much
obliged to you; but was that what you were sent into the world to do? Were you
created on purpose for that? And, having done that, if your soul is lost, was
there absolutely any need for the world to get a new machine that should be
stained blood-red with the blood of a soul for ever? We could have waited a
little while. If it had been put to the humane portion of mankind they would not
have liked to have the best invention at the expense of a single immortal
spirit. There was not any need for you, then—I believe there was no
necessity—that you should have been so busy, even if the excuse be true. But you
say, "Oh, but in my case it was absolutely needful that I should fight for it,
to provide for myself and a little regiment of little ones." Oh, I know how hard
some are pressed; and 'tis grievous when we see men working from early morn till
late at night with no time whatever for mental improvement or for spiritual
thought. It used to be so. I do not think it is so much so now, nor will it ever
be so again. I should hope it would not, but there may be cases in which it is
still so, and, if so, let me remind you that your having found a Saviour would
not have rendered it more difficult to find the bread that perisheth. Your
having given your heart to Christ would, in fact, have eased you of much care.
You would then have felt that you had a Father to provide for you—a Father whose
care over sparrows and ravens would be a guarantee to you that He would take
care of you. Why, your toil would have been lighter. It might have cost you as
much sinew, but it would not have cost you so much discontent and wear and tear
of heart; and this is the main drain upon a man—that wear and tear of his inner
soul. O, you labouring man, if you had loved your God, you would have worked to
music instead of working to groans. If you had thought Christ to be your Friend,
you would have toiled cheerfully, doing it as unto Him, and therefore the yoke
would have been easier about your neck. Therefore it is no excuse, but rather a
call upon you, because of your labour, to come to Him, for He hath said, "Come
unto Me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest." But
now let me put it to you. You say you were so busy that you could not attend to
religion. Had not you time to attend to the other necessary things? I do not see
many of you in the streets ordinarily without your coats or without your
dresses. You have time to dress. Then I am sure God has given you time in which
to put on the robe of righteousness. You sometimes hurry your meals, but still
you do get them. There is the breakfast, and there is the dinner; and I cannot
believe that God gives us time to eat the bread that perisheth and has given us
no time to eat the bread of life. All of you usually get to your beds at some
time or other, and get your sleep; some get quite enough of it, and if they cut
off a little for their devotion, it were well for them; they would be none the
more weary for that. But you do sleep, and he that hath so much time for sleep
must surely have time for the things of God. But permit me to add, I find in
this country and in this city most people have time for recreation. Somehow or
other they will get an outing now and then (and I would not rob them of it);
they have times in which they spend their diversion (I do not blame them); but
do they not say they have no time and are too busy to think of God and their
souls? That is a stark naked He when a man says that he finds time for fun and
merriment, and cannot find time for prayer and for seeking the Lord.

Moreover, although some of you do not hoe your own gardens, occasionally you
find time to hoe your neighbours', aye, and to hoe up their flowers as well as
their weeds. We find persons who are too busy to be saved, but are not too busy
to pick holes in the characters of Christians. They puzzle their heads about
Predestination and Free Will; they do not mind sitting down over some problem
that the archangel Gabriel could not solve, and pose themselves over that; but
the simple truth, "Believe and live"—they have no time for that; and to forsake
their sins and turn to Christ—they are too busy for that; but yet not too busy
to have political speculations, and radical theories, and I know not what
beside. O, sirs, I think the thing does not hold water. It is a. leaky vessel.
Let us put it away. The excuse is hardly worth the combating. It yields as soon
as we give it half a stroke. There will I leave it. It is a broken thing.

III. But I will remind you now, thirdly, that this is art excuse which accuses.
It is an edge tool which cuts the person who defends himself with it; for when
men say that they have had much business and have not had time to think of their
souls, then it is clear if you have had much business you have had much mercy.
You must have seen a good deal of God's goodness in the course of these many
years. Others have been bankrupt; you have seen many wrecked in the sea. of
life; and you have escaped. Man, have you had all these mercies, and never
thanked God for them? You say you are busy. That means that God has given you
much, sent much of His goodness to your door. And have you never returned thanks
to the great Giver of all good? "Ah!" say you, "but I have had much trouble,
too." There I have you again with another argument. Have you had so many
troubles, and never sought God in them? Yes, perhaps you have sought Him in
trouble. But, then, why have you forgotten Him when the trouble has been
removed? How was it you? wrung your hands in despair and said, "O God, help me
out of this," and, when you were helped out of it, you still remained a stranger
to Him? Your many mercies and your many troubles are both calling against you.
Why, surely they should have drawn you or have driven you to your God. With a
favourable wind and a fair sheet you ought to have made for that haven, or, with
a rough wind, you ought to have worked for it and laboured for it with all your
might. You have had much business, you say, and been very busy here and there.
Then that looks to me as if you were not a fool—as if you were a man with brains
beneath that forehead, a man that could think. Now, if you were a downright
simpleton and lost your soul, some might say, "Poor fool, he knows no better."
But you, sir, you take a prominent place in the city, and you are on the
Exchange; you can always hold your own, your opinion is always worth hearing;
and will you be wise about everything but your soul and eternity? Have you wit
for everything except for that which concerns judgment? Do you save your foolery
for your God? Are you a wise man everywhere, and then play the idiot before
Jehovah's face? If you live with heaven's gate wide open before you, and seek
not to enter, if you have the dear wounds of Jesus streaming with atoning blood,
and yet never seek a share in the pardoning efficacy that comes from them, you
are playing the fool with a vengeance—a comedy before God which will end in a
tragedy as you are a living man, unless the grace of God prevent it. The very
fact, then, that you have been busy here and there is an excuse which does
accuse you. Mention it no more lest it increase your condemnation.

Again. This excuse that we have been too busy to think of divine things is an
excuse which will cost us terrible wounds to our memory when we come to die. I
cannot somehow ever try, for I know I never should succeed, in painting the
deathbed of a man who with sound health and good judgment and grand
opportunities, and education, and the like, has spent all his time simply upon
the things which concern him, and then comes to die without any preparation
whatever for the eternal world. It seems to me of all things beneath the sky the
most monstrous. Why, to have one's self prepared for the eternal dwelling-place
might well become so absorbing a pursuit that we might forget the things of
time. I could comprehend a mental abstraction that should make us absolutely
foolish from day to day as to ordinary affairs if the mind were set upon
superior and spiritual concerns; but I cannot comprehend this raving madness of
humanity that men seem to be utterly abstracted from spiritual things, and rapt
and taken altogether away about these bubbles, these trifles, these children's
toys.

I passed the Lake of Thrasymenus one evening, in travelling from Rome, and I
marked the spot right well, for it is said that there when the Romans and the
Carthaginians were engaged in deadly war there happened a terrific earthquake
which shook the ground beneath their feet, and heaved the lake in waves, and
tossed the mountains about on either side, but the combatants were so
desperately set at slaughtering one another that they never observed the
earthquake and did not believe it on the following day when they were told of
it. It seems so strange, does it not, that they should be so taken up with it?
And men seem to be so taken up with the concerns of this life that even were God
to set up His throne of judgment, and it did not interfere with the Stock
Exchange, and the corn market, and the coal market, I believe men would still go
on buying and selling and getting gain, and if the last thunderbolt were even
now to be rushing through the sky, they would be so occupied with the things of
time and sense that they would not be startled even then until it came in even
closer proximity to their own souls. Oh, what perversity of intellect is this!
May God rouse us from it. When a man comes to see how all his lifetime he has
been busy about these things and lost his soul, what a look it will be in
looking backward! "I gained that money, scraped it together, for my heirs—used
the rake, and used the shovel. I pinched myself, fool that I was! Why did I? I
pinched myself for nobody. There I was up early in the morning, and late at
night still at my business, my Bible covered with dust, the House of God
forsaken, or, if I went to it, too sleepy to attend to what I should have heard;
meanwhile no private prayer, no cleansing of myself in Christ's blood, no
seeking reconciliation with God; and all for what? Just that I might leave this
heap of money to those who will forget me and probably be glad that I have gone,
so that they may inherit what I have scraped together. What a fool I have been
to live for that which I must leave, and to scrape together the thick clay which
I must now renounce for ever."

If I have lived for God there is something worth living for. If I have
brightened the home of sorrow, if I have" cheered the mourner, if I have helped
the orphan and made glad the widow, if I have been the instrument in the hands
of God of teaching the young the way to Heaven, and guiding wanderers to the
Saviour, and if my hand is linked with the hand of the Eternal, and I am resting
in the precious blood, then what matters it if death comes? But if I have lived
for just these things that perish in the using, O Death, O Death, thou dost
shake my palaces and pull down my towers. O Death, thou fell destroyer, thou
hast blasted me, and I am blasted, and that for ever and for ever. Sirs, awake,
I pray you! May God awake you! No more use this excuse which will certainly tear
your heart like a serpent gnawing at your very vitals. I pray you, turn from
ever using it again.

IV. And now, lastly, it is an excuse which cannot, even if it could be proved a
valid one, restore to a man the loss which he has sustained. I may say I was
busy; I may moan it over as I clutch the sheets of my dying bed—"I was busy, I
was very busy. God knows I was busy from morning till night. I could not go to
the house of God; I made my ledger up on a Sunday. I could not read my Bible. I
was too busy with the day book. I could not pray: I had enough to do to be
thinking of how I should meet my bills, and what I should do to get custom, and
to get trade. I was all for that which concerned getting my boy out into a trade
or trying to get a connection together. O God, Thou knowest I was so busy!" Yes,
but though the poor wretch may hiss that between his teeth it will not give him
back his soul, and when he is in hell, banished from God's presence, that will
not undo the bolts that shut the iron door; that will not give a drop of water
to his parched tongue; that will not shorten eternity; that will not kill the
worm that never dieth, or quench the fire unquenchable.. No, but that thought,
"I was busy," "I was busy," shall only add to the eternal unrest of the spirit
that can know no repose.

There are certain birds about Constantinople that they say never rest. They seem
to be always on the wing, poor things, and the common name by which they are
known (I am afraid profanely) by many is that of "damned souls." And truly if
men were wise they would look at that metaphor of the birds that never rest.
They must not light upon the sea: even there they shall find no chance of
repose; nor on the land, nor on the tree, nor anywhere; but flit on, on, on,
with wings for ever weary, and that shall never rest. This looks to me like the
fate of souls too busy to find rest in God—to fly for ever and for ever and get
no rest, no rest for the sole of their foot. Poor Noah's dove was plucked into
the ark by Noah when she was faint; but once let this life be passed, O souls
that will not rest in Christ now, and you shall never rest. You shall have
appetites you cannot gratify, desires you cannot satiate, ambitions to which you
never can attain. You shall blaspheme God, and yet will He not be blasphemed by
you; nor will His holy name be injured by your curses. You shall long for death
itself, and it shall be denied you.

Oh, wherefore, wherefore, will ye inherit this? Why will you run these risks and
cast yourself into this woe? "Turn ye, turn ye, why will ye die, O house of
Israel?" To-night, whatever be your business, put it aside till your soul is
saved. I would fain say the most pressing engagement ought to give way to this.
I must become a friend of God; I must be washed from sin; I must be delivered
from going down into the pit. Oh, it does not matter what my engagements are; if
I am slipping down a precipice, and there is a chance of escape, I must escape,
engagements or no engagements. If I have accidentally taken poison it matters
not though I have a call to go to business on the spot. I cannot go. I must take
the antidote first and have my life preserved. Necessity has no law, and the
stern necessity of souls being saved demands that anything and everything should
go on one side and be pushed to the wall, to make room for solemn consideration
and earnest thought concerning the things of God.

I have done; but I wish that I had an opportunity of speaking these words into
every unconverted man's face and heart. It is one of my regrets that I cannot
come round to speak individually to so many; yet I Would fain post myself at
each one of yonder doors, if I were divisible, and say to each thoughtless busy
man, each thoughtless family woman, I beseech you do let1 other things have
their place—their right place; but let Go'd have the first place; let Christ
have the first place; let your soul have the first place; and do not have to
say, "While I was busy here and there my soul was gone, and I was lost."

God save you! Amen.


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  CHAPTER 19: 18. OPENING THE STOREHOUSES OF GRACE
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XVIII. Opening the Storehouses of Grace And Joseph opened all the
storehouses.—(Genesis 41:56.)

Perhaps the history of Joseph is to many persons the most interesting narrative
in the whole of the Old Testament. It is full of pleasing pictures. Poets,
painters, writers of all kinds have revelled in the matchless scenes which that
story presents. To us as Christians it is perhaps chiefly delightful because
Joseph is such an eminent type of our Lord Jesus Christ. All through his life
you see touches that remind you of the story of Jesus of Nazareth; whether it be
in the dungeon or on the throne, whether it be as rejected of his brothers or as
receiving them to his heart, or reigning in Egypt for their good and providing
for all their wants. It needs no ingenuity—it is a very simple matter indeed—to
say, "In this, Joseph is like to Jesus, and in that, and in the other; and in
hundreds of points he becomes one of the chief types of the Old Testament—types
of our divine Master."

Now you see in the present text that Joseph is rightly made a type of Jesus
Christ. There is a famine in all the earth—a famine after the bread, not of the
body, but of the soul; and behold Jesus has provided for that famine; and it is
true in these latter days—especially and notably true—that, as Joseph opened all
the storehouses, so has Jesus opened the rich treasuries of grace that famished
souls in all regions may come and eat even to the full. That, then, will be the
topic of to-night—to work a parallel between Joseph of Egypt opening the
storehouses and Jesus, head over all things to His Church, opening the
storehouse for perishing souls.

There will be four or five points upon which we shall briefly touch.

I. And the first is this: Joseph was empowered by the king to do what he did.
When Pharaoh saw the extraordinary wisdom which dwelt in that young man Joseph,
and the evident favour of God that rested upon him, he selected him to carry out
his own project, and to enable him to do so he made Joseph to be viceroy. He was
the grand vizier of Egypt—was to stand in the place of the king, and attend to
all the business of the land; so that, in the first place, nobody could approach
to Pharaoh except through Joseph. When the people petitioned the king he said,
"Go unto Joseph. What he saith unto you, do it." There was no coming to the
throne except through the mediation of the king's prime minister, even Joseph.
Well now, at this day the Lord God is not to be approached by us except through
Jesus Christ. Prayers addressed immediately to God apart from the mediator will
be unacceptable. We can only hope to succeed with the Most High by pleading that
name which He has given to be a pass-word to the courts of glory, which He has
given to be the seal to our prayers and the pledge of their acceptance with Him.

Dear friend, are you beginning to desire peace with God? You can only get it
through the blood of Jesus Christ. Do you want to be reconciled to the Father?
It must be through the Son. Do not indulge in any sentiments which lead you to
think little of the Lord Jesus Christ, for God will not receive one who will not
receive His Son. "No man cometh unto the Father but by Me," is Christ's own
word; and so it must be. If you will not go to Jesus, the Father can not—will
not—accept you. That is the way of access: there is no other. Come then, I pray
you, if you would approach the great God and find mercy at His hands—come with
the name of Jesus upon your tongue and upon your heart. The king's order was
moreover that Joseph was in all things to be obeyed. "Whatsoever he saith unto
you, do it," says he. Now it is the order of the great King of kings that Jesus
is to be obeyed in all respects. "That at the name of Jesus every knee should
bow, of things in heaven and things on earth, and things that are under the
earth; and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the
glory of God the Father." I want very sinner that would have peace with God to
submit to the sway of Jesus, and to say in his heart, "What He bids me do, by
His enabling grace I am prepared to do. Whatever of self-denial He shall ask at
my hands, that would I endeavour to render, but I long for salvation through the
Mediator." But note that in Egypt there was nobody else in power but the king
and Joseph; so is there nobody appointed to intercede between God and man save
the man Christ Jesus. Do not be beguiled by anybody to seek another mediator.
The virgins and the saints can have no power with God. He has put all power in
Christ. If He pleadeth, the intercession will avail, but seek no other. And do
recollect that you do not want any mediator between you and Christ. Very simple
as this statement is, there is need often to repeat it. You may come to Jesus
just as you are whoever you may be. The poor, needy, hungry, famished, Egyptians
were to go to Joseph. They did not want any great man to introduce them to him,
but if they went to him, then they came practically to Pharaoh. You do want a
mediator between yourselves and God, but you want no mediator between yourselves
and Christ. Priests, clergymen, ministers—they are all altogether unnecessary in
the matter of approaching to Jesus Christ. Come to Him simply and humbly just as
you are, and He will accept you, for God has appointed Him to be a ladder
between earth and heaven. He is the secret link between a needy sinner and the
all-sufficiency of God. There is the first parallel then. As Joseph was put in
power so also is the Lord Jesus Christ King of kings and Lord of lords.

II.

Secondly, the text says, "Joseph opened all the storehouses." The fact is Joseph
had filled the storehouses. He was the man to open them, for he was the man that
filled them. And Joseph had filled all the storehouses before the famine came.
Glory be to the Lord Jesus that before Adam fell He had prepared the way to
restore the fall. Before sin was born, or Eden had been blasted by the breath of
treason, the Lord Jesus Christ had entered into a covenant with the eternal
Father that He would redeem His people from the fall, which, as yet, had not
happened. In that covenant He had filled the storehouses by His promise. Then
came the fulness of time, and though as yet you and I were not bom, and our time
of famine had not come, the Lord Jesus by His life and death filled all the
storehouses. What heaps of grace, what stores of heavenly food, He gathered
together, reaping not with the sweat of His face as we do, but with the sweat of
His very soul, sweating" as it were great drops of blood falling to the ground."
Vast granaries of mighty grace He filled with every pang His body and His soul
endured. Gethsemane heaped up the bread of Heaven: its winepress was full. And
Calvary can tell how the body which He gave to bleed and die became for the
world food, of which if a man eat he shall live for ever. Joseph filled the
storehouses before the famine came, and Jesus has made provision of grace before
you and I were born—certainly long before we had any idea that there was a
famine in the land. And then note that Joseph had filled the storehouses
sufficiently full to last through seven years. So much wheat did he gather that
he ceased to keep account of it. Some of the vast storehouses are still
remaining in Egypt, and we have on the tombs of Egypt representations of the
great underground granaries which Joseph built. So much was it that he could not
count it. O beloved, Jesus has made such provision for the sons of men as to be
quite beyond all calculation. His granaries are deep as our helpless miseries
are, and boundless as our sins. Not only is there sufficiency in Christ, but
all-sufficiency. There is no measuring, for there is no limit. When God Himself
takes human flesh and bleeds and dies, the merit of that sacred passion is not
to be set down in figures or conceived of by the mind. So, poor needy souls,
however ravenous your appetites, you will never exhaust the store of sovereign
grace which Christ has laid by for such as you. But He alone did this. When the
famine was fully come there was nobody in all the world that could feed men but
Jesus. He had filled the storehouses, and there they were. And Joseph had them
all under his own lock and key. And, mark you, there is salvation in Christ, but
there is salvation in no other. The Gospel of Jesus is divinely intolerant. It
does not say, "There is salvation here, and also there and there, for it courts
not the approbation of being charitably false." It speaks the truth and declares
that "other foundation can no man lay than that which is laid "—Jesus Christ the
righteous. "He that believeth and is baptised shall be saved: he that believeth
not shall be damned." It does not flinch matters. Joseph knew that they must
come and buy corn of him, or starve. They might work as hard as they pleased,
but it was no use working where money wages would not buy a piece of bread. They
might dig and toil and till the soil, but as the time of famine had come the
land would yield nothing to them. There was nothing for any man in the known
world, but to go down to Egypt to Joseph and buy corn. And such is the famine
which has fallen on our entire humanity that there is no possibility of your
salvation in any way by your own doings, by your own feelings, by the help of
priests, by multiplying ceremonies, and the like. You must go to Christ and get
bread from Him or you will perish as surely as you are born. May the Holy Ghost
make men know this that they may decide to go to Joseph—to Jesus at once.

III. This brings me to the third remark, which is this: Joseph opened those
storehouses which he had filled all in good time. And here let us notice that
Joseph had filled the storehouses on purpose to open them. He did not put a
bushel of wheat in there for his own keeping and lock it up. What was the use of
having it stale and musty for the mice and the rats? He put the wheat in on
purpose to take it out again. When the Lord Jesus gathered all the merit of His
life and death together, He did not do it to keep it useless. He gathered it on
purpose to save sinners with it, on purpose to give it away. Whenever you think
of Jesus Christ and think highly of Him, dear heart, say to yourself, "All this
is meant for needy sinners." There is not anything in Christ for Himself. It is
all for you and for me and such as we are. If we are guilty, that fountain which
He filled is to wash us. If we are naked, that robe of righteousness was meant
to clothe us. I will put it very plainly: there is not a bushel of wheat in
Christ's granary but what is meant for hungry souls to eat. You have but to come
for it and take it, for He has put it there on purpose for such as you.

Now, if Joseph had kept the grain, it would not have been to his credit. His
profit and his honour both lay in getting rid of the wheat that he had gathered.
If he had kept it there in the granaries, of what good would it have been
to-collect it but to mock and to insult the people? Jesus Christ's honour and
glory never lie in denying mercy to sinners, but they lie in giving to those
that need it. How you ought to catch at this, you that feel your need of Christ.
I think this ought to cheer you very much. O Lord Jesus, if Thou deny me Thy
grace, it will not make Thee more happy nor more rich, nor more honoured. On the
contrary, if Thou give me Thy grace I shall be greatly benefited, but Thou wilt
be honoured. It will be to Thy glory to distribute that which Thou didst gather
on purpose to give us. Is not that good reasoning—sound argument? Be sure such a
man as Joseph means to distribute what he collects, and be sure that such a one
as Jesus means to distribute among poor and needy souls that rich, free, grace
which by His life and death He has stored up on purpose for them. There is much
encouragement in the parallel to those who seek the Lord.

Notice again that Joseph opened the storehouses when the famine was sore in the
land. He did not open them during the seven years of plenty. If people could
have come and had the wheat then, they would only have wasted it. He kept the
door shut till there was need to have it opened, and then he opened it. If there
is anybody here that is exceedingly good, righteous, excellent, and can get to
heaven by his own works, the granary is not open. There is nothing for you. But
if there is a poor soul here that has nothing to trust to of its own—no good
works, no good feelings—if you feel that you are utterly lost by nature and by
practice—then the granaries are open. The famine is in your land. And as Joseph
opened all the storehouses, so does Jesus Christ. Famished soul, the promises
are for you. Hungry soul, the blessings of the covenant are for you. Do but
prove your need, and you have proved your right, for there can be no other need,
no other right, for the poor soul except its own dire necessity. The
advertisements of Joseph were not put out until the corn was all eaten. Then he
made the people know that they might come and buy of him. Jesus Christ publishes
His Gospel to every creature, but the point of it is, "Come unto Me, all ye that
labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest." You that know your
need—you sinners, you lost, you ruined ones—it is to you that the invitation is
most pressingly given. Come and welcome to Jesus Christ!

Now, when Joseph had opened the storehouses, he kept them open. As long as the
seven years lasted, the granaries lasted; they were never exhausted. What a
mercy that is for children of God that have been His people these twenty years!
The granaries are open still. Have you got grace? He giveth more grace—grace
upon grace. Has He blest you? He will bless you twice as much. Have you been
enabled to be strong? He will make you stronger. He never shuts the granary
while there is a hungry soul to be fed. Dear saints, if any of you to-night are
straitened, you are not straitened in Him. Come and welcome; come and take all
that you possibly can out of the great storehouses of grace.

Once more. These granaries were all over Egypt. Up the Nile, down the Nile,
everywhere where there was a city, there were the granaries. Where the people
lived there were the storehouses. What a blessing this is—that, wherever
there-is a sinner, Christ is handy. You will find Him, you workpeople; you will
find Him if you lift your eye towards Him. in the work-room. You will find Him,
you poor sick folk, when you are in the hospital; when you are lying in the bed
you expect to occupy before long. You will find Him, dear mother, at home with
the little ones. Christ is near to you. You may find Him there. And you that
pace the streets, you that are watchmen of the night, you that have scarcely a
home to call your own, go where you may, you will find Him there. And I would
say to the prisoner, if he were lying in his cell in the jail—ay, and to him
that is in the condemned cell—Jesus is to be found even there. Where there is
hunger there there is the granary; and wherever you are, needy, hungry one, say
not, "Who shall climb to Heaven to bring; Christ down, or who shall descend into
the deep to fetch Him up?" He is "nigh you—in your mouth and in your heart." If
with thy mouth thou wilt confess the Lord Jesus, and with thy heart believe in
Him, thou shalt be saved. So Joseph opened all the storehouses. But I should not
wonder, dear friends, if the type would fail if we were to look closely into it,
because he, very likely, only opened them during some hours in the day; and if
you got too late you must go without your dinner. Now, our Lord opens all the
storehouses at all times. From morning" till night—when you are young and when
you are old—there is not one single minute of a man's existence but that, if he
seeks the Lord, he will be found of Him. The storehouses are always open up to
the eleventh hour. Ay, and if a soul shall seek the Lord at the very
last—sincerely seek Him—He will still be found.

While the lamp holds out to burn, The vilest sinner may return,

and, returning, he shall still find the good Lord ready to receive him. Joseph
opened all the storehouses, but he could not keep them always open. He had his
hours, and if he had, I suppose when the crowd was gathered together to get
their morning meal, if it was anything like the shops in Paris, when the people
went to be served, each one with his ration, there would be a deal of pushing
and squeezing, and many poor women would get pushed against the wall and have to
go home with nothing. But it: is not so with Jesus. He has so opened all the
storehouses that the poorest, weakest, most trembling and obscure shall be
served as soon as ever He comes. No fear of too great a multitude. He has enough
for all that come, and He has an open pathway from the very ends of the earth
for all that draw near to Him.

IV. So that brings me to make the fourth observation. "Joseph opened all the
storehouses"; that is, he opened them to all comers. Joseph had an eye to his
brethren. He said, "God sent me before you to keep your souls alive." Yes, there
is an election of grace, but, at the same time, Joseph served everybody that
came, for so we find it. "All countries came into Egypt to Joseph for to buy
corn because that the famine was so sore in all lands." And the Lord Jesus has a
people for whom. He shed His precious blood, for whom the whole work of grace is
wrought out from top to bottom; but, for all that, it is quite as true that
whosoever comes shall be received, come from what land he may. Here are two
truths. It is not everybody that will believe two truths that look a little
different, but here are the two in the Bible. "All that the Father giveth Me
shall come to Me." There is sovereign grace. "Him that cometh to Me I will in no
wise cast out." There is the freeness and richness of the word of God addressed
to every soul that comes to Him. Now, some came to Joseph a great many miles
across deserts, over the sea; but he did not ask where they came from.

They might have the corn. Free trade then. And so some of you may come from very
far-off places to Christ. Perhaps you have been in character something
unmentionable. Possibly you may so have sinned that, if your story were written,
your own friends would blush to own you. But if you will come to Christ, He will
ask no questions, but will "blot out your sins like a cloud, and your iniquities
like a thick cloud," and feed you with the bread of heaven.

Some, however, came to Joseph from near at hand. No doubt they had,
comparatively, a little way to come, but, if they had not come that little way,
they would have perished. So you that are near to the kingdom, take heed of
perishing near to the kingdom. The people in Egypt had to get the corn from
Joseph as well as the people in Canaan and Arabia. It would have been a horrible
thing for them to die of famine with all those great storehouses bursting with
grain; and yet they would have done so if they had refused to go to Joseph. You
people in the Tabernacle that hear the Gospel continually, if you perish, you
will be like Egyptians that lived next door to a granary, and yet were starved,
if such there were. I should suppose there would be none such, but there are
such spiritually. The bread of life stands on the table before them every day,
and yet they are dying of famine because they refuse the appointments of the
Lord. I say again, Joseph opened the granaries to all comers; and Christ has
opened the doors of salvation to all sorts of people, of every colour and
language and character.

None are excluded hence, but those Who do themselves exclude.

Welcome the learned and polite, The ignorant and rude.

While grace is offered to the prince, The poor may take their share. No mortal
has a just pretence To perish in despair.

Joseph opened all the storehouses, and so does Christ. We never read of one that
Joseph sent empty away; and you certainly will never hear of one that Christ
sends empty away.

However, the parallel does not run all through, because Joseph, though he opened
the storehouses, did not give his wheat away. No, those who wished to obtain
wheat must bring their money with them. They could not have it without; and you
know that, after all the money had been spent, they offered their lands; and
when the mortgage had all been eaten up, then the poor Egyptians offered
themselves to become henceforth Pharaoh's servants. Then they had to be fed
right through the rest of the time.

Now, our Lord Jesus Christ makes no such bargains as the son of Jacob did, but
He gives without money and without price. I cannot blame Joseph, because very
likely if he had proceeded to feed the people without their paying for the food,
they would never have worked any more. After the seven years were over they
would wish to be still fed in the same way. He would have demoralised all the
people. As it was, they were ready enough to work, for a part of the bargain was
that they were to have seed-corn as soon as the years of the famine were over,
each man intending to get to his land again and work as Egyptians will do. Well,
the Lord Jesus acts on another principle. Rowland Hill used to say, "You know,
we ministers who have Christ to present to you are very different from other
dealers, for all the other dealers have a difficulty to get people up to their
price. Our trouble is to get you down to our price, for ours is 'without money
and without price.'" The moment you preach Jesus Christ, the sinner begins to
fumble to see if he has not got a shilling's worth of merit somewhere, and when
he finds he has not, he puts his hand into the other pocket to see if he cannot
find at least sixpennyworth of good feeling. When he feels nothing of the kind
there, then he begins fumbling in his waistcoat to see if he has not got at
least a halfpennyworth of something or other that can recommend him. Now, as
long as ever he does that, he cannot deal with Christ. The terms of Christ are
no terms at all: everything for nothing. That is Christ's bargain—all things
freely given to the man who, with an empty hand and a humble heart, will simply
take. O soul, thou art not asked to be, or do, or feel, but simply to let Jesus
be and do and feel, and be to thee all in all—thy Alpha and thy Omega, thy
entire salvation. What sayest thou? Art thou willing? If thou sayest "Yes,
willing: I shall be rejoiced to have it so," trust thou in Him, and it is so.

V.

Now, the last point of all is this: Although Joseph and Jesus in the dealing out
of the bread acted on different principles, yet Jesus brings the thing to the
same conclusion. Before Joseph had done, Pharaoh had got everything in his
hand—people, lands, houses, everything. It was a wonderful speculation in corn,
indeed, and he had become the master—the absolute master—of the whole country.
Probably, that was a good thing for the people; but now they had only one
landlord, and he was a great one and a king; and the little petty landlords all
over the country that used to grind them to death were all sold out. Everything
was now held as crown-land on a lease, and the payment was by no means an unfair
one. Though somewhat rigorous, it was nothing approximate to what is paid in
rent and taxes in that country now.

Well, the Lord Jesus Christ acts on quite a different principle, but He brings
it to the same result. At this moment it is the joy of a large number of us now
present here to say that we belong to the Lord—our money, our lands, if we have
any, and our persons. Oh, it is to us an intense delight that body, soul, and
spirit now belong to God. We do not wish henceforth to think a thought for
ourselves, or say a word except for His glory, or breathe a breath but for Him;
nor would we wish to have a hair on our heads that did not belong to the Lord.
Take my goods; take my talents; take myself, my time—all that I have. I
surrender them to Thee. I do not say that all Christians keep to this. I am
afraid that many of them do not, but they ought; and this is the point that the
genuine Christian wants to come to. He says:—

If I might make some reserve, And duty did Dot call, I love my God with zeal so
great That I would give Him all.

How came we to this position, then? Did Jesus bargain with us? Beloved, we have
given ourselves to Him because He did not bargain—because He said that His love
would take no price, for it was priceless; because He was so generous and
gracious; because it was all giving on His part and not receiving. We feel that
we must be His: we love Him so. Oh, those dear wounds!

I remember seeing a picture once of Magdalen kissing the bleeding wounds of
Christ upon the cross; and, though it was a ghastly subject, I thought that, had
I been there, I would have carried out the painter's strange idea. O blessed
person, even of the dying Saviour. But oh, how blessed is He in His glory! and
what a joy it will be to see Him when He comes, as soon He will, and every eye
shall behold Him. O beloved, do not your hearts burn within you at the very
thought of seeing Him? If suddenly He were to appear on this platform, is there
anything you would deny Him? If He were to look at any one of you and say, "I
have loved thee with an everlasting love," is there any pain you would not bear?
Is there any sacrifice you would refuse to make for Him? You will not be put to
the test, but I am quite sure many of you would bear it, whatever it might be.
If He were to say, "My sister, My spouse, I take thee by the hand, and thou and
I must walk to burn at Smithfield's stake," you would go gladly along if you
knew that He grasped your hand. O dear, dear Saviour, Thou art worth ten
thousand of us, and we give ourselves up wholly to Thee from this time forth
even for ever, for Thou hast saved our lives and fed us with the bread of
Heaven; and henceforth we are not our own, but are "bought with a price." That
was the conclusion of Joseph's opening the storehouses. That is the conclusion
of Jesus Christ's opening the storehouses for you and for me. The Lord bless
this word for Christ's sake. Amen.


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  CHAPTER 20: 19. "WHILE THE LAMP HOLDS ON TO BURN"
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XIX. "While the Lamp Holds on to Burn."

I have sinned. What shall I do unto Thee, O Thou preserver of men?—(Job 7:20.)

Job battled well for his own character against the unjust remarks of his
friends. When they said he was a hypocrite, he would not have it. When they
declared that he must have been indulging some secret sin, he was somewhat tart
in his own defence, as well, indeed, he might be, for God's own witness
concerning Job was that he was a perfect and an upright man. And how should he
who possessed such a character willingly endure to see it torn to pieces by his
envious friends? But, mark you, he who could afford to be thus brave before his
fellow-men, and to stand up for his character as judged by them, adopted a very
different tone when he came to deal with God. Then he was all humility; then he
laid his mouth in the dust; then he put forth no self-defences; but he came
before God with broken-hearted language and with the accents of contrition. "I
have sinned," said he; "what shall I do unto Thee, O Thou preserver of men."

We do not intend, however, speaking about Job to-night. This language might well
become the mouth of any Christian under sharp affliction who is asking God,
"Show me wherefore Thou contendest with me," and who, by the light of God's
Spirit, begins to discover that there were evils within his heart which he had
not seen, but which it was intended by affliction to bring to his knowledge that
they might be put away.

Beloved, many a time through life some of us have had to cry, "I have sinned.
What shall I do unto Thee, O Thou preserver of men?" But this morning I turned
my text into a sermon for seeking souls, and I feel in that mind again to-night,
as if I could leave the godly to look after the ungodly—leave the ninety and
nine in the wilderness to go after that which has gone astray, and forget the
pieces of money that are in the treasury to light the candle and sweep the house
yet again to find that piece which has been lost. Pray for me, my brethren, that
if I was unsuccessful this morning, though I am sure I was not, yet we may be
doubly successful to-night, and that some may be reconciled to God this evening.
I cannot bear the thought of your coming and going—continually coming to this
house in such crowds—unless you are converted; and when I am every now and then
laid aside, and compelled to be silent for a little while, oh, how I bite my
tongue that I cannot preach to you, and fed to fret within my spirit that ever I
should have wasted any opportunity, and counted it to be wasted unless I have
addressed myself to the unconverted and warned them to lay hold on eternal life
and escape lest they perish for ever.

It may not be long that we may be spared to address you, and it may not be long
that you may live to be addressed by anybody. Therefore, with deep concern for
your souls would I speak again to you unsaved ones. We will give the Sabbath up
to you, and count it well used if some of you be led to bow before the Saviour
and to find life in Him. Our text contains three things very clearly: a
confession—"I have sinned"; an enquiry—"What shall I do unto Thee?"; a title—"O
Thou preserver of men."

I.

There is, first, a confession: "I have sinned."

Now, observe, when I take up the words of this confession, there is nothing very
particular in them. "I have sinned." There are only three words. Anybody could
use them. The worst of men have used them. Saul, the king who was cast off of
God for ever, once said, insincerely, "I have sinned." And you remember that
Judas, the son of perdition, took the pieces of money for which he had sold his
Master and threw them down in the temple and said, "I have sinned," and went and
hanged himself. There is nothing in the words. You may remember the publican's
prayer, and yet not be justified like the publican. The best form that was ever
written, or the best extemporaneous effusion that was ever poured forth from the
lip, may have nothing at all in it. There are many things in this world that are
like sacks that are labelled, but they have not the goods within that they
purport to hold; and what is the value of them? In your shops you have many
dummies, perhaps, and nobody knows that they are such; but oh, what thousands of
dummy prayers there are! They are exactly like prayers: they are the very same
words, word for word, which the best of men would use in the most acceptable
prayers; but for all that they are only dummies. We cannot learn much, then,
from the mere words of this confession, unless you look deeper, and look into
the inner sense of it; but this much I do learn from it. "I have sinned." It was
an acceptable confession, but it was very short. Therefore, I gather that length
of words will never be necessary to true confession of sin. "Short and sweet
"—let me alter it: short and bitter let the confession be: bitter with true
repentance, and then as short as you will. Many words are seldom associated with
much heart. Prayers can often be measured, but they must be measured backwards.
The longer, frequently, the worse, and the truer, often, the more brief. "I have
sinned."

Now, there is nobody here that can have an excuse for saying, "I cannot go to
God and pray; I cannot go and confess because I am no orator." It wants no
oratory. Why, sirs, if none but orators could be saved, where would many be?
Where would the members of the House of Commons go to? Where would many go to of
those men who speak, but have not the power to do anything but weary men with
their long sentences? No, God wants no rhetoric. He wants you but to say what
you feel, and pour your heart out as men pour out water. How it bubbles and
gurgles as it goes. Well, let it do so; let it make much noise, or no noise: it
matters not. And so let the heart run out of the mouth in that way: that is the
best praying in all the world. Shout, if you like. None, therefore, can be
excused for want of utterance.

Now, let us think about this prayer of Job; and the first remark about it shall
be that it was very personal. "I have sinned." Oh, how easy it is to join in a
"general confession," and, then, to feel, "Oh, yes, I have only confessed now
what everybody else in the church has confessed too, so I am not particularly
bad." But that man truly confesses who says, "Whatever others may have done, I
have sinned." Charity makes excuses for others, but sincerity makes no excuse
for itself. I can see the imperfections of my neighbour, but I will shut my eyes
to them as far as I can. My own imperfections I desire to look upon with both my
eyes steadily, and so to see them that from my very soul I may say with
emphasis, "I have sinned," whether anybody else in the world has sinned or not.
"I have sinned." Oh, I hope there are some people standing about in this
Tabernacle to-night who, unnoticed by anybody else, are saying in their hearts,
"Ah, true, I have sinned. If there is nobody else in the upper gallery that has
sinned, I have. If there is nobody else anywhere in the house that is a
transgressor, I am one. I have sinned. I have sinned." Personal confession is
that which God accepts. In Job's case, again, it was confession made to the
Lord. "I have sinned," he said to that God whom he called the "preserver of
men." The very point of confession is to feel that you have sinned against God.
Many a man is sorry for having offended his neighbour who was never sorry for
having offended his God. It is a curious thing that, if I call a man a sinner he
is not angry, but if I called him a criminal he would be ready to knock me down,
because a crime is a thing against my fellow-man, and we think a great deal of
that; but a sin is an offence against God, and therefore we think very little
comparatively of it. It should not be so. We should look upon sin against God as
the highest form of criminality, for such, indeed, it is, and in every
disobedience there is a direct attack upon the person of God. Hear how David
puts it: "Against Thee, Thee only, have I sinned, and done this evil in Thy
sight,"—as if sin, though it hurt others, had not the virus in it in that
aspect, but it came to its full poison as being an offence against God Himself.
O sinner, canst thou say this? Thou hast neglected thy God; thou hast lived as
if there were no God; thou hast despised His reign; thou hast forgotten His
will; thou hast violated His law; thou hast refused His mercy; and this it is
that will damn thy soul except thou repent of it. Therefore in thy confession
make sure that thou go unto God and say, "My God, my Father, I have sinned
against Heaven and before Thee."

Now, next, Job's confession was wrought in him by the Holy Spirit. And this is
necessary to every true confession. "No man can call Jesus Lord but by the Holy
Ghost." So says the Scripture. And I will utter a saying that is quite as true
as that: no man can truly say "I have sinned," but by the Holy Ghost. Confession
of sin is as certainly the work of God as the creation of the world. Man will
not acknowledge his guilt. He is proud, self-righteous. He says, "Who is the
Lord, and what is it that I have done if I have broken His law? I care not for
Him." But from the soul to say, "I have erred; I have done amiss: my God, I do
confess it "—this is what only the Spirit of God can give. Oh, may the Spirit of
God grant that to each one of you! It shall be a sure sign of everlasting life
in your soul.

Job's confession, hence, was deeply sincere, and accompanied with a great amount
of feeling. I think I can see the patriarch's face now. He had not shed a tear
through all his losses. From that brave man's face not one single tear had
trickled, although he had seen all his wealth suddenly melt away; but I think I
see the big drop standing in both eyes when he turns to God and says, "I have
sinned. What shall I do unto Thee, O Thou preserver of men?" Bunyan truly puts
Mr. Wet-eyes as one who carried the petitions to King Shaddai when the city of
Mansoul was besieged; and although I stand not here to speak for actual and for
literal tears, for some eyes have but few of them, yet that man whose confession
has no feeling in it, I think I may guess that it has no life in it. Can I, if
God has quickened me, think I may sin without being grieved? God forbid I ever
should. I loathe from my soul to hear some people talk about their sins. Why, I
think I have known even some evangelists who, talking to others about their
sins, have spoken of what they used to do as if they were almost proud of having
been the blackguards that they said they were before they were converted, and
talked about their sins as Chelsea pensioners might talk about their battles.
Oh, God forbid that we should ever do that! Whenever we think of what we have
been, let us blush, or else Satan has taken away from us a very precious thing,
which is not a grace, but it is half of one; I mean shame. There ought to be a
blessed shamefacedness about Christians when they make confession of their sin.
And if you do not cover your brow and tremble when you do say to God, "I have
sinned," then surely that forehead of brass of yours is appointed to be a target
for the eternal thunderbolts in that day when God, shall come to avenge Himself
upon all the proud and stout-hearted among the sons of men. Yes, Job's was a
sincere and feeling confession. And I shall close this by saying it was a
believing confession, for, note, he says, "O Thou preserver of men," and, as I
shall have to show to you, that was the gleam of light that came into Job's
mind. Old Master Wilcox says, "Whenever thou hast a sense of sin, look to the
cross; and if thou dost see thy sin and dost not see thy Saviour, away with such
a seeing of sin!" And I say so too. Oh, it is the right thing as a sinner to see
Jesus, but to see sin only may drive you to despair and to self-murder, like
another Judas. To see sin and to see thy Saviour—that is true repentance,
evangelical repentance, the repentance that needs not to be repented of. I have
heard say that music never sounds so sweet as when it comes over water; and
surely the notes of pardon never sound so sweet to a soul as when they come
across the floods of deep soul sorrow. Jesus is precious when you see Him
through your tears. I know of nothing that gives such beauty to Christ, or,
rather, that doth so give clearance to the eye that it can see the beauty of
Christ, as tears in the eyes—the tears of confession of sin.

Oh, to have, then, to-night, just such a confession! Somebody says, "Well, I
wish I could confess my sin; it would greatly relieve my mind." Dear friend, go
and confess your sin. "To whom?" you ask. Well, not to me. I have got enough in
my own heart that: is bad, without having anything of yours. No, not to me: I
could not stand it. I cannot understand how a priest can make his ear the common
cesspool for the parish; for that is what the man has to do. He just takes in
all the draff and sewage of all his congregation into his own soul, and, if he
does not become the most polluted creature in the world through it, it is
because he was so to begin with. God deliver us from making such confessions. If
you have anything to confess of wrong you have done to your fellow-men, go and
confess it. And, what is more, go and make restitution.

I heard of a country minister who preached in a barn one night, and on the way
home he overtook a man who, apparently, did not want him to walk with him; but
he did, and he noticed that the man had something or other under his smock
frock. By-and-bye they came to a cottage; the preacher had to go another way,
and at last the man said, "The fact of it is, sir, I am carrying a spade under
here which I borrowed from a neighbour and never returned, and therefore
practically stole; and when I heard your sermon I took the spade home. I could
not sleep till it was returned."

Now, such a thing as that you are bound to do to your fellow-men. If you have
wronged anybody go and set that right, if you expect mercy. But still, the
confession of your heart must be to God. Get into your chamber and pour out your
sins before God, into the ear of that High Priest who cannot be polluted by what
you tell Him because He is incapable of pollution. He will hear it, and, what is
more, He will give you an absolution which is worth having. He will effectually
cleanse you from every trace of sin.

Thus much upon the confession.

II.

Now, the second part of our subject is an enquiry. When a soul feels its sin, it
naturally is led to say, "What must I do to be saved? " The text says, "What
shall I do unto Thee, O Thou preserver of men?" This shows that the questioner
was willing to do anything that he could do. But yet he was bewildered, for he
asks, "What shall I do?" as though he did not know what to do but look this way
or that way or the other. '' What shall I do?" O soul, if God has awakened you,
and you do not know the Gospel, it will be little wonder if you are like one in
a maze, not knowing which way to go; and you will cry like those we read of just
now, "Men and brethren, what shall we do to be saved?" And it shows, too, that
the person using this question surrendered at discretion, for he says, "What
shall I do?" as much as to say, "Lord, I make no terms with Thee, no
stipulations, no bargains. Only save me. I have sinned. Do what Thou wilt with
me, only have mercy on me. Lord, I throw it up. I have done with the fight
against Thee now. Only tell me how I may be reconciled, and here stands Thy
servant. Do as Thou wilt with me, but have pity on my soul. What shall I do unto
Thee, O Thou preserver of men? "

Now, this question may be answered in this way: "You can do nothing at all." It
may be so answered. It is not the full answer. It may be so answered, and must
be so answered if the meaning of it be, "What shall I do to escape from God? I
have sinned: whither shall I flee? Shall I dive into the grave and hope to hide
myself in the unfathomable mines of death-shade? Shall I fly beyond the sea,
o'er trackless waves, or shall I, in order to conceal myself, plunge into the
deepest hell, hoping there to escape Thy wrath? "In vain, in vain, in vain. You
cannot escape from God. It was said of the old Caesars that all the world was
only a great prison for Caesar—that he could always find out the offending
party. And so the whole universe is but a great prison for sinners. God can find
you out, and will. You cannot escape from Him. Oh, then, let the question stand
thus: "What shall I do by way of expiation for my sin? Suppose I were to
suffer?" Years of suffering will make no atonement for your sin. You may lie on
the hard bed, in the hospital, for twenty years together. No sin will be put
away in that way. You might scourge yourself and wear a hair shirt and put
yourself through innumerable torments, but no sin would vanish so. This
bloodstain comes not out with any human washing. There is only one blood that
can fetch out the bloodstain of sin, and it is the blood of Christ. "What shall
I do?" asks the soul. "Shall I keep the commandments for the future?" If you do,
you will only do what you ought to do. Pay what you may, it is all due already;
and besides, you will not keep the commandments for the future. You will
continue still to be imperfect and to be sinful. With the best intentions in the
world you will still go astray. It is hopeless, therefore, for you to attempt to
discharge your debts before God in that way. When Thomas Oliver, the famous
Wesleyan preacher, was converted he had been m his early days a most graceless
man, and had many times robbed his creditors, but on being converted he set to
work to pay every one. And he did. He discharged all his liabilities in full,
and travelled many miles to pay a man a sixpence that he had owed to him, in
order to be clear. But you can never clear your debts before God. They are too
heavy for any human payment. There they are; and if you ask, "What can I do to
put away my sin?" our answer is, Nothing: you can do nothing. And, best of all,
there is no need you should, for there is One who paid the debt; there is One
who discharged the liabilities before you were born. And for every soul that
trusts in Jesus his debts were paid on Calvary's bloody tree, and the receipt,
the receipted bill, was nailed up upon that cross, and is there now; for Christ
has "taken away the handwriting of ordinances that was against us, and nailed it
to His cross"; and there it is freeing His people from all charges for ever.
Happy is the man that is a believer in Christ. But take this question again:
"What shall I do?" I do not think it is a full answer to say, "You can do
nothing." What did Peter say? "Men and brethren, what shall we do?" was the
question put to Peter. Did Peter say,

Sinner, nothing do, Either great or small?

No, he did not say that. He would not have spoken an untruth if he had, in the
sense we have already spoken of; but still that is not quite the right answer.
When the Philippian jailer said to Paul, "What must I do to be saved? "Paul did
not say, "Nothing at all." No, he had got something that the man had to do, and
it was this: "Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved." And
Peter had a reply to the crowd in the streets. It was, "Repent and be baptised,
every one of you." I think Peter must have been a Baptist. Surely he spoke out
more plainly than some could very well do who profess to preach the Gospel. So
then, in answer to the sinner's question, "What shall I do unto God?" we reply,
Go to your Father and confess your sin. You cannot do less. Tell Him you deserve
His wrath. Do you feel you do? If not, do not be a hypocrite. Go and confess
that you have broken His law, especially by acts of omission. Make a clean
breast of it. Plead guilty. Stand at the bar and say, "Guilty." And when you
have done this, you are bidden to repent. That is, there must be a thorough
change of mind as to all this. The sin you loved must be hated. That which gave
you pleasure must now cause you pain; and you must, by God's strength, turn away
from these sins and have done with them. "Repent," said the apostle. And then
Paul said, "Believe"; and that, you have been told a thousand times, is to
trust. Trust yourself in the hands of Jesus; rely upon Christ, who was the
substitutionary sacrifice for sin. Depend upon Him. And then it is added, "Be
baptised," for the Gospel, mark you, is: "He that with his heart believeth, and
with his mouth confesseth, shall be saved." You must confess Christ as well as
believe in Christ. And it is put thus, again, "He that believeth and is baptised
shall be saved." There ought to be, there should be, an open declaration before
men of that faith which you have in your heart towards God. And it is a small
thing, after all, though there be some that kick at it. No doubt some Christians
here will tell me to leave it out; and shall I leave it out to please you? God
forbid. I am responsible to someone higher than you; and as Peter said, "Repent
and be baptised, every one of you," so say I the same to every soul here that
asks the way of salvation. And as the Master said, "He that believeth and is
baptised shall be saved," it is as much as my soul is worth to leave out a
single clause of it. I will put it as He bade me put it, and preach it to you
thus. Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and be baptised in acknowledgment of
this, your faith, for there must be the open confession as well as the secret
confidence in Jesus Christ.

Now, this is what you are to do; but this still is nothing by way of merit.
There is no merit in believing: there is no merit in repenting. The merit lies
in Jesus. The power to save lies in the work of the Holy Spirit in your soul.
Yet still the Holy Ghost saves nobody while he is asleep, and no man is dragged
into Heaven by his ears. We are made willing in the day of God's power. The Holy
Ghost does not repent: He has nothing to repent of. We repent, and He leads us
to it. The Holy Ghost does not trust. Why should He trust? It is we that trust;
but He works the trust in us.

So, then, as an answer to this question, "I have sinned. What shall I do unto
Thee?" the answer is, "Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be
saved."

III. But now, finally, we have in our text a title: "O Thou preserver of men."

Ancient saints were accustomed to address the Lord by different titles, and they
generally selected names that were suitable to their condition. Now, when a man
is sad he looks round upon God to see if there is anything in God's character or
God's dealings that would give him hope; and Job lights on this: "God is the
preserver of men." That is to say, "I am a sinner, but I am still alive."

Lord, am I yet alive— Not in torments, not in hell?

Still doth Thy good Spirit strive, With the chief of sinners dwell?

Then, you see, there is a hope. O Thou who hast preserved me up to this day,
what hast Thou done it for? I have sinned, but oh, I beseech Thee, save me, for
hast Thou not kept me alive for this very purpose? Is it not written, "For the
longsuffering of God is salvation"? Lord, by Thy longsuffering look on me.

Now, I know that I am speaking to somebody here that has been shipwrecked. Why
were you not drowned as well as others? I remember speaking one day to an
officer who rode in the famous charge of Balaclava, and after he had spoken to
me about his feelings as he rode along up to the cannon's mouth I could not help
saying to him, "My dear sir, surely God saved you, when the saddles were being
emptied, because He had some views of sovereign grace on you." I have heard of a
man living in America to the age of ninety-three unconverted, and then
recollecting a sermon he heard fifty years before; and then God blessed it to
him, and he lived three more years to rejoice in the sovereign grace of God. Why
did not he die before he was ninety-three? Because God meant to save him, and He
kept him alive till He did save him. He has kept you alive, dear friend. You
escaped the fever. Yellow fever could not lay you low. In that hospital abroad
you could not die because the Lord meant to save you. And He has brought you
here to-night, I hope, because, as the preserver of men, He means to hear your
prayers and give you His grace in your soul. God grant that it may be so! At any
rate the man who has been spared from many perils has good reason to say that
word, "Thou preserver of men," and to take hope from it and appeal to the
longsuffering of God. And then, do not you think that Job meant by this,
moreover, to speak of the way in which God supplies the daily wants of mankind?
We could not live without bread. We could not exist unless we had nutriment for
our bodies. And who finds this? It is sent to the whole multitude of the human
race by God's good providence. In that sense God feeds us all virtually by
making the earth to produce her harvests. O Thou that feedest all mankind, and
so dost preserve them, wilt Thou not give crumbs of mercy to a poor starving
soul like me? Is not it good pleading? O Thou preserver of men, have pity on me.
If Thou art so good even to the unthankful, I, too, a poor soul that have been
unthankful, I do pray Thee to preserve me; and I will be thankful for ever and
ever. And may Job not have meant that it is God who preserves His saints from
going down into the pit; and therefore he says, "O Thou Saviour of men "—(put it
so for a moment, for the sense will be synonymous)—''I beseech Thee have pity on
me and preserve me." We spoke this morning of a man who said that if ever he was
saved he should be the greatest wonder in all Heaven, and the angels would come
trooping down to the doors to look at him, and would say, "Here is the strangest
man that ever was saved yet." And we said that that would bring all the more
glory to God; and we say it now. If thou art an out-of-the-way sinner, far
removed from hope, and the Lord save thee, so much the more will His name be
famous throughout eternity. And since He has saved tens of thousands and
millions of souls that were once as lost as thee, why, appeal to Him as the
preserver or Saviour of men, and beseech Him to save thee. And now I have this
mournful reflection that, though I have tried to put the way of salvation before
you, this audience will all be scattered in a few minutes north and south and
east and west, and with it every word that I have said will be scattered and
forgotten too, save where, here and, there, God's Spirit shall be pleased to
make a lasting impression. I do pray it may be so, in many of your souls. Why,
there are some of you that I am looking upon now that have been hopeful dozens
of times. We have heard about your being awakened; we have seen you at our
various meetings; or, if we have not heard of it, it has been so. You have been
stirred again and again and again, and you have said, "I have sinned"; but you
have never got any farther. It is a very awful thing to be at Heaven's gate and
not to enter. I believe every time a man gets washed up almost on shore from the
Dead Sea of sin, if he does not get on shore it becomes, humanly speaking, less
and less likely that he ever will. Oh, happy are those hearts that yield to the
divine impulses early; but unhappy shall you be if you feel the draw-ings of
God's love to-night and do not come. Oh, that He might draw mightily, that He
might lead you now to cry out with an exceeding bitter cry, "My God, I must be
reconciled to Thee; I cannot live under the shadow of Thine anger. I cannot bear
to have Thy furbished sword for ever hanging over my devoted head. O God,
forgive me ere I go to sleep this night. Speak the word of mercy. Have pity on
my guilty soul."

Ah, dear soul, if you feel an agony for God, an agony for salvation, you shall
have it; you shall have it; you shall have it. The gates of Heaven always open
to those that know how to knock hard. If thou canst, knock hard and entreat and
cry. "The kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent take it by
force." God give thee that violence to-night; and mayst thou this evening say,
"I have sinned, but I am pardoned. I can do nothing unto Thee, O Thou preserver
of men, but Thou hast enabled me to bring Thy dear Son before Thee, and I do so
now, believing in Him, and I am saved." Amen.


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  CHAPTER 21: 20. THE MASTER'S SUMMONS
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XX. The Master's Summons Arise, let us go hence.—(John 14:31.)

You will remember that the Saviour had been sitting at the Paschal table, and He
had also celebrated for the first time that ordinance in which throughout all
time we are bidden to remember Him. After supper, He began to pour out His heart
to His people in that memorable chapter which begins with these comforting
words: "Let not your hearts be troubled"; and He was continuing in a strain of
consolation—most delightful it must have been to them, and I should think no
less pleasing to Himself; for he that makes others happy generally enjoys the
operation himself—when just as it were, in the middle of His discourse, having
spoken concerning His own obedience to His Father, He seemed to start and say,
"Let us go to it at once. A great work is to be done, and a great suffering is
to be endured. Let us not tarry. Arise, let us go hence."

Whether He did arise or not is very questionable. Some have thought that He did,
and that the next two chapters were mainly spoken on the road to the garden of
Gethsemane. But I hardly think so, and, though one cannot tell for certain, it
does look from the 18th chapter, at the 1st verse, as if He did not go then; for
the 18th chapter says: "When Jesus had spoken these words, He went forth with
His disciples over the brook Cedron, where was a garden, into the which He
entered, and His disciples."

Moreover, although it has been said that the chapter about the vine and the
branches may have been suggested by the vines through which the Saviour passed
on the way to Gethsemane, it does not seem to me as if the chapters read like a
conversation on the road. There is such a very deep solemnity about them, a
quiet and subdued air, and, withal, they are so deep and so full of mystery.
There are such pregnant sentences teeming with meaning, that they do not seem to
me to be like the discoursings of one who speaks as he walks along, but rather
like the deliberate utterances that would be given forth in a chamber in quiet
and peace. Perhaps you have never tried it experimentally, but I have, and I
know that preaching out of doors is quite a different thing from preaching
indoors, and that what you would say to a congregation outside or in
conversation with friends on the road is never so profound as that which you
would speak to your own familiar acquaintances in the quiet of a room. It seems
to me that the conjecture of a great many commentators and expositors is
correct. The Saviour here seems to start in the midst of His discourse, and He
says, "Let us go hence!" And then, rising, perhaps, from the place where He had
been speaking, He feels there is still more to say, and, keeping His posture of
standing, He goes on to say somewhat more of that last impressive discourse
which He intended to utter before He was taken from them. However, it is not
very important: it will mean just the same, whether He did go or whether He did
not. It is an explanation dropped by the way; it is a sort of sacred
interpolation upon the sense indicating, as a chance word will sometimes do,
what is going on within. It seems very natural. It is all the better tell-tale
of the internal processes which were going on in the Saviour's soul.

It seems to me that these words, "Arise, let us go hence," which, in the
original Greek, were only three words, may, first of all, be viewed as our
Master's brave watchword, and then, secondly, for all time they may be accepted
as His servant's stirring motto: "Arise, let us go hence."

I.

First, then, they are the Saviour's brave watchword. In these words He expressed
four things.

And, first, He expressed His desire to obey His Father. The clause preceding
read thus: '' But that the world may know that I love the Father; and as the
Father gave Me commandment, even so I do. Arise, let us go hence." He was eager
to do His Father's will; but that will was about to be revealed to Him in
suffering. O brethren, some of us could willingly enough go to serve the Lord in
activity, but to go and serve Him in suffering—we halt, we hesitate, we
deliberate. But not so with the Saviour. His sufferings were to be infinitely
greater than any that can fall to our lot. In the garden they were to fetch from
His entire body a bloody sweat; they were to consist afterwards of shame and
spitting and cruelty and reproach and crucifixion pains, and of death itself. He
knew, knew to the full, what it all meant, and, for all that, without the
slightest hesitation, He says, "Let us go to it! If My Father hath mixed for Me
a cup full of bitterness and gall, shall I not drink it?" And he does not sit
till the cup is passed to Him, but He goes towards it. He does not wait until
that chalice shall be placed to His lips and the dregs shall be drained forcibly
into His throat. Not he! But He rises up, as though He were going to a triumph.
He goes cheerfully and willingly, to be obedient unto death, the death of the
cross, that He may do His Father's will. O matchless lesson of patience! Lord,
help us to learn that lesson. "The spirit truly is willing, but the flesh is
weak." Pray God help even this poor flesh to glorify Him, if need be, in the way
of suffering. And pray remember, dear friends, that in this suffering, which the
Saviour was so willing to endure, out of obedience to His Father, there was one
peculiar bitterness. It was this, that His Father would leave Him in it. We can
bear pain if we are supported by the presence of God. Even death itself is no
longer terrible when Jesus softens the couch by His presence. But, O, beloved,
to know that a part of our trial will consist in a sense of soul-desertion—this
is terrible! It must be a solemn abnegation of self-love, a real crucifixion of
the spirit, when we can forgo not only all earthly joys, but all Heavenly joys,
too, for a time, if we may but endure to the end in obedience, and suffer and
perform all God's righteous will. Child of God, would you be willing, if God
should bless you to save others, to be without one comfortable look from His
eyes by the month together? Would you be content, if it were needful to qualify
you to instruct other saints, to be dragged through the deepest mire yourself,
to be made the off scouring of all things, and in the operation to be without
any consolation from God? Perhaps you can say, "Yes"; but if it came to the
point, would you act like the Master? Would you rise up from supper and say,
with quiet deliberation, "Let us go to this suffering, be it what it may. If the
Lord is glorified by it, then 'March onward!' is the word we hear, and onward
will we march, let the road be rough as it may''?

Remember that it is said in the text that our Lord went to these sufferings, and
especially to the peculiar suffering of being deserted by His Father, with this
motive "that the world may know that I love the Father." The man Christ was
desirous that beyond all dispute everybody should know that He loved the Father.
And assuredly everybody who knows the story of the cross knows that. We,
beloved, know that He loves us; but please to notice how He loved the Father. It
was not only out of love to man that Jesus died, but out of love to God, to
accomplish the Father's purpose, to satisfy the Father's longings, to honour the
Father's broken law, to fulfil the Father's justice and give full channel for
the Father's love. It was for this that Jesus went to the cross, and this
sustained Him: "I shall make all men and angels and devils know that I love the
Father." Oh, that we might have some such motive as this in our service, that we
could say, "It shall be no question with the world whether I love Christ or not.
They despise Him, but they shall know that I adore Him. They cast out His name
as evil, but they shall know that there is one who loves every letter of that
name and is willing to sacrifice all things for Christ's sake." Beloved, 'tis a
glorious motive. It sustained the Saviour: may the like motive constrain us to
go forward in the path of self-sacrifice, that we may obey God and make all men,
whether saints or sinners, know that we love the Father. The first thing, then,
that we see in this brave watchword of our Saviour is His desire to obey God.
The second thing I see in it is this—His readiness to meet the arch-enemy. Look
at the 30th verse: "Hereafter I will not talk much with you: for the prince of
this world cometh, and hath nothing in Me." Then quick after it comes, "Arise,
let us go hence." Our Lord's conflict in the garden with Satan was very painful.
Who can forget how heavy His soul was even unto death? And the temptations with
which He was there assailed were peculiarly trying. But since our Lord knew that
He must on our behalf fight with Satan and overcome him, He did not hesitate to
go to the fight. There were soldiers in the old days, like the Persian soldiers,
who had to be driven to battle with whips. They never won the victory. But the
brave Spartan soldiers stepped each man into his place in the ranks with as much
alacrity as if he were stepping forward into a marriage ceremony. They rejoiced
to light for their country. Now, our Lord and Master was not driven to the last
conflict, but He came forward, a volunteer, for our sake, saying, "Let us go
hence." I can only compare Him to that old Nazarite, the ancient hero, the son
of Manoah, who, as he went through the vineyard, heard a lion, and it roared
upon him, and he turned aside from his father and mother and received the
leaping beast and slew it, as though it had been a kid, and flinging down the
carcase, left it there filled with honey which by-and-bye should be his delight.
So did our Saviour step a little while into that garden of Gethsemane, and there
in desperate conflict with the lion of the pit He slew him and left him there
overcome; and from that victory you and I to-night gather sweet refreshment—out
of the eater, conquered and slain, cometh honey and sweetness to our soul. And
it seemed so brave of our Master to say, "Let us go hence," as though He took a
step or two in advance to meet His adversary. The Son of Man was not afraid of
the dragon of the pit. "Let us go hence," said He.

But, thirdly, I think this watchword revealed an intense desire in the Saviour's
heart for action. You perceive He is communing with those whom He loved best of
any upon earth. The eleven were sitting around Him. His big soul is swelling
within Him. He has got a work to do, and He wants to be at it. So He breaks off
His conversation for a moment, and says to them, "Let us be at it! Let us go
hence." He had just been discoursing with them upon the sweetest of all
subjects, speaking about that priceless gift of the Paraclete, telling them of
the promised Comforter. He breaks that off. He feels it is not a time for
talking. "Henceforth," saith He, "I will not talk much with you, for the Prince
of this world cometh." He wanted to act. He feels the pressure of events upon
Him. The time has come in which no longer can He use dainty words of love, but
He must go to stern deeds of conflict. And it was the communion table, too, that
He left, that very table of which He said, "With desire have I desired to eat
this Passover with you before I suffer." From this He tears Himself away and all
its dear associations and solemn feelings. "Arise," says He, "let us go hence."
Have you never seen a man who wanted to do good feel as though he could break
away from Christian ordinances and sweet means of spiritual profit to get away
and do good to others—something of that spirit that stirs the war-horse when the
battle draweth nigh, when he smelleth the battle afar off, and he says, "Aha!
aha!"? In the midst of the trumpets he paweth and waiteth for the conflict, with
his soul striving within him. It was so with Jesus. With "that stern joy that
warriors feel" when they meet with "foemen worthy of their steel," He longed for
the fight, and could give up the joy of fellowship that He might enter into the
action, for His soul was hot within Him while He said, "Arise, let us go hence."
But once more, there was a fourth thing which these words indicate, namely, His
intense desire to accomplish our redemption. That is the point which to us comes
nearest home. What if I say that up to that moment His elect were unredeemed?
Many of them had entered Heaven, but it was by virtue of the foresight of the
sacrifice that He offered. But suppose He had never authorised that sacrifice?
The supposition does not dare to be dwelt upon, even for a single moment; but
where would have been the covenant if it had never been ratified? Where would
have been the promises if the stipulations on the part of our covenant head had
never been fulfilled? Where would your hope have been, and mine, dear brethren
and sisters? If there had been no bloody sacrifice, how could poor sinners have
been washed from sin? Where would have been the atonement to Almighty wrath for
our tremendous guilt? If I may so speak, everything was in jeopardy till that
hour. "Will He do it? Will He bear it? Will He hold on till He can say, 'It is
finished'? Will He bear the strain? Will He have strength enough? When He passes
between the millstones of eternal wrath, will He come out as pure grain, the
much finer flour? When He is tested and tried, yea, consumed with fire, will He
to the end hold on till all His work is done?" Oh, the Saviour longed to get it
through. He wanted to be able to say of His dear children, "I have redeemed them
out of the hand of the enemy." He wanted to be able to say of His spouse, "I
have paid her debts as her only kinsman; I have redeemed her heritage and have
set her free; and the man Jesus, like the man Boaz in Ruth, could not be at rest
until His spouse was all His own and there was none to claim her, for He had
fully redeemed her. "Arise," said He, "let us go hence," as if He had said to
the sheep, "Let the shepherd go and pay the ransom-price for you. Let Me go, and
let the sword be sheathed in My bosom, that you, the sheep of My care, may never
be touched therewith. Let Me go and bear that you may never bear the whole of
the wrath that is due for your sin."

Oh, it is great love, great love, marvellous love, that makes Him step forward
with such alacrity and say, "Let us go hence. Let us go to redeem My people, and
finish the work which God has given Me to do."

II.

Now, reflect on that, dear brethren and sisters, at your leisure; and now follow
me for a minute or two while I use this short expression as the stirring motto
for the Church in all time, "Arise, let us go hence." This should be the motto
of every new convert. Do I address some who have lately been saved? You have
experienced a change of heart within the last few weeks. Now the very first
thing you have to do is to come out from the world. In your ear Christ puts it,
"Arise, let us go hence! Come out from among them: be ye separate. Touch not the
unclean thing." It does not mean that you are to go out of the world, or that
you are actually to leave friends and relatives, but to come away from all their
idle and sinful customs, come away from all their pursuits and all their
pleasures—come right out. You are a child of God: don't act as the children of
Satan do. If you have followed a bad trade, leave it; if you are a member of a
corrupt Church, leave it. Your course is plain: separate yourself from them and
come straight away and follow your Lord Christ without the camp, bearing His
reproach, "Arise, let us go hence," saith He. But have you been converted for
some time? Have you already trodden the path where believers walk with Christ?
Bear their cross then still. The Saviour saith, "Arise, let us go hence." You
have got one measure of faith; do not sit down and say, "I have got enough
faith." No, go for twice as much faith. You do love Jesus: do not say, "I love
Him enough"; go hence and love Him more. You have a hope that is bright: don't
say, "It is enough for me," but seek to have it brighter still. Remember, as
soon as you are satisfied with yourself, you will never grow any more until that
satisfaction is gone. Get rid of it: let this be constantly your idea, "Not as
though I had already attained, either were already perfect, but I press toward
the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus." O beloved,
that is the point to aim at. "Let us go hence," farther on. Advance upon
everything that you have done and everything that you have been, from strength
to strength, go on, and wrestle and fight and pray—

Tread all the powers of darkness down, And win the well-fought day.

The same motto may be used by Christians when they have got into a state of
great enjoyment. Perhaps you have been lately favoured to feed upon the Gospel
more fully than ever. You have come here this evening, and you have been very
thankful that the Lord has spoken to your heart, and you feel very happy. Dear
brother, if you enjoy God's presence at the Communion table (which will be best
of all), I hope you will hear like the sound of a trumpet behind you, "Arise, go
hence! "Where to? Why, back to that cold Church of which you are a member. Try
and throw a live coal into the midst of them and warm them up; back to your
family, where there are so few that know the Lord. Tell them what you know, and
seek their conversion. Go hence, go hence from the Church and table of God in
among the ungodly. Go and weep over them; pray for them and seek their
salvation. Oh, it is so very easy to sit down at the table, and to sit and hear
Gospel sermons, and sing sweet hymns and hear sweet prayer-meetings and say, "It
is glorious—

My willing soul would stay In such a frame as this!

Ah, that is very lazy and very selfish. Every mouthful a man eats—the strength
of it should be used afterwards for some good end; and every mouthful of
spiritual refreshment a Christian gets should either be spent in the patience of
suffering or else in the perseverance of service; and if God gives you a
specially good meal as He did His servant Elias, it is because you are to go a
specially long journey. He went forty days in the strength of that meal. I say
that if you get special food from God, you ought to undertake some special
service. Go and do more than you ever thought of doing before. If God has made
you strong, don't go on with boy's work: undertake man's work. if you have grown
to manhood, do man's work. We want some of those that can be leaders, Serjeants
in the army of Christ, and if the Lord has made you fit for it, don't be ashamed
to take that rank, but come to the very front in the service of your Lord and
Master. "Arise, let us go hence."

I cannot resist the feeling that there are some of my brethren that ought to
hear that in this way while they are sitting here, if they recollect that
one-third of the population of this world live in China, and out of all the
millions of China there are very few indeed—they might almost be told upon the
fingers—who have ever heard of Christ. Men are wanted to go and tell these
people about salvation. We heard a dear friend say the other night that they did
not want money so much as men, and that simple-hearted men that love Christ were
just what they wanted. Surely there ought to be a stir throughout the Church of
zealous young men who would say, "Arise, let us go hence."

Then there are others sitting here—men of business that love their Lord, and
they can do something for the nation sometimes; but here are sinners perishing
and they never think of doing anything for them. I would the Lord would say in
their hearts, "Arise, go hence! "

There came into the Tabernacle some few years ago a young Christian man who was
everything that could be wished, but he did not do much for Christ. The sermon
touched his heart, and he went back to the town where he lived; began to preach
in the street, and at this moment he has one of the largest congregations in a
certain town, and has built a large tabernacle which he keeps full. I hope he
will occupy this pulpit in two or three Sabbath days to come, and you will see
what a man can do in business when God does but quicken him in the work.

III.

"Arise, let us go hence." Is not that a call to those Christians who eat the fat
and drink the sweet, but send no portion to hungry souls? "Arise, let us go
hence." I should like to sound that in many a village chapel where a few score
people meet all the year round to make themselves comfortable over a little snug
Gospel. Why not get out in the fields on a summer's day and preach there, or do
as the Methodists do, go up and down the streets singing—anything to get the
people in? If the chapels are empty, are the ministers to sit still and say, "We
can't help it"? No, if the people won't hear us in chapels, let us preach in
theatres, or anywhere. The people must hear the Gospel. "Go ye and preach the
Gospel to every creature" is a command that cannot be fulfilled by preaching
good sermons to empty pews. If you come in here, I thank you for it. It saves me
a deal of trouble, for I have not to go after you; but if you would not come
after me, I would sooner go after you, by some means or other to get the ears of
the people, that they may hear the Word, for this is the motto of the Church,
"Arise, let us go hence!" out of our chapels, out of our churches, out of our
little snuggeries, down dark alleys and to little meeting houses, and let us go
through all England and the United States, and pour out our troops just as in
the old crusading days the West poured out its chivalry on to the East to break
the Moslem yoke and set the Gospel free. When men can make money and say, "I
will go and preach the Gospel in foreign countries''—when men will step forward
and say, "We could earn good positions in the Army or Navy or law, but we will
take up the lowest position in the Church for the glory of Christ's name"—then
will the crusading times come back again with true splendour. O Lord of Hosts,
let the Sacred Comforter come into the hearts of all Thy blood-bought ones, and
this shall be; and a mysterious impulse shall go through the Church like that
which went through the world in former ages when they said, "Deus vult" God
wills it, and the Church shall say, "Arise, let us go hence, far hence unto the
heathen." As for us as a Church, let us always be going hence; let us break
forth on the right hand and on the left; let our forces be scattered that they
may be multiplied; let us invent every system of work that ingenuity can devise,
and use old systems at the highest possible rate. Let us go hence from all we
have done to do something more. Let us arise—that means upward. Let us go—that
means forward. Let us go hence—that is, let us leave all behind that we have
already done and up and away to something more.

I think the day will come when this word, which I have sounded out as a
trumpet-note, will come very softly as though it dropped from the harp or
dulcimer, to the ear of each one of us. It may be it will in our lone chamber,
or it may be as we walk the streets—but it matters not where—Jesus will come and
commune with us very sweetly, and as He is talking with us He will say, "Arise,
let us go hence!" and in a moment we shall leave this heavy clay behind us and
find ourselves in the gloryland. Might we not long for that whisper—"Arise!"—not
go alone, but "go with me"—my beloved, my Saviour, my sweet companion—"we will
mount together!" Ah, I see some of my dear aged friends longing for that time,
and those of us who are younger will go perhaps before the older ones. Who can
tell? I never pray "From sudden death, good Lord, deliver me." Is there a
greater blessing for a Christian than sudden death—to shut your eyes on earth
and open them in Heaven and know nothing about it—just to wake up in glory and
ask, "Where am I?" to find, instead of wife and children around you, Seraphim
and Cherubim with whom you can join your everlasting song? Oh, 'tis blessed! You
might almost say, "Good Master, speak the word now!" "Arise, let us go hence."

God bless you, for Christ's sake. Amen.


========================================================================
  CHAPTER 22: BOOK: ACCORDING TO THE PROMISE (20 SERMONS)
========================================================================

According to Promise or The Lord's Method of Dealing with His Chosen People by
Charles H. Spurgeon

I. A Sieve Needed II. The Two Seeds III. The Two Lives IV. Differing Hopes V.
Persecution Consequent On The Promise

VI. The Parting VII. Whose Are The Promises?

VIII. The Promise A Free Gift IX. The Promise Of God A Reality X. The Peculiar
Treasure Of Believers XI. The Valuation Of The Promises XII. The Lord’s Promise
— The Rule Of His Giving XIII. The Rule Without Exception XIV. Taking Possession
Of The Promise XV. Endorsing The Promise XVI. The Promise Used For This Life
XVII. Searching Out The Promise XVIII. The Time Of The Promise XIX. The Promises
In Possession Through The Spirit XX. Jesus And The Promises


========================================================================
  CHAPTER 23: 01. A SIEVE NEEDED
========================================================================

I. A Sieve Needed

IT is very important to be able to distinguish between things that differ, for
appearances are not to be relied upon. Things which seem to be alike may yet be
the opposite of each other. A scorpion may be like an egg, and a stone like a
piece of bread; but they are far from being the same. Like may be very unlike.
Especially is this the case in spiritual things, and therefore it behoves us to
be on our guard.

It would be very difficult to say how far a man may go in religion, and yet die
in his sins; how much he may look like an heir of heaven, and yet be a child of
wrath. Many unconverted men have a belief which is similar to faith, and yet it
is not true faith. Certain persons exhibit pious affections which have the
warmth of spiritual love, but are quite destitute of gracious life. Every grace
can be counterfeited, even as jewels can be imitated. As paste gems are
wonderfully like the real stones, so sham graces are marvellously like the work
of the Spirit of God. In soul matters a man will need to have all his wits about
him, or he will soon deceive his own heart. It is to be feared that many are
already mistaken, and will never discover their delusion till they lift up their
eyes in the world of woe, where their disappointment will be terrible indeed.

The dead child of nature may be carefully washed by its mother, but this will
not make it the living child of grace. The life of God within the soul creates
an infinite difference between the man who has it and the man who has it not;
and the point is, to make sure that we have this life. Are YOU sure that you
have it?

It will be an awful thing to cry, "Peace, peace," where there is no peace, and
to prophesy smooth things for yourself, and make your heart easy, and lull your
conscience to slumber, and never to wake out of the sleep till a clap of the
thunder of judgment shall startle you out of presumption into endless horror.

I desire to help my reader in the business of self-examination. I would have him
go further than examination, and attain to such abundance of grace, that his
holy and happy state shall become a witness to himself.

The first part of this little book is meant to be a sieve to separate the chaff
from the wheat. Let my friend use it upon himself; it may be the best day's work
he has ever done. He who looked into his accounts and found that his business
was a losing one was saved from bankruptcy. This may happen also to my reader.
Should he, however, discover that his heavenly trade is prospering, it will be a
great comfort to him. No man can lose by honestly searching his own heart.

Friend, try it at once.


========================================================================
  CHAPTER 24: 02. THE TWO SEEDS
========================================================================

II. The Two Seeds

"It is written, that Abraham had two sons, the one by a bondmaid, the other by a
freewoman. But he who was of the bondwoman was born after the flesh; but he of
the freewoman was by promise."—Galatians 4:22-23.

ABRAHAM had two sons. Ishmael and Isaac were beyond all dispute veritable sons
of Abraham. Yet, one of them inherited the covenant blessing, and the other was
simply a prosperous man of the world. See how close these two were together!
They were born in the same society, called the same great patriarch "father,"
and sojourned in the same encampment with him. Yet, Ishmael was a stranger to
the covenant, while Isaac was the heir of the promise. How little is there in
blood and birth! A more remarkable instance than this happened a little
afterwards; for Esau and Jacob were born of the same mother, at the same birth,
yet is it written," Jacob have I loved, and Esau have I hated." One became
gracious, and the other profane. So closely may two come together, and yet so
widely may they be separated! Verily, it is not only that two shall be in one
bed, and the one shall be taken, and the other left; but, two shall come into
the world at the same moment, and yet one of them will take up his inheritance
with God, and the other will for a morsel of meat sell his birthright. We may be
in the same church, baptized in the same water, seated at the same communion
table, singing the same psalm, and offering the same prayer; and yet we may be
of two races as opposed as the seed of the woman and the seed of the serpent.

Abraham's two sons are declared by Paul to be the types of two races of men, who
are much alike, and yet widely differ. They are unlike in their origin. They
were both sons of Abraham; but Ishmael, the child of Hagar, was the offspring of
Abraham upon ordinary conditions: he was born after the flesh. Isaac, the son of
Sarah, was not born by the strength of nature; for his father was more than a
hundred years old, and his mother was long past age. He was given to his parents
by the Lord, and was born according to the promise through faith. This is a
grave distinction, and it marks off the true child of God from him who is only
so by profession. The promise lies at the bottom of the distinction, and the
power which goes to accomplish the promise creates and maintains the difference.
Hence the promise, which is our inheritance, is also our test and touchstone.

Let us use the test at once by seeing whether we have been wrought upon by the
power which fulfils the promise. Let me ask a few questions,—How were you
converted? Was it by yourself, by the persuasion of men, by carnal excitement;
or was it by the operation of the Spirit of God? You profess to have been born
again. Whence came that new birth? Did it come from God in consequence of his
eternal purpose and promise, or did it come out of yourself? Was it your old
nature trying to do better, and working itself up to its best form? If so, you
are Ishmael. Or was it that you, being spiritually dead, and having no strength
whatever to rise out of your lost estate, were visited by the Spirit of God, who
put forth his divine energy, and caused life from heaven to enter into you? Then
you are Isaac. All will depend upon the commencement of your spiritual life, and
the source from which that life at first proceeded. If you began in the flesh,
you have gone on in the flesh, and in the flesh you will die. Have you never
read," That which is born of the flesh is flesh"? Before long the flesh will
perish, and from it you will reap corruption. Only "that which is born of the
Spirit is spirit"; the joy is that the spirit will live, and of it you will reap
life everlasting. Whether you area professor of religion or not, I beseech you,
ask yourself—Have I felt the power of the Spirit of God? Is the life that is
within you the result of the fermentation of your own natural desires? Or is it
a new element, infused, imparted, implanted from above? Is your spiritual life a
heavenly creation? Have you been created anew in Christ Jesus? Have you been
born again by divine power?

Ordinary religion is nature gilded over with a thin layer of what is thought to
be grace. Sinners have polished themselves up, and brushed off the worst of the
rust and the filth, and they think their old nature is as good as new. This
touching-up and repairing of the old man is all very well; but it falls, short
of what is needed. You may wash the face and hands of Ishmael as much as you
please, but you cannot make him into Isaac. You may improve nature, and the more
you do so the better for certain temporary purposes; but you cannot raise it
into grace. There is a distinction at the very fountain-head between the stream
which rises in the bog of fallen humanity, and the river which proceeds from the
throne of God. Do not forget that our Lord himself said, "Ye must be born
again." If you have not been born again from above, all your church-going, or
your chapel-going, stands for nothing. Your prayers and your tears, your
Bible-readings and all that have come from yourself only, can only lead to
yourself. Water will naturally rise as high as its source, but no higher: that
which begins with human nature will rise to human nature; but to the divine
nature it cannot reach. Was your new birth natural or supernatural? Was it of
the will of man or of God? Much will depend upon your answer to that question.

Between the child of God and the mere professor there is a distinction as to
origin of the most serious sort. Isaac was born according to promise. Ishmael
was not of promise, but of the course of nature, Where nature's strength
suffices there is no promise; but when human energy fails, the word of the Lord
comes in. God had said that Abraham should have a son of Sarah; Abraham believed
it, and rejoiced therein, and Isaac was born as the result of the divine
promise, by the power of God. There could have been no Isaac if there had been
no promise, and there can be no true believer apart from the promise of grace,
and the grace of the promise.

Gentle reader, here let me enquire as to your salvation. Are you saved by what
you have done? Is your religion the product of your own natural strength? Do you
feel equal to all that salvation may require? Do you conclude yourself to be in
a safe and happy condition because of your natural excellence and moral ability?
Then you are after the manner of Ishmael, and to you the inheritance will not
come; for it is not an inheritance according to the flesh, but according to
promise.

If, on the other hand, you say,—"My hope lies only in the promise of God. He has
set forth that promise in the person of his Son Jesus to every sinner that
believeth in him; and I do believe in him, therefore 1 trust and believe that
the Lord will fulfil his promise and bless me. I look for heavenly blessedness,
not as the result of my own efforts, but as the gift of God's free favour. My
hope is fixed alone upon the free and gratuitous love of God to guilty men, by
the which he has given his Son Jesus Christ to put away sin, and to bring in
everlasting righteousness for those who deserve it not,"—then this is another
sort of language from that of the Ishmaelites, who say "We have Abraham to our
father." You have now learned to speak as Isaac speaks. The difference may seem
small to the careless, but it is great indeed. Hagar, the slave-mother, is a
very different person from Sarah, the princess. To the one there is no covenant
promise, to the other the blessing belongs for evermore. Salvation by works is
one thing; salvation by grace is another. Salvation by human strength is far
removed from salvation by divine power: and salvation by our own resolve is the
opposite of salvation by the promise of God.

Put yourself under this enquiry, and see to which family you belong. Are you of
Ishmael or of Isaac?

If you find that you are like Isaac, born according to the promise, remember
that your name is "Laughter"; for that is the interpretation of the Hebrew name
Isaac. Take care that you rejoice with joy unspeakable and full of glory. Your
new birth is a wonderful thing. If both Abraham and Sarah laughed at the thought
of Isaac, you may certainly do so concerning yourself. There are times when, if
I sit alone and think of the grace of God to me, the most undeserving of all his
creatures, I am ready to laugh and cry at the same time for joy that ever the
Lord should have looked in love and favour upon me. Yes, and every child of God
must have felt the working of that Isaac nature within his soul, filling his
mouth with laughter, because the Lord hath done great things for him.

Mark well the difference between the two seeds, from their very beginning.

Ishmael comes of man, and by man. Isaac comes by God's promise. Ishmael is the
child of Abraham's flesh. Isaac is Abraham's child, too; out then the power of
God comes in, and from the weakness of his parents it is made clear that he is
of the Lord,—a gift according to promise. True faith is assuredly the act of the
man who believes; true repentance is the act of the man who repents; yet both
faith and repentance may with unquestionable correctness be described as the
work of God, even as Isaac is the son of Abraham and Sarah, and yet he is still
more the gift of God. The Lord our God, who bids us believe, also enables us to
believe. All that we do acceptably the Lord worketh in us; yea, the very will to
do it is of his working. No religion is worth a farthing which is not
essentially the outflow of the man's own heart; and yet it must beyond question
be the work of the Holy Ghost who dwells within him.

O friend, if what you have within you is natural, and only natural, it will not
save you! The inward work must be supernatural; it must come of God, or it will
miss the covenant blessing. A gracious life will be your own, even as Isaac was
truly the child of Abraham; but still more it will be of God; for "Salvation is
of the Lord." We must be born from above. Concerning all our religious feelings
and actions, we must be able to say, "Lord, thou hast wrought all our works in
us."


========================================================================
  CHAPTER 25: 03. THE TWO LIVES
========================================================================

III. The Two Lives

"Neither, because they are the seed of Abraham, are they all children: but, In
Isaac shall thy seed be called. That is, They which are the children of the
flesh, these are not the children of God: but the children of the promise are
counted for the seed. For this is the word of promise, At this time will I come,
and Sarah shall have a son."—Romans 9:7-9.

ISHMAEL and Isaac differed as to origin, and hence there was a difference in
their nature which showed itself in their lives, and was chiefly seen in their
relation to the promise.

According to the birth so will be the life which comes of it. In the case of the
man who is only what he made himself to be, there will be only what nature gives
him; but in the case of the man who is created anew by the Spirit of God, there
will be signs following. "Of him are ye in Christ Jesus, who of God is made unto
us wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption: as it is
written, He that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord." There will be in the
new-born man that which the new life brings with it: in the natural man there
will be nothing of the kind.

Ishmael exhibited certain of the natural characteristics of Abraham joined with
those of his slave mother. He was a princely man like his father, and inherited
the patriarch's noble bearing; but Isaac had the faith of his father, and was in
the succession as to holy inward spiritual life. As the heir of the promise,
Isaac remains with his father Abraham, while Ishmael is forming camps of his own
in the wilderness. Isaac seeks alliance with the olden stock in Mesopotamia; but
Ishmael's mother takes him a wife out of Egypt, which was very natural, since
she came from Egypt herself. Like will to like. Isaac meditated in the field at
eventide, for his conversation was with sacred things; but Ishmael contended
with all comers, for he minded earthly things. Meditation is not for the wild
man, whose hand is against every man, and every man's hand against him. Isaac
surrendered himself as a sacrifice to God; but you see nothing of that kind in
Ishmael. Self-sacrifice is not for Ishmael; he is rather a killer and a slayer
than a lamb that presents itself to God. So you shall find, that if you are
religiously trained and tutored, and become "pious," as they call it, and yet
are not renewed in heart, nor visited by the Holy Ghost, you will not live the
secret life of the child of God. You may show many of the outward marks of a
Christian; you may be able to sing, and to pray, and to quote Scripture, and
perhaps to tell some little bits of imaginary experience; but you must be born
again to know in very deed and truth the fellowship of the saints, communion in
secret with the living God, and the yielding of yourself to him as your
reasonable service. The child of the promise abides with God's people, and
counts it his privilege to be numbered with them. The child of the promise feels
that he is in the best company when no man can see or be seen, but when the
Great Invisible draws near to him and holds converse with him. The child of the
promise, and he only, is able to go up to the top of Moriah, there to be bound
upon the altar, and to yield himself up to God. I mean by this last, that only
he who is born of the Spirit will yield himself wholly to God, and love the Lord
better than life itself. Your nature and conduct will be according to your
origin; and therefore I pray that you may begin aright, so that as you profess
to be a child of the kingdom, you may prove to be a true-born heir.

Ishmael, who was born after the flesh, the child of the bondwoman, must always
bear the servile taint. The child of a slave is not free-born. Ishmael is not,
cannot be, what Isaac is—the child of the free woman. Now mark: I do not say
that Ishmael ever desired to be like Isaac; I do not say that he felt himself to
be a loser by differing from Isaac; but, indeed, he was so. The man who is
labouring for self-salvation by his own doings, feelings, and self-denials, may
be proudly ignorant of his servile state; he may even boast that he was born
free, and was never in bondage to any; and yet he spends his whole life in
servitude. He never knows what liberty means, what content means, what delight
in God means. He wonders when men talk about "full assurance of faith." He
judges that they must be presumptuous. He has scarcely time to breathe between
the cracks of the whip. He has done so much, but he must do so much more; he has
suffered so much, but he must suffer so much more. He has never come into "the
rest which remaineth for the people of God;" for he is born of the bondwoman,
and his spirit is ever in bondage. On the other hand, he that is born of the
free woman, and understands that salvation is of the grace of God from first to
last, and that where God has given his grace he does not take it back, for "the
gifts and calling of God are without repentance"—such a man accepting the
finished work of Christ, and knowing his acceptance in the Beloved, rests in the
Lord, and rejoices exceedingly. His life and his spirit are filled with joy and
peace, for he was born free, and he is free, yea, free indeed. Does my reader
understand the freedom of the child of God? or is he still in servitude under
the law, afraid of punishment, afraid of being sent away into the wilderness? If
you are in this latter case, you have not received the promise, or you would
know that such a thing could not be. To Isaac, the child of the promise, the
heritage belongs, and he abides for ever, without fear of being cast out.

Those that are born as Ishmael was, according to the flesh, and whose religion
is a matter of their own power and strength, mind earthly things, as Ishmael
did. Only those that are born from above through the promise according to faith
will, like Isaac, mind heavenly things. See how the naturally religious man
minds earthly things. He is very regular at his place of worship; but while he
is there he thinks of his business, his house, or his farm. Does he enjoy the
worship of God? Not he! There is a sermon. Does he receive with meekness the
engrafted word which is able to save his soul? Not he! He criticizes it as if it
were a political harangue. He gives his money to the cause of God as others do.
Of course he does; for he feels that he has to quiet his conscience, and to keep
up his good repute: but does he care for the glory of God? By no means. If he
did he would give more than money. His heart's prayers would go up for the
progress of the kingdom. Does he sigh and cry because of the sins of the times?
Do you find him alone with God pouring out his heart in anguish because even in
his own family there are those that are not converted to God? Did you ever see
in him a high and holy joy when sinners are converted—an exultation because the
kingdom of Christ is coming? Oh no, he never rises to that. All the service of
God is outward to him: into the core and heart of spiritual things he has never
entered, and he never can. The carnal mind, even when it is religious, is still
enmity against God, and it is not reconciled to God, neither indeed can it be.
There must be a spiritual mind created in the man, he must become a new creature
in Christ Jesus, before he can appreciate, understand, and enjoy spiritual
things. To come back to where we started: "Ye must be born again." We must be
born of the Spirit: we must receive a supernatural life by being quickened from
our death in sin. We cannot bear the fruit of the Spirit till we have the inner
life of the Spirit. Ishmael will be Ishmael; and Isaac will be Isaac. As the man
is, such will his conduct be. The man of sight, and reason, and human power, may
do his best as Ishmael did; but only the child of the promise will rise to the
life and walk of faith as Isaac did.

"Hard lines" says one. Sometimes it is a great blessing to have those hard lines
drawn, and drawn very straight, too. By this means we may be set on the right
track for eternity. One said the other day to a friend of mine, "I once went to
hear Mr. Spurgeon, and when I went into the Tabernacle if you had asked me about
myself I should have judged that I was as religious a man as ever lived in
Newington, and as good a man, certainly, as ever made part of a congregation;
but all this was reversed when I heard the gospel that day. I came out of the
place with every feather plucked out of me. I felt myself the most wretched
sinner that could be on the face of the earth, and I said I will never go to
hear that man again, for he has spoiled me altogether." "Yes," he said, "but
that was the best thing that could have happened to me. I was made to look away
from myself, and all that I could do, to God and to his omnipotent grace, and to
understand that I must pass under my Creator's hand again, or I could never see
his face with joy." I hope my reader knows this truth for himself: a solemn
truth it is. Even as first of all God made Adam, so must he make us over again,
or else we can never bear his image, nor behold his glory. We must come under
the influence of the promise, and live upon the promise, or our lives will never
be guided by right principles, nor directed to right ends.


========================================================================
  CHAPTER 26: 04. DIFFERING HOPES
========================================================================

IV. Differing Hopes

"And as for Ishmael, I have heard thee: Behold, I have blessed him, and will
make him fruitful, and will multiply him exceedingly; twelve princes shall he
beget, and I will make him a great nation. But my covenant will I establish with
Isaac, which Sarah shall bear unto thee at this set time in the next
year."—Genesis 17:20-21.

IT is not at all wonderful that two persons, so different in their birth and
nature as Ishmael and Isaac were, became very different in their hopes. To Isaac
the covenant promise became the pole-star of his being; but for Ishmael no such
light had arisen. Ishmael aimed at large things, for he was the natural son of
one of the greatest of men; but Isaac looked for still higher objects, because
he was the child of the promise, and the inheritor of the covenant of grace
which the Lord had made with Abraham.

Ishmael, with his high and daring spirit, looked to found a nation which should
never be subdued, a race untamable as the wild ass of the desert; and his desire
has been abundantly granted: the Bedaween Arabs are to this day true copies of
their great ancestor. Ishmael in life and death realized the narrow, earthly
hopes for which he looked; but on the roll of those who saw the day of Christ,
and died in hope of the glory, his name is not entered. Isaac, on the other
hand, saw far ahead, even to the day of Christ. He looked for a city which hath
foundations, whose Builder and Maker is God.

Ishmael, like Passion, in "Pilgrim's Progress," had his best things here below;
but Isaac, like Patience, waited for his best things for the future. His
treasures were not in the tent and in the field, but in the "things not seen as
yet." He had received the great covenant promise, and there he found greater
riches than all the flocks of Nebaioth could minister to him. Upon his eye the
day-star of promise had shone, and he expected a full noon of blessing in the
fulness of the appointed time. The promise so operated upon him as to direct the
current of his thoughts and expectations. Is it so with you, my reader? Have you
received and embraced the promise of eternal life? Are you, therefore, hoping
for things not seen as yet? Have you an eye to that which none can behold except
believers in the faithfulness of God? Have you left the rut of present sensual
perception for the way of faith in the unseen and eternal? No doubt the
reception of the promise, and the enjoyment of its hopes, influenced the mind
and temper of Isaac, so that he was of a restful spirit. For him there were no
wars and fightings. He yielded the present, and waited for the future. Isaac
felt that as he was born after the promise it was for God to bless him, and to
fulfil the promise that he had made concerning him; and so he remained with
Abraham and kept himself aloof from the outside world. He both quietly hoped and
patiently waited for the blessing of God. His eye was on the future, on the
great nation yet to come, the promised land, and the yet more glorious promised
seed in whom all the nations of the earth would be blessed. For all this he
looked to God alone, wisely judging that he who gave the promise would himself
see to its fulfilment. Because of this faith he was none the less active; yet he
manifested none of the proud self-reliance which was so apparent in Ishmael. He
was energetic in his own way, with a calm confidence in God, and a quiet
submission to his supreme will. Year after year he held on in the separated
life, and braved unarmed the danger which arose from his heathen
neighbours—dangers which Ishmael confronted with his sword and with his bow. His
trust was in that voice which said, "Touch not mine anointed, and do my prophets
no harm." He was a man of peace, and yet he lived as securely as his warlike
brother. His faith in the promise gave him hope of security, yea, gave him
security itself, though the Canaanite was still in the land.

Thus does the promise operate upon our present life by creating in us an
elevation of spirit, a life above visible surroundings, a calm and heavenly
frame of mind. Isaac finds his bow and his spear in his God, Jehovah is his
shield and his exceeding great reward. Without a foot of land to call his own,
dwelling as a sojourner and a stranger in the land which God had given him by
promise, Isaac was content to live upon the promise and count himself rich in
joys to come. His remarkably quiet and equable spirit, while leading the strange
unearthly life of one of the great pilgrim fathers, sprang out of his simple
faith in the promise of the unchanging God. Hope, kindled by a divine promise,
affects the entire life of a man in his inmost thoughts, ways, and feelings: it
may seem to be of less importance than correct moral deportment, but in truth it
is of vital moment, not only in itself, but in that which it produces upon the
mind, heart, and life. The secret hope of a man is a truer test of his condition
before God than the acts of any one day, or even the public devotions of a year.
Isaac pursues his quiet holy way till he grows old and blind, and gently falls
asleep trusting in his God, who had revealed himself to him, and had called him
to be his friend, and had said, "Sojourn in this land, and I will be with thee
and bless thee, and in thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed."
As a man's hopes are, such is he. If his hope is in the promise of God, it is,
it must be, well with him.

Reader, what are your hopes? "Why," says one, "I am waiting till a relative
dies, and then I shall be rich. I have great expectations." Another hopes in his
steadily growing trade; and a third expects much from a promising speculation.
Hopes which can be realized in a dying world are mere mockeries. Hopes which
have no outlook beyond the grave are dim windows for a soul to look through.
Happy he who believes the promise, and feels assured of its fulfilment to
himself in due time, and leaves all else in the hands of infinite wisdom and
love. Such hope will endure trials, conquer temptations, and enjoy heaven below.
When Christ died on the cross our hopes began, when he rose they were confirmed,
when he went up on high they began to be fulfilled, when he comes a second time
they will be realized. In this world we shall have pilgrim's fare, and a table
spread in the presence of our enemies; and in the world to come we shall possess
the land which floweth with milk and honey, a land of peace and joy, where the
sun shall no more go down, neither shall the moon withdraw herself. Till then we
hope, and our hope layeth hold upon the promise.


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  CHAPTER 27: 05. PERSECUTION CONSEQUENT ON THE PROMISE
========================================================================

V. Persecution Consequent on the Promise

"Now we, brethren, as Isaac was, are the children of promise. But as then he
that was born after the flesh persecuted him that was born after the Spirit,
even so it is now."—Galatians 4:28-29. WHEN brothers differ so greatly as
Ishmael and Isaac, it is not surprising if they fall out, and indulge unkind
feelings. Ishmael was older than Isaac, and when the time came for Isaac to be
weaned, his mother, Sarah, saw the son of the bondwoman mocking her child: so
early had the difference of birth and condition begun to display itself. This
may serve us as an indication of what we may expect if we possess the God-given
life, and are heirs according to the promise. Those who are under the bondage of
the law cannot love those who are free-born by the gospel, and in some way or
other they soon display their enmity.

We are not now thinking of the hostility between the wicked world and the
church, but of that which exists between men of a merely natural religion, and
those who are born of God. We speak not of the Philistines opposing Isaac, but
of his brother Ishmael mocking him. Keenest of all is this opposition of the
externally religious, to those who are born from above and worship God in spirit
and in truth. Many precious children of God have suffered bitterly from the
cruel hatred of those who professed to be their brethren.

Probably the motive of Ishmael was envy; he could not endure that the little one
should have preeminence over himself. He seemed to say, "This is the heir, and
therefore I hate him." Perhaps he mocked Isaac's heir-ship, and boasted that he
had as good a right to the estate as ever the child of the promise could have.
Thus do mere professors envy the condition of believers, and reckon themselves
to be quite as good as the best of those who hope to be saved by the grace of
God. They do not desire the grace of God themselves, and yet, like the dog in
the manger, they cannot bear that others should have it: they envy the saints
their hope, their peace of mind, and their enjoyment of the favour of God. If
any of you find it so, be not in the least surprised. The envy of Ishmael
displayed itself most at the great feast which had been made at his brother's
weaning; and even thus do formalists, like the elder brother in the parable,
become most provoked when there is most occasion for rejoicing in connection
with the Father's beloved child. The music and dancing of the true family are
gall and wormwood to proud base-born professors. When full assurance is weaned
from doubt, and holy delight is weaned from the world, then the carnal
religionist puts on a sneer, and calls the godly mad, or fanatical, or murmurs
with sullen sarcasm, "Poor fools! let them alone; they are a sadly deluded
crew." People who are religious but not truly regenerated, who are working and
hoping to be saved by their own merits, usually exhibit a bitter hatred towards
those who are born of the promise.

Sometimes they mock their feebleness. May be Ishmael called Isaac a mere baby,
just weaned. So are believers a feeble folk, and exceedingly likely to excite
the derision of those who think themselves strong-minded. Isaac could not deny
that he was weak, neither can believers deny that they are faulty, and are
subject to infirmities which may put them under just censure: but the world
makes more of this than justice will allow, and mocks at saints for weaknesses
which in others would be overlooked. We must not think it a strange thing if our
insignificance and imperfection should set proud and self-righteous Pharisees
jeering at us and our Gospel.

Frequently the sport is raised by the believer's pretensions. Isaac was called
"the heir," and Ishmael could not bear to hear it "Look," says the legalist,
"yonder man was not long ago a known sinner; now he says he has believed in
Jesus Christ, and therefore he declares that he knows himself to be saved and
accepted, and sure of heaven. Did you ever hear of such presumption?" He who
hugs his chains hates the presence of a free man. He who refuses the mercy of
God because he proudly trusts his own merits, is angry with the man who rejoices
to be saved by grace.

Perhaps the little Isaac, the child of such aged parents, seemed odd and strange
to the young half-bred Egyptian. No person is so much a foreigner to his
fellow-men as a man born from above. To live by faith upon the promise of God
ought to seem the most proper and natural thing in the world; but it is not so
esteemed: on the contrary, men count those to be strange beings who believe in
God, and act upon such a belief. Wretched boys in the streets still hoot at
foreigners, and men of the world still jest at true believers, because of their
unworldly spirit and conduct. To us this is a testimony for good, for our Lord
said, "If ye were of the world, the world would love his own; but because ye are
not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world
hateth you." In a thousand ways, many of them so petty as to be unworthy of
mention, the believer can be made to bear "trials of cruel mockings," and he
ought to be prepared so to do. After all, it is but a small matter to be
persecuted nowadays; for the fires of Smithfield are quenched, the Lollards'
tower contains no prisoners, and not even a thumb-screw remains in use. Courage,
good brother! Even should you be ridiculed, no bones will be broken; and if you
are brave enough to despise contempt, even your sleep will not be disturbed.

Ishmael's mocking Isaac is only one among ten thousand proofs of the enmity
which exists between the seed of the woman and the seed of the serpent. The
mixture of these two in Abraham's household came about through his going down
into Egypt and acting in an unbelieving manner towards Pharaoh. Then the
Egyptian bondwoman was given to Sarah, and the evil element came into the camp.
Sarah, in an evil hour, gave the bondwoman to her husband; hence ten thousand
tears. No association of the unregenerate with the Church of God will avail to
alter their nature: an Ishmael in Abraham's encampment is Ishmael still. To-day,
the fiercest enemies of the truth of God are the aliens in our communion. These
are they who make believers in sound evangelical teaching look like strangers in
the Churches which were founded on the basis of scriptural doctrine. They make
us foreigners in our own land. They are lenient to all manner of heresy; but the
believer in the doctrines of grace they sneer at as old-fashioned and bigoted—a
belated mortal who ought studiously to seek out a grave and bury himself. Yet
will the man who trusts his God and believes in his covenant, be able to survive
all mockeries; for he counts the reproach of Christ greater riches than all the
treasures of Egypt. It is by no means shameful to trust God: on the contrary it
is a point of honour with good men to trust in Him who is faithful and true; and
if they have to suffer for it they do so joyfully. Gird yourselves, therefore,
with a holy courage, you who are learning through grace to live upon the promise
of God by faith. Was not the great Head of the family despised and rejected of
men? Must not the rest of the brotherhood be conformed to the First-born? If we
are made partakers of Christ's sufferings, we shall be partakers of his glory;
wherefore, let us take part and lot with the Crucified heir of all things.


========================================================================
  CHAPTER 28: 06. THE PARTING
========================================================================

VI. The Parting

"Nevertheless what saith the scripture? Cast out the bondwoman and her son: for
the son of the bondwoman shall not be heir with the son of the
freewoman."—Galatians 4:30.

ISAAC and Ishmael lived together for a time. The self-religionist and the
believer in the promise may be members of the same church for years, but they
are not agreed, and cannot be happy together, for their principles are
essentially opposed. As the believer grows in grace and enters upon his
spiritual manhood, he will be more and more disagreeable to the legalist, and it
will ultimately be seen that the two have no fellowship with one another. They
must separate, and this is the word that will be fulfilled to the Ishmaelite:
"Cast out this bondwoman and her son: for the son of this bondwoman shall not be
heir with my son, even with Isaac." Grievous as the parting may be, it will be
according to the divine will, and according to the necessities of the case. Oil
and water will not mingle, neither will the natural man's religion agree with
that which is born of the promise, and sustained by the promise. Their parting
will be only the outward result of a serious difference which always existed.
Ishmael was sent away, but he soon ceased to regret it; for he found greater
freedom with the wild tribes of the country, among whom he soon became a great
man. He prospered much, and became the father of princes. He was in his proper
sphere in the wide world; there he had honour and gained a name among its great
ones. Often it happens that the carnally religious man has many excellent habits
and ways about him; and having a desire to shine, he goes into society, and is
appreciated and becomes notable. The world is sure to love its own. The aspiring
religionist usually forsakes his first friends, and openly declares, "I have
given up the old-fashioned style of religion. The saints were all very well
while I was poor, but now I have made a fortune I feel that I must mix with a
more fashionable set of people." He does so, and has his reward. Ishmael had his
portion in this life, and never expressed a desire to share in the heavenly
covenant and its mysterious blessings. If my reader would feel freer and more at
home in society than in the church of God, let him know assuredly that he
belongs to the world, and let him not deceive himself. As his heart is, such is
he. No measure of force-work can turn Ishmael into Isaac, or a worldling into an
heir of heaven.

Outwardly, and in this present life, the heir of the promise did not appear to
have the best of it. Nor, indeed, should this be expected, since they who choose
their heritage in the future have, in fact, agreed to accept trial in the
present.

Isaac experienced certain afflictions which Ishmael never knew: he was mocked,
and he was at last laid on the altar; but nothing of the sort happened to
Ishmael. You, who like Isaac are the children of the promise, must not envy
those who are the heirs of this present life, though their lot seems easier than
your own. Your temptation is to do so; even as the Psalmist did when he was
grieved because of the prosperity of the wicked. There is in this fretting a
measure of running back from our spiritual choice: have we not agreed to take
our part in the future rather than in the present? Do we rue the bargain?
Moreover, how absurd it is to envy those who are themselves so much to be
pitied! To lose the promise is practically to lose everything; and the
self-righteous have lost it. These worldly professors have no spiritual light or
life, and they desire none. What a loss, to be in the dark and not to know it!
They have enough religion to make them respectable among men, and comfortable in
their own consciences; but this is a sorry gain if they are abominable in the
sight of God. They feel no inward fightings and wrestlings; they find no
contention of the old man against the new; and so they go through life with a
jaunty air, knowing nothing till their end come. What wretchedness to be so
besotted! Again, I say, do not envy them. Better far is the life of Isaac with
its sacrifice, than that of Ishmael with its sovereignty and wild freedom; for
all the worldling's greatness will soon be ended and leave nothing behind it but
that which will make the eternal world to be the more miserable.

Yet dream not that believers are unhappy. If in this life only we had hope we
should be miserable indeed; but the promise lights up our whole career, and
makes us truly blessed. God's smile beheld by faith gives us fulness of joy. Put
the believer's life at the greatest possible disadvantage, paint it in the
darkest colours, take away from it not only comforts but necessaries, and even
then the Christian at his worst is better than the worldling at his best. Let
Ishmael have the whole world; ay, give him as many worlds as there are stars in
the midnight sky, and we will not envy him. It is ours still to take up our
cross, and to be strangers and foreigners with God in this land, as all our
fathers were; for the promise, though it seems far off to others, we do, by
faith, realize, and embrace, and in it we find a heaven below. Abiding with God,
and with his people, we count our lot far better than that of the greatest and
most honoured of the children of this world. The prospect of our Lord's second
coming, and of our own eternal glory in fellowship with him, suffices to fill us
with content while we wait for his appearing. This difference on earth will lead
to a sad division in death. The child of the bondwoman must be cast out in
eternity as well as in time. None can enter heaven who claim it by their own
doings, or boast that they have won it by their own strength. Glory is reserved
for those who are saved by grace, and none who trust in self can enter there.
What a terrible thing it will be when those who laboured to establish their own
righteousness, and would not submit to the righteousness of Christ, shall be
driven out! How will they then envy those lowly ones who were fain to accept
pardon through the blood of Jesus! How will they discover their folly and
wickedness in having despised the gift of God by preferring their own
righteousness to that of the Son of God! As the persons who are represented by
Ishmael and Isaac are ultimately parted, so the principles upon which they rest
must never be mingled, for they can by no means be made to agree. We cannot be
saved in part by self, and in part by the promise of God. The principle and
notion of earning salvation must be expelled from the mind. Every degree and
form of it must be "cast out." If we are so unwise as to place our dependence
partly on grace and partly on merit, we shall be resting one foot on a rock and
the other on the sea, and our fall will be certain. There can be no dividing of
the work or of the glory of salvation. It must be all of grace or all of works,
all of God or all of man; but it cannot be half of one and half of the other.
Cease from the vain attempt to unite two principles which are as adverse as fire
and water. The promise, and the promise alone, must be the foundation of our
hope, and all legal notions must be sternly dismissed as irreconcilable with
salvation by grace. We must not begin in the spirit, and hope to be made perfect
in the flesh. Our religion must be all of a piece. To sow with mingled seed, or
to wear a garment of linen and woollen mixed, was forbidden to the Lord's
ancient people; and to us it is unlawful to mingle mercy and merit, grace and
debt. Whenever the notion of salvation by merit, or feeling, or ceremonies comes
in, we must cast it out without delay, though it be as dear to us as Ishmael was
to Abraham. Faith is not sight; the spirit is not the flesh; grace is not merit;
and we must never forget the distinction, lest we fall into grievous error and
miss the heritage which belongs only to the heirs according to promise.

Here is our confession of faith:—"Knowing that a man is not justified by the
works of the law, but by the faith of Jesus Christ, even we have believed in
Jesus Christ, that we might be justified by the faith of Christ, and not by the
works of the law: for by the works of the law shall no flesh be
justified.—Galatians 2:16.

Here also is the clear line of distinction as to the method of our salvation,
and we desire to keep it plain and manifest:—"Even so then at this present time
also there is a remnant according to the election of grace. And if by grace,
then is it no more of works: otherwise grace is no more grace. But if it be of
works, then is it no more grace: otherwise work is no more work."—Romans 11:5-6.

Reader, do you see this?


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  CHAPTER 29: 07.  WHOSE ARE THE PROMISES?
========================================================================

VII. Whose Are the Promises? THE Lord is ever just and good towards his
creatures: it is his nature so to be. But there was no necessity either in his
justice or in his goodness that he should make promises of grace to those who
had rebelled against him. Man has forfeited every form of claim upon his Maker,
which he may have thought he had; for he has broken the pure and holy law which
he was under bond to have obeyed. Nothing is now due to man but the reward of
his sins. If God should now deal with man upon the ground of strict justice he
must condemn and punish him. Anything in the way of favour to a guilty creature
must proceed only from the undeserved mercy and sovereign goodness of God: it
must spring spontaneously from the goodwill and pleasure of the Most High. The
promises of grace flow from the boundless love of God, and from that alone. They
could not have proceeded from any other source. No single one of the race of man
has any natural right to promises of blessing, nor can the whole world of men
deserve them. God has made promises to men of his own free will and good
pleasure, from no motive but that love which lies within himself.

He has chosen to make his promises to elect persons, who in process of time are
discovered by their exercising faith in him. Those whom God has chosen are led
by the Holy Spirit to choose God and his way of salvation by faith in Christ
Jesus. Those of the elect that come to years of discretion are led to faith in
Jesus; and all who have faith in him may conclude beyond doubt that they are of
the chosen number to whom the promises are given. To those who live and die in
unbelief there is no absolute and personal promise of God: they are not under
grace but under law, and to them belong the threatenings and not the promises.
These prefer another method of dealing to that of gracious promise, and in the
end they perish as the result of their foolish preference. The chosen of the
Lord are led to relinquish the proud way of self and merit: they take to the
road of faith, and so find rest unto their souls. To believe the word of God,
and to trust in him whom God has sent to be our Saviour may seem a small thing;
but indeed it is not so: it is the sign of election, the token of regeneration,
the mark of coming glory. So to believe that God is true as to rest one's
eternal interests upon his promise, bespeaks a heart reconciled to God, a spirit
in which the germ of perfect holiness is present. When we believe God as he is
revealed in Christ Jesus, we believe all his promises. Confidence in the Person
involves confidence in all that he speaks: hence we accept all the promises of
God as being sure and certain. We do not trust one promise and doubt another,
but we rely upon each one as true, and we believe it to be true to us so far as
it has respect to our condition and circumstances. We argue from general
statements to particular applications. He who has said that he will save those
who believe in him will save me since I believe in him; and every blessing which
he has engaged to bestow upon believers he will bestow upon me as a believer.
This is sound reasoning, and by it we justify the faith by which we live and are
comforted. Not because I deserve anything, but because God has freely promised
it to me in Christ Jesus, therefore I shall receive it: this is the reason and
ground of our hope.

One wonders at first sight that all men do not believe God. It would seem as if
this mark of divine election would be universally present; for God cannot lie,
and there is no reason to suspect him of change, or failure of ability to keep
his word. Yet, so false is the heart of man, that man doubts his Maker. He hates
his God, and therefore disbelieves him. It is the surest proof of man's natural
enmity against God that he dares to impute falsehood to one who is truth itself.
"He that believeth not God hath made him a liar; because he believeth not the
record that God gave, of his Son" (1 John 5:10).

Real, practical trust in the living God, easy as it seems to be, is a virtue
which was never practised by an unrenewed heart. The glorious atonement made by
the incarnate Son of God is worthy of the reliance of all mankind. One would
have imagined that every sinner would have washed at once in this cleansing
fountain, and without hesitation would have believed in the divine Redeemer: but
it is very far from being so. Men will not come unto Christ that they may have
life. They would rather trust in anything than in the sacrifice of Jesus. Until
the Holy Ghost works a miracle upon a man, he will not confide in the great
sacrifice which God has provided and accepted for the putting away of guilt.
Hence it is that this simple, common-place matter of faith, yet becomes the
distinguishing mark of the chosen of the Lord. No other token is so infallible:
"He that believeth on him hath everlasting life." Feelings and actions may all
serve as evidences; but the master evidence of an interest in the promise of God
is faith in him. "Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him for
righteousness": there were many other good points in the patriarch's character,
but this was the decisive one,—he believed God; indeed, this was the root of all
else that was commendable in him.

Worldly-wise men despise faith, and set it in contrast with virtuous action; but
this contrast is not fair: one might as well contrast a fountain with its
stream, or the sun with its own heat. If true faith be the mother of holiness,
let the mother grace have praise because of its offspring, and let it not be
contrasted therewith. Such unfair reasoning comes of wanton malice: if men loved
good works as much as they pretend to do, they would love the faith which
produces them.

God loves faith because it honours him, and also because it leads to acts of
obedience to him, which obedience includes love to our fellow-men. There is more
in faith than meets the eye. It is in one aspect the greatest of all good works,
even as our Lord Jesus teaches us. The Jews said to him (John 6:28-29), "What
shall we do, that we might work the works of God? "They would fain perform
godlike works, works above all others approved of the Lord. Jesus answered them,
"This is the work of God, that ye believe on him whom he hath sent." As much as
to say—the most divinely approved work possible to you, is to believe in the
Messiah. To trust in the Lord Jesus is the climax of virtue. Proud men may
sneer, but this statement is true. "Without faith it is impossible to please
God;" but "he that believeth in him is not condemned." The promise is made to
him that believes the promise, and to him it shall be fulfilled. He who embraces
the promise is embraced by the promise. He who accepts Christ is accepted in
Christ. He who truly believes is surely saved.

Reader, do you believe your God?


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  CHAPTER 30: 08. THE PROMISE A FREE GIFT
========================================================================

VIII. The Promise a Free Gift "Whereby are given unto us exceeding great and
precious promises."—2 Peter 1:4.

OBSERVE that word "given" Peter says, "Whereby are given unto us exceeding great
and precious promises." We are beholden for everything to the gift of God. We
live upon divine charity. All that we have we have received as a gift, and all
we are to have must come in the same way. "The wages of sin is death, but the
gift of God is eternal life." We are unable to earn anything, but God is able to
give all things. Salvation must be all a gift, a free gift, an undeserved gift,
a spontaneous gift of divine love. The promise of salvation is of the same
nature. "It is more blessed to give than to receive"; and he that is most blest
of all, the ever-blessed God, delights to give. It is as much his nature to give
as it is the nature of the sun to shine, or of a river to flow. How blessed we
are in being receivers! This is emphasized greatly, when we reflect how
necessary it is that we should receive; for the things that we need are such
that if we do not obtain them we are lost now, and lost for ever. We are without
life, without light, without hope, and without peace, if we are without God. If
God does not give to us according to the riches of his grace, we are then worse
than naked, and poor, and miserable; we are utterly and altogether undone. It is
not possible that we should deserve such rich gifts. Even if we could deserve
anything, these must come to us without money and without price. A promise from
God must be a boon of grace: we cannot claim that God should promise us his
favour, and the priceless boons which are wrapped up in it. This teaches us what
posture to take up. Pride ill becomes dependants. He who lives upon gifts should
be humble and grateful. We are beggars at the door of mercy. At the beautiful
gate of the temple we sit down every day to ask an alms, not of the worshippers,
but of him whom angels worship. As often as our Lord passes by, we ask and he
gives; nor are we surprised that we receive from his love; for he has promised
to bestow great mercies. He taught us to say, "Give us this day our daily
bread," and therefore we are neither ashamed nor afraid to ask all things from
him. Ours is a life of dependence, and we delight to have it so. It is sweet to
take all things from the hands of our crucified Lord. Happy is the poverty which
leads us to be rich in Christ. We earn nothing, and yet receive everything,
thrice blest in being hourly partakers of the gift of God. "Whereby axe given
unto us exceeding great and precious promises."

Beloved, this teaching as to the promise coming of pure gift should be
exceedingly encouraging to all who feel their lost estate, and own that they are
spiritually bankrupt. To such it is a word of good cheer, that everything is
freely given to us of God: why should he not give to them as well as to other
needy ones? Those of us who rejoice in God have received all things as a free
gift; why should not others receive the like? They say," There is nothing freer
than a gift": why should not my reader receive as well as myself? To one who is
willing to give, poverty, on the part of the receiver, is a recommendation
instead of an obstacle. Come, then, you who are without merit, Christ will be
your merit. Come, you that have no righteousness, he will be your righteousness.
Come, you who are as full of sin as an egg is full of meat, and the pardoning
Lord will put away your sin. Come, you who are utterly forlorn, and be made rich
in Jesus. The trade of a mendicant will suit you, and you will prosper in it;
for I see you have a cruel hunger, and an empty wallet. He that cannot dig
should not be ashamed to beg. A beggar needs no stock-in-trade. "Old shoes and
clouted," rags worn and foul—these form a fit livery for a beggar. Are you not
dressed in this fashion spiritually? The poorer the wretch, the more welcome is
he at the door of divine charity. The less you have of your own, the more
welcome you are to him who giveth freely and upbraideth not.

"Come, ye needy, come and welcome, God's free bounty glorify;

True belief, and true repentance, Every grace that brings us nigh,

Without money, Come to Jesus Christ and buy."

Yes, it is all a gift. This is the gospel that we are sent to preach to you—"God
so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth
in him should not perish, but have everlasting life." "This is the record, that
God hath given to us eternal life, and this life is in his Son" (1 John 5:11).
On God's part it is all giving; on our part it is all receiving. The promise is
already made, and freely made: it will be fulfilled, and freely fulfilled. God
does not begin with giving, and then go on to charging a price. No commission is
payable upon receipt of his grace. He does not ask or receive a farthing; his
love is altogether a gift. As a gift you may accept his promise: he will not
degrade himself by listening to any other terms. The word given in the text is a
plain invitation to the poorest of the poor. Oh that they would make bold to
avail themselves of it! The great bell is ringing, ringing that all who will to
come to the great table of infinite liberality may hear it and draw near.
Freely, according to the riches of his grace, doth God promise salvation and
eternal life to all who believe on his Son, Jesus Christ. His promise is firm
and sure, why is it that men do not believe it?

Reader, what say you to the promise so freely given to all believers? Will you
believe it and live thereby?


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  CHAPTER 31: 09. THE PROMISE OF GOD A REALITY
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IX. The Promise of God a Reality

SURELY it is a wonderful thing that the eternal God should make promises to his
own creatures. Before he pledged his word he was free to do as it pleased him;
but after he has made a promise, his truth and honour bind him to do as he has
said. To him, indeed, this is no limiting of his liberty; for the promise is
always the declaration of his sovereign will and good pleasure, and it is ever
his delight to act according to his word: yet is it marvellous condescension for
the free spirit of the Lord to form for itself covenant bonds. Yet he hath done
so. The Lord has made a covenant of grace with men, in which he has confirmed
his promises', not only by pledging his word, but by giving his oath; "that by
two immutable things in which it was impossible for God to lie, we might have
strong consolation who have fled for refuge to lay hold upon the hope set before
us." In that covenant there are promises many and precious, all confirmed in
Christ Jesus, and established for ever upon the foundation of divine
truthfulness. This is our hope, even as Paul wrote to Titus: "In hope of eternal
life, which God, that cannot lie, promised before the world began."

God has promised, and on the faithfulness of that promise we build our
confidence for time and for eternity. We think it no imprudent thing to rest our
soul's salvation upon the promise of our faithful Creator. To help us so to
trust, the promises were not only spoken but written. Men say they like to have
an agreement in black and white, and we have it so in this case. "In the volume
of the book it is written." In the page of inspiration the record stands; and as
we believe our Bibles, we are bound to rely upon the promises contained therein.

It is a cause of much weakness to many that they do not treat the promises of
God as realities. If a friend makes them a promise, they regard it as a
substantial thing, and look for that which it secures; but the declarations of
God are often viewed as so many words which mean very little. This is most
dishonouring to the Lord, and very injurious to ourselves. Rest assured that the
Lord never trifles with words: "Hath he said, and will he not do it?" His
engagements are always kept. David said of the Lord's promises to him, "Yet hast
thou made with me an everlasting covenant, ordered in all things and sure." God
speaks deliberately, in due order and determination, and we may depend upon it
that his words are sure, and will be fulfilled as certainly as they are uttered.
Have any who have trusted in the Lord been confounded? Can an instance be found
in which our God has been false to his word? The ages cannot produce a single
proof that the promise-making Jehovah has run back from that which he has
spoken.

We admire fidelity in men, and we cannot imagine it to be absent from the
character of God) and therefore we may safely reckon upon his being as good as
his word. It is said of Blücher, that when he was marching to help Wellington at
Waterloo, his troops faltered. "It can't be done," said they. "It must be done,"
was his answer. "I have promised to be there—promised, do you hear? You would
not have me break my word." He was at Waterloo to good purpose: he would not be
hindered, for his promise was given. We praise such faithfulness; we should
think little of one who did not exhibit it. Shall the Lord God Almighty fail in
his promise? No, he will move heaven and earth, and shake the universe, rather
than be behindhand with his word. He seems to say—"It must be done. I have
promised—promised, do you hear?" Sooner than his promise should fail, he spared
not his own Son. Better Jesus die than the word of the Lord be broken. I say
again,—depend upon it, the Lord means what he says, and will make good every
syllable. Yet none but the chosen seed will believe him. Reader, will you?

God must be true, whoever else may deceive. If all the truth in the whole world
could be gathered together, it would be but as a drop in the bucket compared
with the truthfulness of God. The veracity of the most just of men is vanity
itself compared with the sure truth of God. The faithfulness of the most upright
of men is as a vapour, but the faithfulness of God is as a rock. If we trust in
good men we ought infinitely more to trust in the good God. Why does it seem a
singular thing to rest on the promise of God? Somehow it looks to many to be a
dreamy, sentimental, mystical business; and yet if we view it calmly it is the
most matter of fact transaction that can be. God is real: all else is shadowy.
He is certain: all else is questionable. He must keep his word, this is an
absolute necessity: how else could he be God? To believe God should be an act of
the mind which needs no effort. Even if difficulties could be suggested, the
simple and pure in heart should spontaneously say, "Let God be true and every
man a liar." To give God less than an implicit faith is to rob him of an honour
justly due to his spotless holiness. Our duty to God demands that we accept his
promise, and act upon it. Every honest man has a right to credence, and much
more does the God of truth deserve it. We ought to treat the promise as in
itself the substance of the thing promised, just as we look upon a man's cheque
or note of hand as an actual payment. Promises to pay are passed from hand to
hand in daily business, as if they were current money of the merchant; and God's
promises should be regarded in the same light. Let us believe that we have the
petitions which we have asked of him. He warrants our so doing, and promises to
reward such faith.

Let us regard the promise as a thing so sure and certain that we act upon it,
and make it to be a chief figure in all our calculations. The Lord promises
eternal life to those who believe in Jesus; therefore, if we really believe in
Jesus, let us conclude that we have eternal life, and rejoice in the great
privilege. The promise of God is our best ground of assurance; it is far more
sure than dreams and visions, and fancied revelations; and it is far more to be
trusted than feelings, either of joy or sorrow. It is written, "He that
believeth in him is not condemned." I believe in Jesus, therefore I am not
condemned. This is good reasoning, and the conclusion is certain. If God has
said so, it is so, beyond all doubt. Nothing can be more certain than that which
is declared by God himself; nothing more sure to happen, than that which he has
guaranteed by his own hand and seal. When a soul is under conviction, it
perceives the threatenings of the Lord with an intensity of belief which is very
noticeable, since its awe-stricken faith breeds within the heart overwhelming
terror and dismay. Why should not the promises be accepted with a similar
realization? Why not accepted with the same certainty? If it be made true in the
conscience that he that believeth not shall be damned, it may be accepted with
equal assurance, that he that believeth and is baptized shall be saved, since
the latter is as much the word of God as the former. The tendency of the
awakened mind, is to dwell upon the dark side of God's word, and feel the full
force of it; and at the same time to neglect the brighter portion of the record,
and cast a doubt upon it, as though it were too good to be true. This is folly.
Every blessing is too good for us to receive if we measure it by our
unworthiness; but no blessing is too good for God to give, if we judge of it by
his surpassing excellence. It is after the nature of a God of love to give
boundless blessing. If Alexander gave like a king, shall not Jehovah give like a
God?

We have sometimes heard persons say, "As sure as death"; we suggest that we
might as fitly say, "As sure as life." Gracious things are as sure as "terrible
things in righteousness." "Whosoever believeth in Jesus shall not perish, but
have everlasting life." It must be so, for God's word hath said it, and there
can be no mistake about it.

Yes, the Lord means what he says. He never mocks men with barren words and empty
sounds. Why should he deceive his creatures, and ask from them a barren
confidence? The Lord may go beyond his word in giving more than it might be
thought to mean; but he can never fall short of it. We may interpret his
promises upon the most liberal scale. He never falls below the largest rendering
which expectation can give to the promise. Faith never yet outstripped the
bounty of the Lord. Let us embrace the promise, and rejoice that it is substance
and not shadow. Let us even now rejoice in it as being the reality of that for
which we are hoping.


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  CHAPTER 32: 10. THE PECULIAR TREASURE OF BELIEVERS
========================================================================

X. The Peculiar Treasure of Believers

GOD'S promises are the peculiar treasure of believers: the substance of faith's
heritage lies in them. All the promises of our covenant God are ours to have and
to hold as our personal possession. By faith we receive and embrace them, and
they constitute our true riches. We have certain most precious things in actual
enjoyment at this present; but the capital of our wealth, the bulk of our estate
lies in the promise of our God. That which we have in hand is only the earnest
penny of the immeasurable wage of grace which is to be paid to us in due time.
The Lord graciously gives us even now all things necessary for this life and
godliness; but his choicest blessings are held in reserve for time to come.
Grace given to us from day to day is our spending money for travelling expenses
on the road home; but it is not our estate. Providential supplies are rations on
the march, but not the ultimate feast of love. We may miss these wayside meals,
but we are bound for The Supper of The Lamb. Thieves may rob us of our ready
cash; but our peculiar treasure is hid with Christ in God beyond all fear of
loss. The hand which bled to make this treasure ours is keeping it for us.

It is a great joy to have a full assurance of our interest in the promises: but
this joyful feeling we may lose, and we may find it hard to get it again, and
yet the eternal inheritance will be quite as truly ours. It is as though a man
should have in his hand a fair copy of his title-deeds, and should much delight
himself in reading it until by some mischance his copy is stolen or mislaid. The
loss of his writings is not the loss of his rights. His comfortable reading of
the title-deed is suspended, but his claim to his property is not shaken. The
covenant promise is entailed upon every joint-heir with Christ, and there is no
such thing as the breaking of this entail. Many an event may tend to shake the
believer's sense of security, but "the promise is sure to all the seed." Our
greatest possession lies not in any present comfort or confidence which we
receive from the promise, but in the promise itself, and in the glorious
heritage which it secures to us. Our inheritance lies not on this side Jordan.
Our city of habitation is not within the borders of the present: we see it from
afar, but we wait for its full enjoyment in that illustrious day when our
covenant Head shall be revealed in his glory, and all his people with him. God's
providence is our earthly pension; but God's promise is our heavenly heritage.
Did it ever occur to you to enquire why the way of God's dealing with his chosen
should be by promises? He could have bestowed his blessings at once, and without
giving us notice of his intention. In this way he would have obviated the
necessity of a covenant concerning them. There was no necessity in the nature of
things for this plan of promising. The Lord might have given us all the mercies
we needed, without pledging himself to do so. God, with his great strength of
will, and firmness of purpose, could have secretly resolved in himself to do all
that he does unto believers without having made them the confidants of his
divine counsels. Many a decree hath he kept secret from the foundations of the
world; why, then, hath he revealed his purposes of blessing? Why is it that his
dealings with his people from the gate of Eden till now have been upon the
footing of publicly expressed promises? Does not the question answer itself? In
the first place, we could not have been believers if there had not been a
promise in which to believe. If the system of salvation is to be by faith, a
promise must be made upon which faith can exercise itself. The plan of salvation
by faith is selected because it is most suitable to the principle of grace; and
this involves the giving of promises, that faith may have both food and
foundation. Faith without a promise would be a foot without ground to stand
upon; and such a faith, if faith it could be called, would be unworthy of the
plan of grace. Faith being chosen as the great evangelical command, the promise
becomes an essential part of the gospel dispensation.

Moreover, it is a charming thought that our good God designedly gives us
promises of good things that we may enjoy them twice; first by faith, and then
by fruition. He gives twice by giving by promise; and we also receive twice in
embracing the promise by faith. The time for the fulfilment of many a promise is
not by-and-by; but by faith we realize the promise, and the foreshadowing of the
expected blessing fills our souls with the benefit long before it actually
comes. We have an instance of this upon a large scale in Old Testament saints.
The great promise of the seed in whom the nations should be blessed was the
ground of faith, the foundation of hope, and the cause of salvation to thousands
of believers before the Son of God actually appeared among men. Did not our Lord
say, "Abraham saw my day: he saw it, and was glad"? The great father of the
faithful saw the day of Christ through the telescope of God's promise, by the
eye of faith; and though Abraham did not obtain the fulfilment of that promise,
but fell asleep before the coming of the Lord, as did Isaac, and Jacob, and many
others of the saints, yet he had Christ to trust in, Christ to rejoice in, and
Christ to love and serve. Before he was born in Bethlehem, or offered upon
Calvary, Jesus was so seen of the faithful as to make them glad. The promise
gave them a Saviour before the Saviour actually appeared. So is it with us at
this time: by means of the promise we enter into possession of things not seen
as yet. By anticipation we make the coming blessing present to us. Faith
obliterates time, annihilates distance, and brings future things at once into
its possession, The Lord has not as yet given us to join the hallelujahs of
heaven: we have not yet passed through the gates of pearl, nor have we trodden
the streets of transparent gold; but the promise of such felicity lights up the
gloom of our affliction, and yields us immediate foretastes of glory. We triumph
by faith before our hands actually grasp the palm. We reign with Christ by faith
before our heads are encircled with our unfading coronets. Many and many a time
we have seen the dawn of heaven while we have beheld light breaking from the
promise. When faith has been vigorous we have climbed where Moses stood and
gazed upon the land which floweth with milk and honey; and then, when Atheist
has declared that there is no Celestial City, we have answered, "Did we not see
it from the Delectable Mountains?" We have seen enough by means of the promise
to make us quite sure of the glory which the Lord hath prepared for them that
love him; and thus we have obtained our first draught of the promised bliss, and
found therein a sure pledge of our full and final enjoyment of it. Do you not
think that the promise also is intended to lead us constantly away from the
things that are seen, onward and upward to the spiritual and the unseen? The man
who lives on the promise of God has risen into quite another atmosphere than
that which oppresses us in these low-lying vales of daily life. "It is better,!'
says one, "to trust in the Lord than to put confidence in men. It is better to
trust in the Lord than to put confidence in princes." And so, indeed, it is; for
it is more spiritual, more noble, more inspiring. We need to be raised to this
elevated trust by divine power; for our soul naturally cleaveth unto the dust.
Alas! we are hampered by our idolatrous desire to see, and touch, and handle: we
trust our senses, but have not sense enough to trust our God. The same spirit
which led Israel to cry in the wilderness, "Make us gods to go before us," leads
us to sigh for something tangible by flesh and blood, whereon our confidence may
take hold. We hunger for proofs, tokens, and evidences, and will not accept the
divine promise as better and surer than all visible signs. Thus we pine away in
hungering for tokens and evidences which are visible, till we are driven to try
the better and surer things which are invisible. Oh, it is a blessed thing for a
child of God to be made to quit the sand of things temporal for the rock of
things eternal, by being called upon to walk by the rule of the promise!

Furthermore, the promises are to our hearts a help to the realization of the
Lord himself. The child of God, when he believes the promise, is brought to feel
that God is, and that he is the rewarder of them that diligently seek him. Our
tendency is to get away from a real God. We live and move in the region of
materialism, and we are apt to be enthralled by its influences. We feel these
bodies to be real when we have pain in them, and this world to be real when we
are weighted with its crosses: yet the body is a poor tent, and the world a mere
bubble. These visible things are unsubstantial, but they appear sadly solid to
us: what we need is to know the invisible to be quite as real as that which is
seen, and even more so. We need a living God in this dying world, and we must
have him truly near us, or we shall fail. The Lord is training his people to
perceive himself: the promise is part of this educational process. When the Lord
gives us faith, and we rest on his promise, then are we brought face to face
with him. We ask, "Who gave this promise? Who is to fulfil this promise?" and
our thoughts are thus led into the presence of the glorious Jehovah. We feel how
necessary he is to the whole system of our spiritual life; and how truly he
enters into it, so that in him we live, and move, and have our being. If the
promise cheers us, it is only because there is God at the back of it; for the
mere words of the promise are nothing to us except as they come from the lips of
God who cannot lie, and except as they are wrought out by that hand which cannot
fail. The promise is the forecast of the divine purpose, the shadow of the
coming blessing; in fact, it is the token of God's own nearness to us. We are
cast upon God for the fulfilment of his engagements, and that is one of his
reasons for dealing with us after the method of promise. Perhaps if the Lord had
dropped our mercies at our door without a previous hint of their coming, we
should not have cared to know whence they came. If he had sent them with
unbroken regularity, even as he makes his sun to rise every morning, we might
have slighted them as common results of natural laws, and so have forgotten God
because of the punctuality of his providence. Certainly we should have lacked
that grand test of the being and loving-kindness of God which we now receive as
we read the promise, accept it by faith, plead it in prayer, and in due season
see it fulfilled. That regularity of divine bounty which ought to sustain and
increase faith is often the means of weakening it. He whose bread comes to him
by a government annuity or a quarterly rent, is tempted to forget that God has
any hand in it. It ought not to be so; but through the hardness of our hearts
such an ill result does frequently follow from the constancy of a gracious
providence.

I should not wonder if those Israelites who were born in the wilderness, and had
gathered manna every morning for years, had also ceased to wonder at it, or to
see the hand of the Lord in it. Shameful stupidity! but, ah, how common! Many a
person has lived from hand to mouth, and seen the hand of the Lord in the gift
of every morsel of bread: at last by God's goodness he has prospered in this
world, and obtained a regular income, which he has received without care and
trouble, and shortly he has come to look at it as the natural result of his own
industry, and has no longer praised the loving-kindness of the Lord. To be
living without the conscious presence of the Lord is a horrible state of
affairs. Supplied, but not by God! Sustained without the hand of God! It were
better to be poor, or sick, or exiled, and thus to be driven to approach our
heavenly Father. To avoid our coming under the curse of forgetting God, the Lord
is pleased to put his choicest blessings into connection with his own promises,
and to call forth our faith in reference to them. He will not allow his mercies
to become veils to hide his face from the eyes of our love; but he makes them
windows through which he looks upon us. The Promiser is seen in the promise, and
we watch to see his hand in the performance; thus are we saved from that natural
atheism which lurks within the heart of man.

I think it well to repeat that we are put under the régime of promise in order
that we may grow in faith. How could there be faith without a promise? How
growing faith without grasping more and more of the promise? We are made to
remember in the hour of need, that God has said, "Call upon me in the day of
trouble, and I will deliver thee." Faith believes this word, calls upon God, and
finds herself delivered: thus she is strengthened, and made to glorify the Lord.

Sometimes faith does not find the promise fulfilled at the moment; but she has
to wait a while. This is fine exercise for her, and serves to test her sincerity
and force: this test brings assurance to the believer, and fills him with
comfort. By-and-by the answer is given to prayer, the promised boon is bestowed,
faith is crowned with victory, and glory is given to God; but meanwhile the
delay has produced the patience of hope, and made every mercy to wear a double
value. Promises afford training-ground for faith: these are poles and
leaping-bars for the athletic exercise of our young faith, by the use of which
it grows to be so strong that it can break through a troop, or leap over a wall.
When our confidence in God is firm we laugh at impossibility, and cry, "It shall
be done"; but this could not be if there were not an infallible promise
wherewith faith could gird itself.

Those promises which as yet are unfulfilled are precious helps to our advance in
the spiritual life. We are encouraged by exceeding great and precious promises
to aspire to higher things. The prospect of good things to come strengthens us
to endure, and to press forward. You and I are like little children who are
learning to walk, and are induced to take step after step by an apple being held
out to them. We are persuaded to try the trembling legs of our faith by the
sight of a promise. Thus we are drawn to go a step nearer to our God. The little
one is very apt to cling to a chair, it is hard to get it to quit all hold, and
venture upon its feet; but at last it becomes daring enough for a tiny trip,
which it ends at its mother's knees. This little venture leads to another and
another, till it runs alone. The apple plays a great part in the training of the
babe, and so does the promise in the education of faith. Promise after promise
have we received, till now, I trust, we can give up crawling on the earth, and
clinging to the things which rest upon it, and can commit ourselves to the walk
of faith. The promise is a needful instrument in the education of our souls in
all manner of spiritual graces and actions. How often have I said, "My Lord, I
have received much from thee, blessed be thy name for it; but there is yet a
promise more which I have not enjoyed; therefore I will go forward till I attain
its fulfilment! The future is an unknown country, but I enter it with thy
promise, and expect to find in it the same goodness and mercy which have
followed me hitherto; yea, I look for greater things than these." Nor must I
forget to remind you, that the promise is part of the economy of our spiritual
condition here below because it excites prayer. What is prayer but the promise
pleaded? A promise is, so to speak, the raw material of prayer. Prayer irrigates
the fields of life with the waters which are stored up in the reservoirs of
promise. The promise is the power of prayer. We go to God, and we say to him,
"Do as thou hast said.

O Lord, here is thy word; we beseech thee fulfil it." Thus the promise is the
bow by which we shoot the arrows of supplication. I like in my time of trouble
to find a promise which exactly fits my need, and then to put my finger on it,
and say, "Lord, this is thy word; I beseech thee to prove that it is so, by
carrying it out in my case.

I believe that this is thine own writing; and I pray thee make it good to my
faith." I believe in plenary inspiration, and I humbly look to the Lord for a
plenary fulfilment of every sentence that he has put on record. I delight to
hold the Lord to the very words that he has used, and to expect him to do as he
has said, because he has said it. It is a great thing to be driven to prayer by
necessity; but it is a better thing to be drawn to it by the expectation which
the promise arouses. Should we pray at all if God did not find us an occasion
for praying, and then encourage us with gracious promises of an answer? As it
is, in the order of providence we are tried, and then we try the promises; we
are brought to spiritual hunger, and then we are fed on the word which
proceedeth out of the mouth of God. By the system which the Lord follows with
his chosen we are kept in constant intercourse with him, and are not allowed to
forget our heavenly Father: we are often at the throne of grace, blessing God
for promises fulfilled, and pleading promises on which we rely. We pay
innumerable visits to the divine dwelling-place, because there is a promise to
plead, and a God waiting to be gracious. Is not this an order of things for
which to be grateful? Ought we not to magnify the Lord that he doth not pour
upon us showers of unpromised blessings, but he enhances the value of his
benefits by making them the subjects of his promises and the objects of our
faith?


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  CHAPTER 33: 11. THE VALUATION OF THE PROMISES
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XI. The Valuation of the Promises "Whereby are given unto us exceeding great and
precious promises."—2 Peter 1:4.

WE have thought upon the promises as our treasure: it is time that we should
take a survey of them, and calculate their value. Since the promises are our
estate, let us form a correct estimate of our wealth: possibly we may not fully
know how rich we are. It will be a pity to pine in poverty from ignorance of our
large property. May the Holy Spirit help us to form a due valuation of the
riches of grace and glory reserved for us in the covenant of promise! The
apostle Peter speaks of the promises as "exceeding great and precious." They do
indeed exceed all things with which they can be compared. None ever promised as
God has done. Kings have promised even to the half of their kingdoms; but what
of that? God promised to give his own Son, and even his own Self, to his people;
and he did it. Princes draw a line somewhere, but the Lord sets no bounds to the
gifts which he ordains for his chosen. The promises of God not only exceed all
precedent, but they also exceed all imitation. Even with God himself for an
example, none have been able to vie with him in the language of liberality. The
promises of Jehovah are as much above all other promises as the heavens are
above the earth.

They also exceed all expectation. He does for us "exceeding abundantly above all
that we ask or even think." Nobody could have imagined that the Lord would have
made such promises as he has made: they surpass the dreams of romance. Even the
most sanguine hopes are left far behind, and the loftiest conceptions are
outdone. The Bible must be true, for it could not have been invented: the
promises contained in it are greater for quantity and better for quality than
the most expectant could have looked for. God surprises us with the surpassing
fulness of his cheering words: he overwhelms us with favours till, like David,
we sit down in wonder, and cry, "Whence is this to me?" The promises exceed all
measurement: there is an abyss of depth in them as to meaning, a heaven of
height in them as to excellence, and an ocean of breadth in them as to duration.
We might say of every promise, "It is high: I cannot attain to it." As a whole,
the promises exhibit the fulness and all-sufficiency of God: like God himself
they fill all things. Unbounded in their range, they are everywhere about us,
whether we wake or sleep, go forth or return. They cover the whole of life from
the cradle to the tomb. A sort of omnipresence may be ascribed to them; for they
surround us in all places, and at all times. They are our pillow when we fall
asleep, and when we awake they are still with us. "How precious also are thy
thoughts unto me, O God! How great is the sum of them!" "Exceeding" all
conception and calculation; we admire them and adore their Giver, but we can
never measure them. The promises even exceed all experience. Those men of God
who have known the Lord for fifty or sixty years have never yet extracted the
whole of the marrow from his promise. Still it might be said, "the arrow is
beyond thee." Somewhat better and deeper yet remains to be searched out in the
future. He who dives deepest by experience into the depths of the divine
promises is fully aware that there is yet a lower depth of grace and love
unfathomable. The promise is longer than life, broader than sin, deeper than the
grave, and higher than the clouds. He that is most acquainted with the golden
book of promise is still a new beginner in its study: even the ancients of
Israel find that this volume passeth knowledge.

Certainly I need not say that the promises exceed all expression. If all the
tongues of men and of angels were given me, I could not tell you how great are
the promises of God. They exceed not only one language, but all languages: they
surpass the glowing praises of all the enthusiasts that have ever spoken. Even
angels before the throne still desire to look into these marvels, for they
cannot yet reach the mystery—the length, and breadth, and height. In Christ
Jesus everything exceeds description; and the promises in him exhaust the force
of all speech, human or divine. Vain is it for me to attempt the impossible.

Exceeding "great" Peter says they are; and he knew right well. They come from a
great God, they assure us of great love, they come to great sinners, they work
for us great results, and deal with great matters. They are as great as
greatness itself; they bring us the great God, to be our God for ever and ever.
God's first promise was that in which he engaged to give us his Son. We are wont
to say, "Thanks be unto God for his unspeakable gift," but let not the words
glide too easily over the tongue. For God to give his Only-begotten Son is
beyond all conception a great deed of love: indeed, "great" seems too little a
word to describe such a miracle of love. When the Lord had given his Son, freely
delivering him up for us all—what then? He promised to give the Holy Ghost, the
Comforter, to abide with us for ever. Can we measure the value of that great
promise? The Holy Ghost came down at Pentecost, in fulfilment of that ancient
prophecy: was not that marvellous descent an exceeding great and precious gift?
Remember that the Holy Spirit works in us all those graces which prepare us for
the society of heaven. Glory be to God for this visitation of boundless grace!

What next? Our Lord has given us now the promise that he will "come again a
second time without a sin offering unto salvation." Can all the saints put
together fully measure the greatness of the promise of the Second Advent? This
means infinite felicity for saints. What else has he promised? Why, that because
he lives we shall live also. We shall possess an immortality of bliss for our
souls; we shall enjoy also a resurrection for our bodies; we shall reign with
Christ; we shall be glorified at his right hand. Promises fulfilled and promises
unfulfilled, promises for time and promises for eternity—they are indeed so
great that it is impossible to conceive of their being greater.

"What more can he say than to you he hath said?

You who unto Jesus for refuge have fled."

O ye whose minds are trained to lofty thought, tell me your estimate of the
faithful promises! I perceive a promise of the pardon of sin. O ye forgiven
ones, declare the greatness of this boon! There is the promise of adoption.
Children of God, you begin to know what manner of love the Father hath bestowed
on you in this; tell out your joy! There is the promise of help in every time of
need. Tried ones, you know how the Lord sustains and delivers his chosen;
proclaim the largeness of his grace! There is the promise that as your day your
strength shall be. You that are working hard for Christ, or bearing his cross
from day to day, you feel how exceeding great is that promise of sure support.
What a word is this: "No good thing will he withhold from them that walk
uprightly"! What a sentence is this: "All things work together for good to them
that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose"! Who can
estimate the breadth of such a gracious assurance? No, you need not take that
foot-rule from your pocket: it will not serve you here. If you could take the
distance of a fixed star as your base, all reckoning would still be impossible.
All the chains that ever measured the acres of the wealthy are useless here. A
certain millionaire glories that his estate reaches from sea to sea; but no
ocean can bound the possessions secured to us by the promise of our faithful God
The theme is so exceeding great that it exceeds my power of expression, and
therefore I forbear. The verse, upon which we are now thinking, speaks of
"exceeding great and precious promises? Greatness and preciousness seldom go
together; but in this instance they are united in an exceeding degree. When the
Lord opens his mouth to make a promise, it is sure to be worthy of him: he
speaks words of exceeding power and richness. Instead of trying to speak of the
preciousness of the promises doctrinally, I will fall back upon the experience
of those who have tried and proved them.

Beloved, how precious the promises, are to the poor and needy! They that know
their spiritual poverty discern the value of the promise which meets their case.
How precious, also, are the promises, to those who have enjoyed the fulfilment
of them! We can go back in memory to times and seasons when we were brought low,
and the Lord helped us according to his word. Even before he brought us up out
of the horrible pit, we were kept from sinking in the deep mire by looking
forward to the time when he would appear for our rescue. His promise kept us
from dying of hunger long before we reached the feast of love. In the
expectation of future trial our confidence is in the promise. Thus it is very
precious to us even before it is actually fulfilled. The more we believe the
promise, the more we find in it to believe. So precious is the word of the Lord
to us, that we could part with everything we have rather than throw away a
single sentence of it. We cannot tell which promise of the Lord we may next
need: that which we have hardly noticed may yet turn out at a certain moment to
be essential to our life. Thank God, we are not called to part with any one of
the jewels from the breastplate of Holy Scripture: they are all yea and amen in
Christ Jesus to the glory of God by us!

How precious are the promises when we lie sick, gazing into eternity by the
month together, sorely tried and tempted through pain and weariness! All
depressing circumstances lose their power for evil when our faith takes firm
hold upon the promises of God, How sweet to feel I have my head on the promise,
and my heart on the promise: I rest on the truth of the Most High! Not on
earthly vanity, but on heavenly verity, do I repose. There is nothing to be
found elsewhere comparable to this perfect rest. The pearl of peace is found
among the precious promises. That is precious indeed which can support dying
men, and cause them to pass into eternity with as much delight as if they were
going to a marriage-feast. That which lasts for ever, and lasts good for ever,
is most precious. That which brings all things with it, and hath all things in
it,—that is precious indeed; and such is the promise of God.

If such be the greatness and preciousness of the promises, let us joyfully
accept and believe them. Shall I urge the child of God to do this? No, I will
not so dishonour him; surely he will believe his own Father! Surely, surely, it
ought to be the easiest thing in the world for the sons and daughters of the
Most High to believe in him who has given them power to become the children of
God! My brethren, let us not stagger at the promise through unbelief, but
believe up to the hilt!

Furthermore, let us know the promises. Should we" not carry them at our fingers'
ends? Should we not know them better than anything else? The promises should be
the classics of believers. If you have not read the last new book, and have not
heard the last Act of the Government, yet know right well what God the Lord hath
said, and look to see his word made good. We ought to be so versed in Scripture
as always to have at the tip of our tongue the promise which most exactly meets
our case. We ought to be transcripts of Scripture: the divine promise should be
as much written upon our hearts as upon the pages of the Book. It is a sad pity
that any child of God should be unaware of the existence of the royal promise
which would enrich him. It is pitiful for any one of us to be like the poor man,
who had a fortune left him, of which he knew nothing, and therefore he went on
sweeping a crossing, and begging for pence. What is the use of having an anchor
at home when your ship is in a storm at sea? What avails a promise which you
cannot remember so as to plead it in prayer? Whatever else you do not know, do
endeavour to be familiar with those words of the Lord which are more needful to
our souls than bread to our bodies.

Let us also make use of the promises. A little while ago, a friend gave me a
cheque for certain charities, and he said to me, "Be sure that you pay it into
the bank to-day." You may rest assured that this was done. I do not keep cheques
to look at, and play with: they go to the banker's, and the cash is received and
expended. The precious promises of our great God are expressly intended to be
taken to him, and exchanged for the blessings which they guarantee. Prayer takes
the promise to the Bank of Faith, and obtains the golden blessing. Mind how you
pray. Make real business of it. Let it never be a dead formality. Some people
pray a long time, but do not get what they are supposed to ask for, because they
do not plead the promise in a truthful, businesslike way. If you were to go into
a bank, and stand an hour talking to the clerk, and then come out again without
your cash, what would be the good of it? If I go to a bank, I pass my cheque
across the counter, take up my money, and go about my business: that is the best
way of praying, Ask for what you want, because the Lord has promised it. Believe
that you have the blessing, and go forth to your work in full assurance of it.
Go from your knees singing, because the promise is fulfilled: thus will your
prayer be answered. It is not the length of your prayer, but the strength of
your prayer which wins with God; and the strength of prayer lies in your faith
in the promise which you have pleaded before the Lord.

Lastly, talk about the promises. Tell the King's household what the King has
said. Never keep God's lamps under bushels. Promises are proclamations; exhibit
them on the wall; read them aloud at the market-cross. Oh, that our conversation
were more often sweetened with the precious promises of God! After dinner we
often sit for half-an-hour, and pull our ministers to pieces, or scandalize our
neighbours. How often is this the Sunday's amusement! It would be far better if
we said, "Now, friend, quote a promise," and if the other replied, "And you
mention a promise too." Then let each one speak according to his own personal
knowledge concerning the Lord's fulfilment of those promises, and let every one
present tell the story of the Lord's faithfulness to him. By such holy converse
we should warm our own hearts, and gladden one another's spirits, and the
Sabbath would thus be rightly spent.

Business men speak of their trade, travellers of their adventures, and farmers
of their crops; should not we abundantly utter the memory of the Lord's
goodness, and talk of his faithfulness? If we did so, we should all endorse
Peter's statement, that our God has given unto us "exceeding great and precious
promises?


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  CHAPTER 34: 12. THE LORD’S PROMISE — THE RULE OF HIS GIVING
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XII. The Lord's Promise—The Rule of His Giving "And the Lord gave Solomon
wisdom, as he promised him."—1 Kings 5:12.

HOW the Lord wrought wisdom in Solomon 1 do not know; but he promised that he.
would give him wisdom, and he kept his word. The more you think of this the more
remarkable will the fact appear. Solomon was not born under the most hopeful
circumstances for wisdom. As the darling child of a somewhat aged father, he was
highly likely to be spoiled. As a young man who came to a throne before he was
at all fitted for it in the course of nature, he was very likely to have made
great blunders and mistakes. As a man of strong animal passions, which in the
end overpowered him, he seemed more likely to prove a profligate than a
philosopher. As a person possessing great wealth, unlimited power, and unvarying
prosperity, he had little of that trying experience by which men acquire wisdom.
Who were his teachers? Who taught him to be wise? His penitent mother may have
set before him much of sound morality and religion, but she could never have
imparted to him the eminent degree of wisdom which raised him above all other
men and set him upon the pinnacle of renown. He knew more than others, and
therefore could not have borrowed his wisdom from them. Sages sat at his feet,
and his fame brought pilgrims from the ends of the earth: none could have been
his tutors, since he surpassed them all. How did this man rise to absolute
preeminence in wisdom, so as to make his name throughout all time the synonym
for a wise man?

It is a very mysterious process this creation of a master mind. Who shall give a
young man wisdom? You can impart knowledge to him, but not wisdom. No tutor, no
master, no divine, can give another man wisdom: he has much ado to get a little
of it for himself. Yet God gave Solomon largeness of heart as the sands of the
sea, and wisdom unrivalled; for God can do all things. By operations known only
to himself, the Lord produced in the young king a capacity for observation,
reasoning, and prudent action, seldom if ever equalled. We have often admired
the wisdom of Solomon; I invite you still more to admire the wisdom of Jehovah,
by whom Solomon's marvellous genius was produced. The reason why the Lord
wrought this wonder upon Solomon was because he had promised to do it, and he is
sure to keep his word. Many another text would serve my turn as well as this
one, for all I desire to bring out of it is this—that whatever God has promised
to anyone, he will surely give it to him. Whether it be wisdom to Solomon, or
grace to my reader, if the Lord has made the promise, he will not allow it to be
a dead letter. The God who performed his word in this very remarkable instance,
where the matter was so entirely beyond human power, and was surrounded with
such disadvantageous circumstances, will accomplish his promise in other cases,
however difficult and mysterious the process of performance may be. God will
always keep his word to the letter; yea, and he will usually go beyond what the
letter seems to mean. In this instance, while he gave Solomon wisdom, he also
added to him riches, and a thousand other things which did not appear in the
compact. "Seek ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these
things shall be added unto you." He who makes promises about infinite blessings,
will throw in every-day things as if they were of small account, and were given
in as a matter of course, like the grocer's paper and string with which he packs
up our purchases. From the case of Solomon, and thousands of a similar kind, we
learn first that the rule of God's giving is—as he has promised. The page of
history sparkles with instances. The Lord promised to our fallen parents that
the seed of the woman should bruise the serpent's head: behold, that wondrous
Seed of the woman has appeared, and has gotten for himself, and for us, the
glorious victory of our redemption! In the fulfilment of that one promise we
have security for the keeping of all the rest. When God promised to Noah that
entering into the ark he would be safe, he found it so. Not one of those
innumerable waves which destroyed the antediluvian world, could break into his
place of safety. When God said to Abraham that he would give him a seed, and a
land which should be the possession of that seed, it seemed impossible; but
Abraham believed God, and in due time rejoiced to behold Isaac, and to see in
him the promised heir. When the Lord promised to Jacob that he would be with him
and do him good, he kept his word, and gave him the deliverance for which he
wrestled at the brook Jabbok. That long-slumbering promise, that the seed of
Israel should possess the land which flowed with milk and honey; it did seem as
if it would never be accomplished, when the tribes were reduced to slavery in
Egypt, and Pharaoh held them with iron grip, and would not let them go. But God,
who undertook for his people, brought them out with a high hand, and with an
outstretched arm, on the very day in which he promised to rescue them. He
divided the Red Sea also, and he led his people through the wilderness, for he
assured them that he would do so. He clave the Jordan in twain, and he drove out
the Canaanites before his people, and gave to Israel the land for their
inheritance, even as he had promised. The histories of the Lord's faithfulness
are so many, that time would fail us to repeat them all. God's words have always
in due time been justified by God's acts. God has dealt with men according to
his promise. Whenever they have taken hold upon the promise, and said, "Do as
thou hast said," God has responded to the plea, and proved that it is no vain
thing to trust him. Throughout all time it has been God's unvarying rule to keep
his word to the letter, and to the moment.

"This is big talk" says one; then we will descend to smaller talk. It is God's
way to keep his promise to each individual. We ourselves are living witnesses
that God forgets not his word. Tens of thousands of us can testify that we have
trusted in him and have never been confounded. I was once a broken-hearted
sinner, cowering down beneath the black cloud of almighty wrath, guilty and
self-condemned, and I felt that if I were banished for ever from Jehovah's
presence, I could not say a word against the justice of the sentence. When I
read in his word, "If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us
our sins," I went to him. Tremblingly I resolved to test his promise. I
acknowledged my transgressions unto the Lord, and he forgave the iniquity of my
sin. I am telling no idle tale, for the deep, restful peace which came to my
heart in the moment of forgiveness was such that it seemed as if I had begun a
new life; as, indeed, I had. This is how it came about: I heard, one Sabbath
day, a poor man speak upon that promise, "Look unto me, and be ye saved, all ye
ends of the earth." I could not understand how a mere look to Christ could save
me. It seemed too simple an act to effect so great a result; but, as I was ready
to try anything, I looked—I looked to Jesus.

It was all I did. It was all I could do. I looked unto him who is set forth as a
propitiation for sin; and in a moment I saw that I was reconciled to God. I saw
that if Jesus suffered in my stead, I could not suffer too; and that if he bore
all my sin, I had no more sin to bear. My iniquity must be blotted out if Jesus
bore it in my stead, and suffered all its penalty. With that" thought there came
into my spirit a sweet sense of peace with God through Jesus Christ my Lord. The
promise was true, and I found it to be so. It happened some six-and-thirty years
ago, but I have never lost the sense of that complete salvation which I then
found, nor have I lost that peace which so sweetly dawned upon my spirit. Since
then I have never relied in vain upon a promise of God. I have been placed in
positions of great peril, have known great need, have felt sharp pain, and have
been weighted with incessant anxieties; but the Lord has been true to every line
of his word, and when I have trusted him he has carried me through everything
without a failure. I am bound to speak well of him, and I do so. To this I set
my hand and seal, without hesitation or reserve. The experience of all believers
is to much the same effect: we began our new lives of joy and peace by believing
the promise-making God, and we continue to live in the same manner. A long list
of fulfilled promises is present to our happy memories, awakening our gratitude
and confirming our confidence. We have tested the faithfulness of our God year
after year, in a great many ways, but always with the same result. We have gone
to him with promises of the common things of life, relating to daily bread, and
raiment, and children, and home; and the Lord has dealt graciously with us. We
have resorted to him concerning sickness, and slander, and doubt, and
temptation; and never has he failed us. In little things he has been mindful of
us: even the hairs of our head have been numbered. When it appeared very
unlikely that the promise could be kept, it has been fulfilled with remarkable
exactness. We have been broken down by the falseness of man, but we have exulted
and do exult in the truthfulness of God. It brings the tears into our eyes to
think of the startling ways in which Jehovah, our God, has wrought to carry out
his gracious promises.

"Thus far we prove that promise good, Which Jesus ratified with blood:

Still he is faithful, wise, and just, And still in him believers trust."

Let me freely speak to all who trust in the Lord. Children of God, has not your
heavenly Father been true to you? Is not this your constant experience, that you
are always failing, but he never fails? Well said our apostle, "Though we
believe not, he abideth faithful: he cannot deny himself." We may interpret
divine language in its broadest sense, and we shall find that the Lord's promise
is kept to the utmost of its meaning. The rule of his giving is large and
liberal: the promise is a great vessel, and the Lord fills it to overflowing. As
the Lord in Solomon's case gave him "as he promised him" so will he in every
instance so long as the world standeth. O reader! believe the promise, and thus
prove yourself to be an inheritor of it. May the Holy Spirit lead you thus to
do, for Jesus' sake!


========================================================================
  CHAPTER 35: 13. THE RULE WITHOUT EXCEPTION
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XIII. The Rule without Exception

"Blessed be the Lord, that hath given rest unto his people Israel, according to
all that he promised: there hath not failed one word of all his good promise,
which he promised by the hand of Moses his servant."—1 Kings 8:56.

GOD gives good things to men according to his promise. This is a matter of fact,
and not a mere opinion. We declare it, and defy all the world to bring any
evidence to disprove the statement.

Upon this point the writer is a personal witness. My experience has been long,
and my observation has been wide; but I have never yet met with a person who
trusted God, and found the Lord's promise fail him. I have seen many living men
sustained under heavy trials by resting in the word of the Lord, and I have also
seen many dying persons made triumphant in death by the same means; but I have
never met with a believer who has been made ashamed of his hope because of his
temporal afflictions, nor with one who on his deathbed has repented of trusting
in the Lord. All my observation points the other way, and confirms me in the
persuasion that the Lord is faithful to all who rely upon him. About this matter
I should be prepared to make solemn affirmation in a court of justice. I would
not utter a falsehood under the pretext of a pious fraud, but I would testify
upon this important subject as an honest witness without reserve or
equivocation. I never knew a man in the pangs of death lament that he trusted
the Saviour. Nay, what is more, I have never heard that such a thing has
happened anywhere at any time. If there had been such a case, the haters of the
gospel would have advertised it high and low; every street would have heard the
evil news; every preacher would have been confronted with it. We should have
been met with pamphlets at the door of every church and chapel, reporting that
such an one, who had lived a saintly life, and relied on the Redeemer's merits,
had discovered in his last hours that he had been duped, and that the doctrine
of the cross was all delusion. We challenge opponents to discover such an
instance. Let them find it among rich or poor, old or young. Let the very fiend
himself, if he can, bear witness to the failure of a single promise of the
Living God. But it has not been said that Jehovah has deceived one of his
people, and it never shall be said; for God is true to every word that he has
ever spoken.

God never stoops to a lie. The mere supposition is blasphemous. Why should he be
false? What is there about him that could cause him to break his word? It would
be contrary to his nature. How could he be God and not be just and true? He
cannot therefore violate his promise through any want of faithfulness.

Furthermore, the Omnipotent God never promises beyond his power. We frequently
intend to act according to our word, but we find ourselves mastered by
overwhelming circumstances, and our promise falls to the ground because we are
unable to perform it. It can never be so with the Almighty God, for his ability
is without limit. All things are possible with him. Our promise may have been
made in error, and we may afterwards discover that it would be wrong to do as we
have said; but God is infallible, and therefore his word will never be withdrawn
upon the ground of a mistake. Infinite wisdom has set its imprimatur upon every
promise; each word of the Lord is registered by unerring judgment, and ratified
by eternal truth. Nor can the promise fail because of an alteration in the
Divine Promiser. We change; poor, frail things that we are! But the Lord knows
no variableness, neither shadow of a turning; hence his word abideth for ever
the same. Because he changes not, his promises stand fast like the great
mountains. "Hath he said, and shall he not do it?" Our strong consolation rests
upon the immutable things of God. Nor can the word of the Lord fall to the
ground through forgetfulness on his part. With our tongues we outrun our hands;
for, although we are willing, we fail in the performing because other things
come in, and distract our attention. We forget, or we grow cold; but never is it
so with the Faithful Promiser. His most ancient promise is still fresh in his
mind, and he means it now as he did when he first uttered it. He is, in fact,
always giving the promise, since there is no time with him. The old promises of
Scripture are new promises to faith; for every word still proceedeth out of the
mouth of the Lord, to be bread for men.

Because of all this, the word of the Lord deserves all faith, both implicit and
explicit We can trust men too much, but we can never do so towards God. It is
the surest thing that has been, or that can ever be. To believe his word is to
believe what none can fairly question. Has God said it? Then so it must be.
Heaven and earth will pass away, but God's word will never pass away. The laws
of nature may be suspended: fire may cease to burn, and water to drown, for this
would involve no unfaithfulness in God; but for his word to fail would involve a
dishonouring variableness in the character and nature of the Godhead, and this
can never be. Let us set to our seal that God is true, and never suffer a
suspicion of his veracity to cross our minds. The immutable word of promise is,
and ever must be, the rule of God's giving. Consider a little, while I make a
further observation, namely, that against this no other rule can stand. With the
rule of God's promise no other law, supposed or real, can ever come into
conflict. The law of deserving is sometimes set up against it, but it cannot
prevail. "Oh," says one, "I cannot think that God can or will save me, for there
is no good thing in me!" You speak rightly, and your fear cannot be removed if
God is to act towards you upon the rule of deserving. But if you believe on his
Son Jesus, that rule will not operate, for the Lord will act towards you
according to the rule of his promise. The promise was not founded upon your
merits; it was freely made, and it will be as freely kept. If you enquire how
your ill-deservings can be met, let me remind you of Jesus who came to save you
from your sins. The boundless deservings of the Lord Jesus are set to your
account, and your terrible demerits are thereby neutralized once for all. The
law of merit would sentence you to destruction as you stand in your own proper
person; but he that believeth is not under law, but under grace; and under grace
the great Lord deals with men according to pure mercy as revealed in his
promise. Choose not to be self-righteous, or justice must condemn you; be
willing to accept salvation as a free gift bestowed through the exercise of the
sovereign prerogative of God, who says, "I will have mercy on whom I will have
mercy." Be humbly trustful in the grace of God which is revealed in Christ
Jesus, and the promise shall be richly fulfilled to you.

Neither doth the Lord deal with men according to the measure of their moral
ability. "Oh," says the seeker, "I think I might be saved if I could make myself
better, or become more religious, or exercise greater faith; but I am without
strength. I cannot believe; I cannot repent; I cannot do anything aright!"
Remember, then, that, the Gracious God has not promised to bless you according
to the measure of your ability to serve him, but according to the riches of his
grace as declared in his word. If his gifts were bestowed according to your
spiritual strength, you would get nothing; for you can do nothing without the
Lord. But as the promise is kept according to the infinity of divine grace,
there can be no question cast upon it. You need not stagger at the promise
through unbelief, but reckon that he who has promised is able also to perform.
Do not limit the Holy One of Israel by dreaming that his love is bounded by your
capacity. The volume of the river is not to be computed by the dryness of the
desert through which it flows: there is no logical proportion between the two.
With half an eye one can see that there is no calculating the extent of infinite
love by measuring human weakness. The operations of almighty grace are not
limited by mortal strength, or want of strength. God's power will keep God's
promise. It is not your weakness that can defeat God's promise, nor your
strength that can fulfil the promise: he that spoke the word will himself make
it good. It is neither your business nor mine to keep God's promises: that is
his office, and not ours. Poor helpless one, attach your heavy waggon of
incapacity to the great engine of the promise, and you will be drawn along the
lines of duty and blessing! Though you are more dead than alive, though you have
more weakness than strength, this shall not affect the certainty of the divine
engagement. The power of the promise lies in him who made the promise. Look
therefore away from self to God. If you are faint, swoon away upon the bosom of
the divine promise; if you count yourself dead, be buried in the grave where lie
the bones of a promise, and you shall be made alive as soon as you touch them.
What we can or cannot do is not the question; but everything hinges upon what
the Lord can do. It is enough for us to keep our own contracts without
attempting to keep God's promises. I should not like my fellow-man to doubt my
solvency because a beggar who lives in the next street cannot pay his debts.
Why, then, should I suspect the Lord because I have grave cause to distrust
myself? My ability is quite another question from the faithfulness of God, and
it is a pity to mix the two things. Let us not dishonour our God by dreaming
that his arm has waxed short because our arm has grown weak or weary.

Neither must we measure God by the rule of our feelings. Often do we hear the
lamentation—" I do not feel that I can be saved. I do not feel that such sin as
mine can be forgiven. I do not feel it possible that my hard heart can ever be
softened and renewed." This is poor, foolish talk. In what way can our feelings
guide us in such matters? Do you feel that the dead in their graves can be
raised again? Do you even feel that the cold of winter will be followed by the
heat of summer? How can you feel these things? You believe them. To talk of
feeling in the matter is absurd. Does the fainting man feel that he will revive?
Is it not the nature of such a state to suggest death? Do dead bodies feel that
they will have a resurrection? Feeling is out of the question.

God gave Solomon wisdom as he had promised him, and he will give you what he has
promised, whatever your feelings may be. If you look through the Book of
Deuteronomy, you will see how often Moses uses the expression "as he promised."
He says (Deuteronomy 1:11), "The Lord bless you as he hath promised you": he
cannot pronounce on Israel a larger benediction. That holy man viewed the
dealings of the Lord with constant admiration, because they were "as he
promised." In our case, also, the rule of the Lord's dealings will be "as he
promised." Our experience of divine grace will not be "as we now feel," but "as
he promised."

While writing thus for the comfort of others, I feel bound to confess that,
personally, I am the subject of very changeful feelings; but I have learned to
set very small store by them, either one way or the other: above all, I have
ceased to estimate the truth of the promise by my condition of mind. To-day I
feel so joyful that I could dance to the tune of Miriam's timbrel; but perhaps
when I wake to-morrow morning I shall only be able to sigh in harmony with
Jeremiah's lamentations. Has my salvation changed according to these feelings?
Then it must have had a very movable foundation. Feelings are more fickle than
the winds, more unsubstantial than bubbles: are these to be the gauge of the
divine fidelity? States of mind more or less depend upon the condition of the
liver or the stomach: are we to judge the Lord by these? Certainly not. The
state of the barometer may send our feelings up or down: can there be much
dependence upon things so changeable? God does not suspend his eternal love upon
our emotions that were to build a temple on a wave. We are saved according to
facts, not according to fancies. Certain eternal verities prove us saved or
lost; and those verities are not affected by our exhilarations or depressions. O
my reader, do not set up your feelings as a test by which to try the
truthfulness of the Lord! Such conduct is a sort of mingled insanity and
wickedness. If the Lord has said the word, he will make it good, whether you
feel triumphant or despondent.

Again, God will not give to us according to the rule of probabilities. It does
seem very improbable that you, my friend, should be blessed of the Lord that
made heaven and earth: but if you trust the Lord, you are favoured as surely as
the Blessed Virgin herself, of whom it is said that all generations shall call
her blessed; for it is written, "Blessed is she that believeth: for there shall
be a performance of those things which were told her from the Lord." "O Lord of
hosts, blessed is the man that trusteth in thee!" It may seem improbable that an
old sinner, steeped in vice, should, by believing in Jesus, at once begin a new
life; and yet it shall be so. It may seem very unlikely that a woman living in
sin should hear that word, "He that believeth on him hath everlasting life,"
should immediately lay hold upon it, and at once receive everlasting life; yet
it is true, for all that; and I have seen it so. Our God is a God of wonders.
Things improbable, yea, impossible, with us, are every-day things with him. He
causes the camel, despite its hump, to go through the needle's eye. He calleth
the things which are not as though they were. Do you laugh at the very idea of
your being saved? Let it not be the distrustful laugh of Sarai, but the joyous
expectancy of Abraham. Believe on Jesus, and you shall laugh all over, inwardly
and outwardly, not from incredulity, but for quite another reason. When we know
God we do not cease to wonder, but we begin to be at home with wonders. Believe
the promise of God's grace, and believing, you shall live in a new world which
shall be always wonder-land to you. It is a happy thing to have such faith in
God as to expect as certain that which to mere human judgment is most unlikely.
"With God all things are possible": it is therefore possible that he should save
every soul that believeth in Jesus. The law of gravitation acts in all cases,
and so does the law of divine faithfulness: there are no exceptions to the rule
that God will keep his covenant. Extreme cases, difficult cases, yea, impossible
cases, are included within the circle of the Lord's word, and therefore none
need despair, or even doubt. God's opportunity has come when man's extremity is
reached. The worse the case, the more sure is it to be helped of the Lord. Oh,
that my hopeless, helpless reader would do the Lord the honour to believe him,
and leave all in his hands!

How long will it be ere men will trust their God? "O thou of little faith,
wherefore didst thou doubt?" Oh, that we would settle it in our minds that we
would never again distrust the Faithful One!

"Let God be true, but every man a liar." The Lord himself saith, "Is the Lord's
hand waxed short? Thou shalt see now whether my word shall come to pass unto
thee or not" (Numbers 11:23). Let not the Lord speak thus to us in anger, but
let us believe and be sure that the solemn declarations of the Lord must be
fulfilled. Speak no longer one to another, saying, "What is truth?" but know
infallibly that the word of the Lord is sure, and endureth for ever.

Here is a promise for the reader to begin with: let him test it, and see if it
be not true:—"Call upon me in the day of trouble: I will deliver thee, and thou
shalt glorify me" (Psalms 50:15).


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  CHAPTER 36: 14. TAKING POSSESSION OF THE PROMISE
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XIV. Taking Possession of the Promise

"I am the Lord God of Abraham thy father, and the God of Isaac: the land whereon
thou liest, to thee will I give it."—Genesis 28:13.

TIMOROUS souls find much difficulty in laying hold upon the promises of God as
being made to themselves: they fear that it would be presumption to grasp things
so good and precious. As a general rule, we may consider that if we have faith
to grasp a promise, that promise is ours. He who gives us the key which will fit
the lock of his door intends that we should open the door and enter. There can
never be presumption in humbly believing God; there may be a great deal of it in
daring to question his word. We are not likely to err in trusting the promise
too far. Our failure lies in want of faith, not in excess of it. It would be
hard to believe God too much: it is dreadfully common to believe him too little.
"According to your faith be it unto you," is a benediction from which the Lord
will never draw back. "If thou canst believe, all things are possible to him
that believeth." It is written, "they could not enter in because of unbelief;"
but it is never said that one who entered in by faith was censured for his
impertinence, and driven out again. Jacob, according to the text with which we
have headed this chapter, took possession of the promised land by stretching
himself upon it, and going to sleep. There is no surer way of taking possession
of a promise than by placing your whole weight upon it, and then enjoying a
hearty rest. "The land whereon thou liest, to thee will I give it."

How often have I found the promise true to my own self when I have accepted it
as truth, and acted upon it! I have stretched myself upon it as upon a couch,
and left myself in the hands of the Lord; and a sweet repose has crept over my
spirit. Confidence in God realizes its own desires. The promise which our Lord
made to those who seek favours in prayer runs thus,—"Believe that ye receive
them, and ye shall have them." This sounds strange, but it is true; it is
according to the philosophy of faith. Say, by a realizing faith, "this promise
is mine," and straightway it is yours. It is by faith that we "receive
promises", and not by sight and sense. The promises of God are not enclosures to
be the private property of this saint or that, but they are an open common for
all the dwellers in the parish of Holy Faith. No doubt there are persons who
would, if they could, make a freehold of the stars, and a personal estate out of
the sun and moon. The same greed might put a ring-fence around the promises; but
this cannot be done. As well might misers hedge in the song-birds, and claim the
music of lark and thrush as their own sole inheritance, as propose to keep
promises all to themselves. No, not the best of the saints can, even if they
wished to do so, put a single word of the God of grace under lock and key. The
promise is not only "unto you, and to your children," but also "to all that are
afar off, even as many as the Lord our God shall call." What a comfort is this!
Let us take up our common-rights, and possess by faith what the Lord has made
ours by a covenant of salt.

Words spoken to Jacob belong equally to all believers. Hosea says of him, "Yea,
he had power over the angel, and prevailed: he wept, and made supplication unto
him: he found him in Bethel, and there he spake with us." So that Jehovah spake
with us when he spake with the patriarch. The wonders which God displayed at the
Red Sea were wrought for all his people, for we read, "there did we rejoice in
him." (See Psalms 66:6.) It is true we were not there, and yet the joy of
Israel's victory is ours. The apostle quotes the word of the Lord to Joshua as
if it were spoken to any and every child of God,—"He hath said, I will never
leave thee, nor forsake thee" (Hebrews 13:5), the fact being that no word of the
Lord ends with the occasion which called it forth, or spends itself in blessing
the individual to whom it was first addressed. All the promises are to believers
who have faith enough to embrace them, and plead them at the throne of grace.
What God is to one who trusts him, he will be to all such according to their
circumstances and necessities. The Bible has its eye upon each one of us as it
otters its words of grace. A Bampton lecturer has well said, "We, ourselves, and
such as we are, are the very persons whom Scripture speaks of; and to whom, as
men, in every variety of persuasive form, it makes its condescending, though
celestial, appeal. The point worthy of observation is, to note how a book of its
description and its compass should possess this versatility of power, this eye,
like that of a portrait uniformly fixed upon us, turn where we will."

"Eye of God's word! where'er we turn, Ever upon us thy kind gaze Doth all our
depths of woe discern, Unravel every bosom's maze."

"What word is this? whence know'st thou me?

All wondering cries the humbled heart, To hear thee that deep mystery, The
knowledge of itself, impart."

This singular personality of the word to each one of a thousand generations of
believers is one of its greatest charms, and one of the surest proofs of its
divine inspiration. We treat our Bibles, not as old almanacks, but as books for
the present, new, fresh, adapted for the hour. Abiding sweetness dwells in
undiminished freshness in the ancient words upon which our fathers fed in their
day. Glory be to God, we are feasting on them still; or if not, we ought to be;
and can only blame ourselves if we do not! The wells of Abraham served for
Isaac, and Jacob, and a thousand generations. Come, let us let down our buckets,
and with joy draw water out of the old wells of salvation, digged in the far-off
days when our fathers trusted in the Lord, and he delivered them! We need not
fear that we shall be superstitious or credulous. The promises of the Lord are
made to all who will believe them: faith is itself a warrant for trusting. If
thou canst trust, thou mayest trust. After being fulfilled hundreds of times,
the words of promise still stand to be yet further made good. Many a time and
oft have we stooped down to the spring-head in the meadow, and quaffed a cooling
draught; it is just as full and free, and we may drink to-day with as much
confidence as if we now stooped for the first time. Men do not keep their
promises over and over again: it would be unreasonable to expect it of them.
They are cisterns, but thou, O Lord, art a fountain! All my fresh springs are in
thee.

Come, reader, imitate Jacob! As he laid him down in a certain place, and took of
the stones of the place for his pillows, so do thou. Here is the whole Bible for
a couch, and here are certain promises to serve as pillows; lay down thy
burdens, and thyself also, and take thy rest. Behold, this Scripture and its
promises are henceforth thine,—"the land whereon thou /test, to thee will I give
it."


========================================================================
  CHAPTER 37: 15. ENDORSING THE PROMISE
========================================================================

XV. Endorsing the Promise "I believe God, that it shall be even as it was told
me."—Acts 27:25.

PAUL had received a special promise, and he openly avowed his faith in it. He
believed that God would fulfil every detail of that promise. In this way he set
to his seal that God is true. We are each one of us bound to do this with those
words of the Lord which are suitable to our case. This is what I mean by the
head-line—endorsing the promise. A friend gives me for the Orphanage a cheque,
which runs thus, "Pay to the order of C. H. Spurgeon, the sum of £10." His name
is good, and his bank is good, but I get nothing from his kindness till I put my
own name at the back of his cheque or draft. It is a very simple act: I merely
sign my name, and the banker pays me: but the signature cannot be dispensed
with.

There are many nobler names than mine, but none of these can be used instead of
my own. If I wrote the Queen's name, it would not avail me. If the Chancellor of
the Exchequer placed his signature on the back of the document, it would be in
vain. I must myself affix my own name. Even so each one must personally accept,
adopts and endorse the promise of God by his own individual faith, or he will
derive no benefit from it If you were to write Miltonic lines in honour of the
bank, or exceed Tennyson in verses in praise of the generous benefactor of the
orphans, it would avail nothing. The choicest language of men and of angels
would count for nothing; what is absolutely requisite is the personal signature
of the party who is named as the receiver. However fine might be the sketch
which an artistic pencil might draw upon the back of the draft, that also would
be of no sort of service: the simple, self-written name is demanded, and nothing
will be accepted instead of it. We must believe the promise, each one for
himself, and declare that we know it to be true, or it will bring us no
blessing. No good works, or ceremonial performances, or rapturous feelings, can
supply the place of a simple confidence. "He that cometh to God must believe
that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him." Some
things may be or may not be, but this must be. The promise may be said to run
thus, "I promise to pay to the order of any sinner who will believe on me the
blessing of eternal life." The sinner must write his name on the back of the
draft; but nothing else is asked of him. He believes the promise, he goes to the
throne of grace with it, and he looks to receive the mercy which it guaranteed
to him. He shall have that mercy: he cannot fail to do so. It is written, "He
that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life"; and so it is.

Paul believed that all in the ship with him would escape because God had
promised it. He accepted the promise as ample security for the fact, and acted
accordingly. He was calm amid the storm; he gave his comrades sage and sensible
advice as to breaking their fast; and, in general, he managed matters as a man
would do who was sure of a happy escape from the tempest. Thus he treated God as
he should be treated, namely, with unquestioning confidence. An upright man
likes to be trusted; it would grieve him if he saw that he was regarded with
suspicion. Our faithful God is jealous of his honour, and cannot endure that men
should treat him as if he could be false. Unbelief provokes the Lord above any
other sin: it touches the apple of his eye, and cuts him to the quick. Far be it
from us to perpetrate so infamous a wrong towards our heavenly Father; let us
believe him up to the hilt, placing no bounds to our hearty reliance upon his
word. Paul openly avowed his confidence in the promise. It is well that we
should do the same. Just at this time, bold, outspoken testimonies to the truth
of God are greatly needed, and may prove to be of seven-fold value. The air is
full of doubt; indeed, few really and substantially believe. Such a man as
George Müller, who believes in God for the maintenance of two thousand children,
is a rare personage. "When the Son of man cometh, shall he find faith on the
earth? "Therefore let us speak out. Infidelity has defied us; let no man's heart
fail him, but let us meet the giant with the sling and stone of actual
experience, and unflinching witness. God does keep his promise, and we know it.
We dare endorse every one of his promises. Ay, we would do it with our blood if
it were needful! The word of the Lord endureth for ever, and of this we are
undaunted witnesses, even all of us who are called by his name.


========================================================================
  CHAPTER 38: 16. THE PROMISE USED FOR THIS LIFE
========================================================================

XVI. The Promise Used for This Life

"Godliness is profitable unto all things, having promise of the life that now
is, and of that which is to come."—1 Timothy 4:8. A SORT of affectation prevents
some Christians from treating religion as if its sphere lay among the common
places of daily life. It is to them transcendental and dreamy; rather a creation
of pious fiction than a matter of fact. They believe in God, after a fashion,
for things spiritual, and for the life which is to be; but they totally forget
that true godliness hath the promise of the life which now is, as well as of
that which is to come. To them it would seem almost a profanation to pray about
the small matters of which daily life is made up. Perhaps they will be startled
if I venture to suggest that this should make them question the reality of their
faith. If it cannot bring, them help in little troubles of life, will it support
them in the greater trials of death? If it cannot profit them as to food and
raiment, what can it do for them as to the immortal spirit? In the life of
Abraham we perceive that his faith had to do with all the events of his earthly
pilgrimage; it was connected with his removals from one country to another, with
the separation of a nephew from his camp, with fighting against invaders, and
specially with the birth of the long-promised son. No part of the patriarch's
life was outside the circle of his faith in God. Towards the close of his life
it is said, "and the Lord had blessed Abraham in all things," which includes
temporals as well as spirituals. In Jacob's case the Lord promised him bread to
eat, and raiment to put on, and the bringing of him to his father's house in
peace; and all these things are of a temporal and earthly character. Assuredly
these first believers did not spirit away the present blessings of the covenant,
or regard it as an airy, mystical matter to believe in God. One is struck with
the want of any line of demarcation between secular and sacred in their lives;
they journeyed as pilgrims, fought like Crusaders, ate and drank like saints,
lived as priests, and spake as prophets. Their life was their religion, and
their religion was their life. They trusted God, not merely about certain things
of higher import, but about everything, and hence, even a servant from one of
their houses, when he was sent on an errand, prayed, "O Lord God of my master,
prosper the way which I go!" This was genuine faith, and it is ours to imitate
it, and no longer to allow the substance of the promise, and the life of faith,
to evaporate in mere sentimental and visionary fancies. If trust in God is good
for anything, it is good for everything within the line of the promise, and it
is certain that the life which now is lies within that region.

Let my reader observe and practically use such words of God as these,—"Ye shall
serve the Lord your God, and he shall bless thy bread, and thy water; and I will
take sickness away from the midst of thee" (Exodus 23:25). "Trust in the Lord,
and do good; so shalt thou dwell in the land, and verily thou shalt be fed"
(Psalms 37:3). "Surely he shall deliver thee from the snare of the fowler, and
from the noisome pestilence. He shall cover thee with his feathers, and under
his wings shalt thou trust: his truth shall be thy shield and buckler. Thou
shalt not be afraid for the terror by night; nor for the arrow that flieth by
day; nor for the pestilence that walketh in darkness; nor for the destruction
that wasteth at noonday. A thousand shall fall at thy side, and ten thousand at
thy right hand; but it shall not come nigh thee" (Psalms 91:3-7). "He shall
deliver thee in six troubles: yea, in seven there shall no evil touch thee" (Job
5:19). "He that walketh righteously, and speaketh uprightly; he that despiseth
the gain of oppressions, that shaketh his hands from holding of bribes, that
stoppeth his ears from hearing of blood, and shutteth his eyes from seeing evil;
he shall dwell on high: his place of defence shall be the munitions of rocks:
bread shall be given him; his waters shall be sure" (Isaiah 33:15-16). "For the
Lord God is a sun and shield: the Lord will give grace and glory: no good thing
will he withhold from them that walk uprightly" (Psalms 84:11). "No weapon that
is formed against thee shall prosper; and every tongue that shall rise against
thee in judgment thou shalt condemn. This is the heritage of the servants of the
Lord, and their righteousness is of me, saith the Lord" (Isaiah 54:17). Our
Saviour intended faith to be our quietus concerning daily cares, or he would not
have said, "Therefore I say unto you, take no thought for your life, what ye
shall eat, or what ye shall drink; nor yet for your body, what ye shall put on.
Is not the life more than meat, and the body than raiment? Behold the fowls of
the air: for they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns; yet your
heavenly Father feedeth them. Are ye not much better than they?" (Matthew
6:25-26.) What else but the exercise of faith concerning temporal things could
he have meant when he used the following language?—"And seek not ye what ye
shall eat, or what ye shall drink, neither be ye of doubtful mind. For all these
things do the nations of the world seek after: and your Father knoweth that ye
have need of these things" (Luke 12:29-30).

Paul meant the same when he wrote, "Be careful for nothing; but in every thing
by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known
unto God. And the peace of God, which passeth all understanding, shall keep your
hearts and minds through Christ Jesus" (Php 4:6-7).

He who is gone to prepare heaven for us will not leave us without provision for
the journey thither. God does not give us heaven as the Pope gave England to the
Spanish King—if he could get it: but he makes the road sure, as well as the end.

Now, our earthly necessities are as real as our spiritual ones, and we may rest
sure that the Lord will supply them. He will send us those supplies in the way
of promise, prayer, and faith, and so make them a means of education for us. He
will fit us for Canaan by the experience of the wilderness. To suppose that
temporal things are too little for our condescending God, is to forget that he
observes the flight of sparrows, and counts the hairs of his people's heads.
Besides, everything is so little to him, that, if he does not care for the
little, he cares for nothing. Who is to divide affairs by size or weight? The
turning-point of history may be a minute circumstance. Blessed is the man to
whom nothing is too small for God; for certainly nothing is too small to cause
us sorrow, or to involve us in peril. A man of God once lost a key: he prayed
about it, and found it. It was reported of him as a strange circumstance.
Indeed, it was nothing unusual: some of us pray about everything, and tremble
lest the infinitesimal things should not be sanctified by the word of God and
prayer. It is not the including of trifles which is any trouble to our
consciences, but the omission of them. We are assured that, when our Lord gave
his angels charge to guard our feet from stones in the way, he placed all the
details of our life under heavenly care, and we are glad to commit all things to
his keeping.

It is one of the abiding miracles of the present dispensation that in Christ we
have continual peace under all trials, and through him we have power in prayer
to obtain from the Lord all things necessary for this life and godliness. It has
been the writer's lot to test the Lord hundreds of times about temporal needs,
being driven thereto by the care of orphans and students. Prayer has many, many
times brought opportune supplies, and cleared away serious difficulties. I know
that faith can fill a purse, provide a meal, change a hard heart, procure a site
for a building, heal sickness, quiet insubordination, and stay an epidemic. Like
money in the worldling's hand, faith in the hand of the man of God "answereth
all things." All things in heaven, and earth, and under the earth, answer to the
command of prayer. Faith is not to be imitated by a quack, nor simulated by a
hypocrite; but where it is real, and can grasp a divine promise with firm grip,
it is a great wonder-worker. How I wish that my reader would so believe in God
as to lean upon him in all the concerns of his life! This would lead him into
anew world, and bring to him such confirmatory evidence as to the truth of our
holy faith that he would laugh sceptics to scorn. Child-like faith in God
provides sincere hearts with a practical prudence, which I am inclined to
call—sanctified common-sense. The simple-minded believer, though laughed at as
an idiot, has a wisdom about him which cometh from above, and effectually
baffles the cunning of the wicked. Nothing puzzles a malicious enemy like the
straightforward unguardedness of an out-and-out believer.

He that believes his God is not afraid of evil tidings, for his heart has found
a calm fixity in trusting in the Lord. In a thousand ways this faith sweetens,
enlarges, and enriches life. Try it, dear reader, and see if it does not yield
you an immeasurable wealth of blessedness! It will not save you from trouble,
for the promise is, "These things I have spoken unto you, that in me ye might
have peace. In the world ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have
overcome the world" (John 16:33): but it will cause you to glory in tribulations
also, "knowing that tribulation worketh patience; and patience, experience; and
experience, hope: and hope maketh not ashamed; because the love of God is shed
abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given unto us" (Romans 5:3-5).

My faith not only flies to heaven, But walks with God below; To me are all
things daily given, "While passing to and fro. The promise speaks of worlds
above, But not of these alone;

It feeds and clothes me now with love, And makes this world my own.

I trust the Lord, and he replies, In things both great and small.

He honours faith with prompt supplies;

Faith honours him in all.


========================================================================
  CHAPTER 39: 17. SEARCHING OUT THE PROMISE
========================================================================

XVII. Searching Out the Promise "Thou hast promised this goodness unto thy
servant."—2 Samuel 7:28.

KING David knew what the Lord had engaged to give him, and he referred to it
specially in his prayer as "this good thing." (Revised Version.) We greatly need
to be more definite in our supplications than we usually are: we pray for
everything in such a way that we practically pray for nothing. It is well to
know what we want. Hence our Lord said to the blind man, "What wilt thou that I
should do unto thee?" He wished him to be aware of his own needs, and to be
filled with earnest desires concerning those needs: these are valuable
ingredients in the composition of prayer.

Knowing what we need, the next business is to find that the Lord has promised us
this particular blessing, for then we can go to God with the utmost confidence,
and look for the fulfilment of his word. To this end we should diligently search
the Scriptures, looking much to the cases of other believers which are like our
own, and endeavouring to light upon that particular utterance of divine grace
which is suitable to ourselves in our present circumstances. The more exact the
agreement of the promise to the case, the greater the comfort which it will
yield. In this school the believer will learn the value of plenary, ay, of
verbal inspiration; for in his own instance he may have to dwell upon so slight
a matter as the number of a noun, as Paul did when quoting the promise made to
Abraham he remarks, "Now to Abraham and his seed were the promises made. He
saith not, And to seeds, as of many; but as of one, And to thy seed, which is
Christ" (Galatians 3:16).

We may rest assured that somewhere in the inspired page there is a promise
fitting the occasion. The infinite wisdom of God is seen in his having given us
a revelation which meets the innumerable varieties of his people's conditions.
Not a single trial is overlooked, however peculiar it may be. As there is food
specially adapted for every living thing upon the face of the earth, so there is
suitable support for every child of God in the volume of inspiration. If we do
not find a fitting promise, it is because we do not look for it; or having found
it, have not yet perceived its full meaning. A homely comparison may be useful
here. You have lost the key of a chest, and after trying all the keys you
possess, you are obliged to send out for a smith. The tradesman comes with a
huge bunch of keys of all sorts and sizes. To you they appear to be a singular
collection of rusty instruments. He looks at the lock, and then he tries first
one key and then another. He has not touched it yet; and your treasures are
still out of your reach. Look, he has found a likely key: it almost touches the
bolt, but not quite. He is evidently on the right track now. At last the chest
is opened, for the right key has been found. This is a correct representation of
many a perplexity. You cannot get at the difficulty so as to deal with it
aright, and find your way to a happy result. You pray, but have not the liberty
in prayer which you desire. A definite promise is what you want. You try one and
another of the inspired words, but they do not fit. The troubled heart sees
reasons to suspect that they are not strictly applicable to the case in hand,
and so they are left in the old Book for use another day; for they are not
available in the present emergency. You try again, and in due season a promise
presents itself, which seems to have been made for the occasion; it fits as
exactly as a well-made key fits the wards of the lock for which it was
originally prepared. Having found the identical word of the living God, you
hasten to plead it at the throne of grace, saying, "O my Lord, thou hast
promised this good thing unto thy servant; be pleased to grant it!" The matter
is ended; sorrow is turned to joy; prayer is heard. Frequently the Holy Spirit
brings to our remembrance with life and power words of the Lord which else we
might have forgotten. He also sheds a new light upon well-remembered passages,
and so reveals a fulness in them which we had little suspected. In cases known
to me, the texts have been singular, and for a while the person upon whose mind
they were impressed could hardly see their bearing. For years one heart was
comforted with the words "His soul shall dwell at ease; and his seed shall
inherit the earth." This passage was seldom out of his mind; indeed, it seemed
to him to be perpetually whispered in his ear. The special relation of the
promise to his experience was made known by the event. A child of God, who
mourned his years of barrenness, was lifted at once into joy and peace by that
seldom-quoted word, "I will restore to you the years that the locust hath
eaten." The bitter experiences of David as to slander and malice led to the
utterance of consoling promises, which have been a thousand times appropriated
by obscure and broken-hearted Christians when afflicted with "trials of cruel
mockings." Before this dispensation shall close, we doubt not that every
sentence of Scripture will have been illustrated by the life of one or other of
the saints. Perhaps some obscure and little-understood promise is still lying by
until he shall come for whom it was specially written. If we may so say, there
is one rusty key on the bunch which has not yet found its lock; but it will find
it before the history of the church is finished: we may be sure of that. The
word of the Lord which would remove our present discomfort may be close at hand,
and yet we may not be aware of it. With singular knowledge of human experience,
John Bunyan represents the prisoner of Doubting Castle as finding in his own
bosom the key called Promise, which opened every door in that gloomy
prison-house. We often lie in durance vile when the means of obtaining fullest
liberty proffers itself to us. If we would but open our eyes, we should, like
Hagar, see a well of water close at hand, and wonder why we thought of dying of
thirst. At this moment, O tempted brother, there is a word of the Lord awaiting
thee! As the manna fell early in the morning, and lay ready for the Israelites
to gather it as soon as ever they left their beds, so does the promise of the
Lord wait for thy coming. The oxen and the fatlings of grace are killed, and all
things are ready for thine immediate comfort. The mountain is full of chariots
of fire, and horses of fire, prepared for thy deliverance; the prophet of the
Lord can see them, and if thine eyes were opened thou wouldst see them too. Like
the lepers at the gate of Samaria, it would be foolish for thee to sit where
thou art, and die. Bestir thyself, for close at hand lavish mercy is poured
forth, exceeding abundantly above all that thou dost ask, or even think. Only
believe, and enter into rest. For the poor, the sick, the faint, the erring,
there are words of good cheer which they alone can enjoy. For the fallen, the
desponding, the despairing, the dying, there are cordials which are compounded
with an eye to their peculiar maladies. The widow and the fatherless have their
promises, and so have captives, travellers, shipwrecked mariners, aged persons,
and those in the article of death. No one ever wanders where a promise does not
follow him. An atmosphere of promise surrounds believers as the air surrounds
the globe. I might almost call it omnipresent, and say of it, "Thou hast beset
me behind and before, and laid thine hand upon me.

Such knowledge is too wonderful for me; it is high, I cannot attain unto it.
Whither shall I go from thy spirit? Or whither shall I flee from thy presence?"
(Psalms 139:5-7.) No depth of darkness can hide us from the covenant of promise;
say, rather, in its presence the night shineth as the day. Wherefore, let us
take courage, and by faith and patience wait in the land of our exile till the
day of our home-bringing. So shall we, like the rest of the heirs of salvation,
"inherit the promise." Certain covenant engagements, made with the Lord Jesus
Christ, as to his elect and redeemed ones, are altogether without condition so
far as we are concerned; but many other wealthy words of the Lord contain
stipulations which must be carefully regarded, or we shall not obtain the
blessing. One part of my reader's diligent search must be directed towards this
most important point. God will keep his promise to thee; only see thou to it
that the way in which he conditions his engagement is carefully observed of
thee. Only when we fulfil the requirement of a conditional promise can we expect
that promise to be fulfilled to us. He hath said, "He that believeth in Jesus
shall be saved." If thou believest in the Lord Jesus Christ, it is certain that
thou shalt be saved; but not else. In the same way, if the promise is made to
prayer, to holiness, to reading the word, to abiding in Christ, or whatever else
it may be, give thy heart and soul to the thing commanded, that the blessing may
become thine. In some cases, great blessedness is not realized because known
duties are neglected. The promise cannot enter because "sin lieth at the door."
Even an unknown duty may whip us with "a few stripes," and a few strokes may
greatly mar our happiness. Let us endeavour to know the Lord's will in all
things, and then let us obey it without a trace of hesitation. It is not of the
way of our wilfulness, but of the tracks of divine wisdom that we read, "Her
ways are ways of pleasantness, and all her paths are peace." Do not undervalue
the grace of the promise because it has a condition appended to it; for, as a
rule, it is in this way made doubly valuable,—the condition being in itself
another blessing, which the Lord has purposely made inseparable from that which
thou desirest, that thou mayest gain two mercies while seeking only one.
Moreover, remember that the condition is grievous to those only who are not
heirs of the promise: to them it is as a thorn hedge, keeping them off from the
comfort to which they have no right; but to thee it is not grievous, but
pleasant, and it is therefore no hindrance to thine access to the blessing.
Those requirements, which show a black cloud and darkness to the Egyptians, have
a bright side for the Israelites, and give light by night to them. To us the
Lord's yoke is easy, and in taking it upon us we find rest unto our souls. See
then that thou note the wording of the promise, and carry out all its precepts,
that all good things may come to thee.

If thou art a believer in the Lord Jesus, all the promises are thine; and among
them is one for this very day of the month, and for this particular place
wherein thou art now encamped: wherefore search the roll of thy Magna Charta,
and find out thy portion for this hour. Of all the promises which the Lord hath
given in his Book, he hath said, "No one of these shall fail, none shall want
its mate, for my mouth hath commanded them." Therefore trust, and be not afraid.
Whatever else may prove a failure, the promise of God never will. Treasure laid
up in this Bank is beyond all hazard. "It is better to trust in the Lord than to
put confidence in princes." Let us sing at every remembrance of the God of truth
and grace.

"Tell of his wondrous faithfulness, And sound his power abroad;

Sing the sweet promise of his grace, And the performing God.

He that can dash whole worlds to death, And make them when he please;

He speaks, and that almighty breath Fulfils his great decrees. His very word of
grace is strong As that which built the skies; The voice that rolls the stars
along Speaks all the promises."


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  CHAPTER 40: 18. THE TIME OF THE PROMISE
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XVIII. The Time of the Promise "The time of the promise drew nigh."—Acts 7:17.

THOMAS BROOKS reminds us that the mercies of God are not styled the swift, but
"the sure mercies of David."

There is nothing of hurry about the procedure of the Lord: it may even seem that
the chariots of his grace are long in coming. It is by no means an unusual
circumstance for the saints to be heard crying, "O Lord, how long?" It is
written "the glory of the Lord shall be thy rereward" (Isaiah 58:8). Now the
guard of the rear comes up last, but it does come. God may sometimes make us
wait; but we shall see in the end that he is as surely the Omega as the Alpha of
his people's salvation. Let us never distrust him, but though the vision tarry,
let us wait for it; because it will surely come, it will not tarry (Habakkuk
2:3).

There once sailed from the port of London a vessel, which the owner called the
Swift-sure, because he hoped it would prove both safe and speedy. Truly this is
a fit name for the Lord's mercy: it is both swift and sure. David may not have
said so in the text which Brooks quotes, but he often said as much and even more
in others. Did he not say "He rode upon a cherub, and did fly: yea, he did fly
upon the wings of the wind"? The Lord is not slow to hear the cries of his
people. He has a set time to favour Zion, and when that set time is come there
will be no delay. The date for its fulfilment is an important part of a promise;
indeed, it enters into the essence of it. It would be unjust to delay the
payment of a debt; and the obligation to keep one's word is of the same nature.
The Lord is prompt to the moment in carrying out. his gracious engagements. The
Lord had threatened to destroy the world with a flood, but he waited the full
time of respite until Noah had entered the ark; and then, on the selfsame day,
the fountains of the great deep were broken up. He had declared that Israel
should come out of Egypt, and it was so: "And it came to pass at the end of the
four hundred and thirty years, even the selfsame day it came to pass, that all
the hosts of the Lord went put from the land of Egypt" (Exodus 12:41). According
to Daniel, the Lord numbers the years of his promise, and. counts the weeks of
his waiting. As for the greatest promise of all, namely, the sending of his Son
from heaven, the Lord was not behindhand in that great gift, "but when the
fulness of the time was come, God sent forth his Son, made of a woman." Beyond
all question, the Lord our God keeps his word to the moment. When we are in
need, we may be urgent with the Lord to come quickly to our rescue, even as
David pleaded in the seventieth Psalm,—"Make haste, O God, to deliver me; make
haste to help me, O Lord." (Verse 1.) "I am poor and needy: make haste unto me,
O God: thou art my help and my deliverer; O Lord, make no tarrying." (Verse 5.)
The Lord even condescends to describe himself as making speed to carry out his
gracious engagements, saying, "I the Lord will hasten it in his time" (Isaiah
60:22). But we must not pray in this fashion as though we had the slightest fear
that the Lord could or would be dilatory, or that he needed us to quicken his
diligence. No. "The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some men count
slackness" (2 Peter 3:9). Our God is slow to anger, but in deeds of grace "his
word runneth very swiftly" (Psalms 147:15). Sometimes his speed to bless his
people outstrips time and thought: as, for instance, when he fulfils that
ancient declaration, "It shall come to pass, that before they call, I will
answer; and while they are yet speaking, I will hear" (Isaiah 65:24).

Yet there are delays in the answers to our prayers. As the husbandman does not
reap to-day that which he sowed yesterday, so neither do we always at once
obtain from the Lord that which we seek of him. The door of grace does open, but
not to our first knocks. Why is this? It is because the mercy will be all the
greater for being longer on the road. There is a time for every purpose under
heaven, and everything is best in its time. Fruit ripens in its season; and the
more seasonable it is the better it is. Untimely mercies would be only half
mercies; therefore the Lord withholds them till they have come to their
perfection. Even heaven itself will be all the better because it will not be
ours till it is prepared for us, and we are prepared for it.

Love presides over the arrangements of grace, and strikes upon the bell when the
best moment has arrived. God blesses us by his temporary delays, as well as by
his prompt replies. We are not to doubt the Lord because his time has not yet
come: that would be to act like petulant children, who must have a thing at the
instant, or else they think they shall never have it. A waiting God is the true
object of confidence to his waiting people. "Therefore will the Lord wait, that
he may be gracious unto you" (Isaiah 30:18). His compassions fail not even when
his gracious operations appear to be suspended, and our griefs are deepened.
Yea, it is because he loves us so much that he tries us by delaying his answers
of peace. It is with our Father in heaven even as it was with our Lord on earth:
"Now Jesus loved Martha, and her sister, and Lazarus. When he had heard
therefore that he was sick, he abode two days still in the same place where he
was" (John 11:5-6). Love closes the hand of divine bounty, and restrains the
outflow of favour, when it sees that a solid gain will ensue from a period of
trial.

Perhaps the time of the promise has not yet come, because our trial has not yet
fulfilled its design. The chastening must answer its purpose, or it cannot be
brought to an end. Who would desire to see the gold taken out of the fire before
its dross is consumed? Wait, O precious thing, till thou hast gained the utmost
of purity! These furnace moments are profitable. It would be unwise to shorten
such golden hours. The time of the promise corresponds with the time most
enriching to heart and soul.

Perhaps, moreover, we have not yet displayed sufficient submission to the divine
will. Patience has not yet had her perfect work. The weaning process is not
accomplished: we are still hankering after the comforts which the Lord intends
us for ever to outgrow. Abraham made a great feast when his son Isaac was
weaned; and, peradventure, our heavenly Father will do the same with us. Lie
down, proud heart! Quit thine idols; forsake thy fond dotings; and the promised
peace will come unto thee.

Possibly, also, we have not yet performed a duty which will become the
turning-point of our condition. The Lord turned again the captivity of Job when
he prayed for his friends. It may be that the Lord will make us useful to a
relative or other friend before he will favour us with personal consolations: we
are not to see the face of our Joseph except our brother be with us. Some
ordinance of the Lord's house may lie neglected, or some holy work may be left
undone; and this may hinder the promise. Is it so? "Are the consolations of God
small with thee? Is there any secret thing with thee?" Peradventure we are yet
to vow unto the Lord, and make a notable sacrifice unto him, and then will he
bring his covenant to mind. Let him not have to complain, "Thou hast bought me
no sweet cane with money." Rather let us accept his challenge, "Bring ye all the
tithes into the storehouse, and prove me now herewith, saith the Lord of hosts,
if I, will not open you the windows of heaven, and pour you out a blessing"
(Malachi 3:10).

God's promises are so dated as to secure his glory in their fulfilment, and this
must be enough for us when we can see no other reason for delay. It may be
necessary for us to be made more fully aware of our need, and the great value of
the blessings which we crave. That which too lightly comes may be too lightly
prized. Perhaps our ungrateful spirits need tutoring to thankfulness by an
education of waiting. We might not loudly sing if we did not deeply sigh.
Wanting and waiting lead to panting and pleading; and these in due time lead to
joying and rejoicing.

If all things could be known to us as they are known to God, we should bless him
with all our hearts for keeping us under the smarting rod, and not sparing us
for our crying. If we could know the end as well as the beginning, we should
praise the Lord for closed doors, and frowning looks, and unanswered petitions.
Surely, if we knew that the Lord's great purposes were answered by our
continuing without the pleasures we desire, and bearing the evils which we
dread, we should cry aloud to be left in our poverty, and to be shut up in our
pain. If we can glorify God by. being denied what we seek, we desire to be
denied. Greatest of all our prayers, and sum of all the rest, is this one,
"Nevertheless, not as I will, but as thou wilt."


========================================================================
  CHAPTER 41: 19. THE PROMISES IN POSSESSION THROUGH THE SPIRIT
========================================================================

XIX. The Promises in Possession through the Spirit

"That holy Spirit of promise, which is the earnest of our inheritance until the
redemption of the purchased possession, unto the praise of his glory."—Ephesians
1:13-14. IN a. very true and real sense the things promised in the covenant are
already the property of believers. "All things are yours." The great Father
might truly say to each one of the sons who abide in his house, "All that I have
is thine." The inheritance is already ours, say the old divines, in promisso, in
pretio, in principiis that, is to say, in the promise of God, in the price paid
by the Lord Jesus, and in its first principles which are infused into us by the
Holy Spirit. In his sure promise the Father has already "blessed us with all
spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ": he has not only resolved to
enrich us in the future, but even now he has endowed us with the treasures of
his love. The Lord Jesus has not merely made us heirs of an infinite estate in
the ages to come, but he has brought us into immediate enjoyment of a present
portion; as saith the Scripture, "In whom also we have obtained an inheritance."
The Holy Spirit is in many ways the means of making the promised heritage ours
even now. By him we are "sealed." We know of a surety that the inheritance is
ours, and that we ourselves belong to the great Heir of all things. The
operations of the Holy Ghost upon us in our regeneration, and his abiding in us
by sanctification, are certificates of our being in grace, and of our being
inheritors of glory. Beyond all other testimonies of our being saved, there
stands this sure and certain evidence, namely, that the Spirit of the living God
rests upon us. Repentance, faith, spiritual life, holy desires, upward
breathings, and even "groanings which cannot be uttered," are all proofs that
the Holy Ghost is working upon us; and working in a way peculiar to the heirs of
salvation. Life breathed into us by the Holy Ghost is the great seal of the
kingdom of God to our souls. We need no dreams, nor visions, nor mystic voices,
nor rapturous feelings: the quickening and renewing of the Holy Ghost are better
seals than these. The Spirit of promise does not prepare men for a blessedness
which shall never be theirs. He who hath wrought us to the selfsame thing will
secure that blessing to us for which he hath prepared us. The faintest impress
of the seal of the Spirit is a better attestation of our part and lot with the
people of God than all the presumptuous inferences which self-conceit can draw
from its heated fancies. Nor is the Holy Spirit only the seal of the
inheritance, he is also the earnest of it. Now an earnest is a part of the thing
itself, given as a guarantee that the remainder will be forthcoming in due
season. If a man is paid a part of his six-days' wage in the middle of the week,
it is earnest-money. In this an earnest differs from a pledge, for a pledge is
returned when we receive that which it secured; but an earnest is not returned,
for it is a part of that which is promised. Even so the Holy Spirit is himself a
great portion of the inheritance of the saints; and in having him we have the
beginning of perfectness, of heaven, of eternal glory. He is everlasting life,
and his gifts, graces, and workings are the first principles of endless
felicity. In having the Holy Ghost we have the kingdom which it is our Father's
good pleasure to give to his chosen. This will be made clear by a few moments'
reflection. Heaven will much consist in holiness; and it is clear that, as far
as the Holy Ghost makes us holy here, he has implanted the beginnings of heaven.
Heaven is victory; and each time that we overcome sin, Satan, the world, and the
flesh, we have foretastes of the unfading triumph which causes the waving of
palms in the New Jerusalem. Heaven is an endless Sabbath; and how can we have
better antepasts of the perfect rest than by that joy and peace which are shed
abroad in us by the Holy Ghost? Communion with God is a chief ingredient in the
bliss of the glorified; and here below, by the Spirit of God, we are enabled to
delight ourselves in the Lord, and rejoice in the God of our salvation.
Fellowship with the Lord Jesus in all his gracious designs and purposes, and
likeness to him in love to God and man, are also chief constituents in our
perfected condition before the throne; and these the Spirit of holiness is
working in us from day to day. To be pure in heart so as to see God, to be
established in character so as to be fixed in righteousness, to be strong in
good so as to overcome all evil, and to be cleansed from self so as to find our
all in God; are not these, when carried to the full, among the central
benedictions of the beatific vision? And are they not already bestowed upon us
by that Spirit of glory and of power which even now rests upon us? It is so. In
the Holy Spirit we have the things we seek after. In him the flower of heaven
has come to us in the bud, the dawn of the day of glory has smiled upon us.

We are not, then, such strangers to the promised blessings as common talk would
make us out to be. Many repeat, like parrots, the word, "Eye hath not seen, nor
ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath
prepared for them that love him" (1 Corinthians 2:9); but they fail to add the
words which follow in the same Scripture, "but God hath revealed them unto us by
his Spirit." What cruelty thus to cut the living child of Scripture in halves!
The Holy Spirit has revealed to us what neither eye nor ear has perceived: he
has drawn back the curtains, and bidden us see the secrets hidden from ages and
from generations. Behold, in the life of God within your soul, the everlasting
life which is promised to them that love God. The life of glory is but the
continuance and the outgrowth of the life of grace. Behold, in reconciliation
through the atoning blood, that celestial peace which is the groundwork of
eternal rest. See, in the love of God shed abroad in the believing soul, a
foretaste of the fragrance of felicity. Mark, in the immovable security and
hallowed serenity of full assurance, a forecast of the infinite repose of
Paradise. When our inward joys swell high, and burst into a song, then we hear
preludes of the heavenly hallelujahs. If we would know the clusters of Canaan,
lo, they are brought to us by those emotions and anticipations, which, under the
guidance of the Spirit, have gone, like spies, into the good land, and brought
us hence its choicest fruits!

It is not only that we shall have an inheritance: but we have it. In having the
Holy Spirit, we are already put in possession of the land which floweth with
milk and honey. "We which have believed do enter into rest" (Hebrews 4:3). "Ye
are come unto mount Sion, and unto the city of the living God, and to an
innumerable company of angels" (Hebrews 12:22).

What remains for such persons, thus made partakers of a divine inheritance in
the Son of God, but that they walk worthy of their high, holy, heavenly calling?
"If ye then be risen with Christ, seek those things which are above, where
Christ sitteth on the right hand of God" (Colossians 3:1).


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  CHAPTER 42: 20. JESUS AND THE PROMISES
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XX. Jesus and the Promises

"For all the promises of God in him are yea, and in him Amen, unto the glory of
God. by us."—2 Corinthians 1:20.

JESUS our Lord, stands for ever connected with the way of the promise. Indeed,
he is "the way, the truth, and the life." No man comes to the Faithful Promiser
but by Jesus Christ. We could not close this little book without a short chapter
upon HIM. Our hope is that the reader will not attempt to obtain any comfort
from a word that we have written, or even from the Word of God itself, except as
he receives it through Jesus Christ. Apart from him the Scripture itself
contains nothing which the soul of man may live upon. This, indeed, is the great
fault of many—they search the Scriptures, for in them they think they have
eternal life, but they will not come unto Christ, that they might have life. Let
us not be of this foolish company; but let us come to Jesus day by day, knowing
that it pleased the Father that in him should all fulness dwell. Only as we know
him do we know the light, life, and liberty of the heirs of promise; and, as
surely as we wander from him we roam into bondage. Oh, for grace to abide in
him, that we may possess all the good things of the covenant made with us in
him!

Jesus is the Gate of the promises. Through him the Lord is able to enter into
gracious engagements with guilty men. Until "the seed of the woman" had been
appointed to be the Mediator between God and man, no messages of comfort could
be sent to the offending race. God had no word for sinners till the Word of God
undertook to be made flesh, and to dwell among us. God could not communicate his
mind of love to men except through Jesus, the Word. As God could not come to us
apart from the Messenger of the covenant, so we could not approach to him except
through the Mediator. Our fears drive us away from the Holy One till we see in
the Son of God a Brother full of tender sympathy. The glory of the divine
Trinity overawes us until we behold the milder radiance of the Incarnate God. We
come to God through the humanity of his Son, and especially through that
humanity suffering and dying on our behalf.

Jesus is the Sum of all the promises. When God promised his Son to be ours, he
gave us in him all things necessary for our salvation. Every good gift and every
perfect gift will be found within the person, offices, and work of our Redeemer.
All the promises are "in him." If you would add them up, or make a long
catalogue of all the blessings which they secure to us, you may save yourself
the pains, and be happy to know that this is the full total—the Lord has given
us his Son Jesus. As all the stars are in the sky, and all the waves are in the
sea, so are all covenant blessings in Christ. We cannot think of a real blessing
outside of our Lord: He is all in all. On this thread all pearls are strung: in
this casket all gems are contained.

Jesus is the Guarantee of the promises. He that spared not his own Son will deny
nothing to his people. If he had ever thought of drawing back, he would have
done so before he had made the infinite sacrifice of his Only-begotten Son.
Never can there be a suspicion that the Lord will revoke any one of the promises
since he has already fulfilled the greatest and most costly of them all. "How
shall he not with him also freely give us all things?"

Jesus is the Confirmer of the promises. They are. "in him yea, and in him Amen."
His coming into our nature, his standing as our federal Head, and his fulfilling
of all the stipulations of the covenant, have made all the articles of the
divine compact firm and enduring. Now is it not only kind but just with God to
keep his promises to men. Since Jesus has rendered, man's behalf, a full
recompense to the divine honour which sin has assailed, the justice of God
unites with his love in securing the carrying out of every word of promise. As
the rainbow is our assurance that the world shall never be destroyed by a flood,
so is Jesus our assurance that the floods of human sin shall never drown the
faithful kindness of the Lord. He has magnified the law, and made it honourable;
he must be rewarded for his soul-travail, and therefore all good things must
come to those for whom he died. It would be an unhinging and dislocation of all
things if the promises were now to become of none effect after our Lord has done
all that was required to make them sure. If we are indeed one with the Lord
Jesus Christ, the promises are as sure to us as the love of his Father is to
him.

Jesus is the Remembrancer of the promises. He pleads with God on our behalf, and
his plea is the divine promise. "He made intercession for the transgressors."
For the good things which he has promised the Lord will be enquired of by us
that he may do them for us; and that this enquiry may be carried out under the
most encouraging circumstances, behold, the Lord Jesus himself becomes the
Intercessor for us: for Zion's sake he doth not hold his peace, but day and
night he makes remembrance of the everlasting covenant, and of the blood whereby
it was sealed and ratified. At the back of every promise stands the living,
pleading, and prevailing High-priest of our profession. We may forget the
faithful promise, but he will not: he will present the incense of his merit, and
the engagements of God on our behalf, in that place within the veil where he
exercises omnipotent intercession.

Jesus is the Fulfiller of the promises. His first Advent brought us the major
part of the blessings which the Lord has foreordained for his own, and his
second Advent is to bring us the rest. Our spiritual riches are linked with his
ever-adorable person. Because he lives, we live; because he reigns, we reign;
because he is accepted, we are accepted. Soon, at his manifestation, we shall be
manifested; in his triumph, we shall triumph; in his glory, we shall be
glorified. He is himself the Alpha and the Omega of the promises of God: in him
we have found life as sinners, in him we shall find glory as saints. If he be
not risen, our faith is vain; and if he come not a second time, our hope is a
delusion; but, since he has risen from the dead, we are justified; since he will
come in the glory of the Father, we also shall be glorified.

Reader, what hast thou to do with Christ?

All will depend upon thine answer to this question. Dost thou rest alone in Him?
Then the Lord has promised to bless thee, and do thee good; and he will surprise
thee with the amazing manner in which he will do this unto thee. Nothing is too
good for the Father to give to the man who delights in his Son Jesus. On the
other hand, art thou trusting to thine own doings, feelings, prayings, and
ceremonials? Then thou art of the works of the law, and thou art under the
curse. See what we said of the seed of Hagar, the bondwoman; and guess what thy
portion will be. Oh, that thou wouldst quit the house of bondage, and flee to
the home of free grace, and become one whom God will bless According to the
Promise!

God grant this great favour unto thee for the Lord Jesus Christ's sake! Amen.


========================================================================
  CHAPTER 43: BOOK: ADVICE FOR SEEKERS (14 SERMONS)
========================================================================

Advice for Seekers by Charles Haddon Spurgeon

I. Do Not Try to Save Yourself II. Despised Ones Seeking Jesus III. Seekers
Touching Christ IV. Still No Light, and Why?

V. “We Wait for Light” (Isaiah 59:9) VI. The Invitation VII. Something to Be Set
Right VIII. Hindrances to Coming to the Light IX. Seekers Encouraged—The
Substitute

X. Seeking XI. How Luther Sought and Found XII. Saved through Faith XIII. May I
Believe?

XIV. A Needless Question Answered


========================================================================
  CHAPTER 44: 01. DO NOT TRY TO SAVE YOURSELF
========================================================================

I. Do not try to Save Yourself

If you think about it, God's value of heaven and yours are very different
things. His salvation, when he set a price upon it, was to be brought to men
only through the death of his Son. But you think that your good works can win
the heaven which Jesus Christ, the Son of God, procured at the cost of his own
blood! Do you dare to put your miserable life in comparison with the life of
God's obedient Son, who gave himself even to death? Does it not strike you that
you are insulting God? If there is a way to heaven by works, why did he put his
dear Son to all that pain and grief? Why the scenes of Gethsemane? Why the
tragedy on Golgotha, when the thing could be done so easily another way? You
insult the wisdom of God and the love of God.

There is no attribute of God which self-righteousness does not impugn. It
debases the eternal perfections which the blessed Saviour magnified, in order to
exalt the pretensions of the creature which the Almighty spurns as vain and
worthless. The trader may barter his gold for your trinkets and glass beads, but
if you give all that you have to God it would be utterly rejected. He will
bestow the milk and the honey of his mercy without money and without price, but
if you come to him trying to bargain for it, it is all over for you; God will
not give you choice provisions of his love that you do not know how to
appreciate. The great things you propose to do, these works of yours, what
comparison do they bear to the blessing which you hope to obtain? I suppose by
these works you hope to obtain the favour of God and procure a place in heaven.
What is it, then you propose to offer? What could you bring to God? Would you
bring him rivers of oil, or the fat of ten thousand of fed beasts? Suppose you
were to empty Potosi of its silver, and Golcanda should be drained of all its
diamonds; may, count up all the treasures that crouch beneath the surface of the
earth; if you brought them all, what would they be to God? And if you could pile
up all the gold reaching from the depths of the earth to the highest heavens,
what would it be to him? How could all this enrich his coffers or buy your
salvation? Can he be affected by anything you do to augment the sum of his
happiness, or to increase the glory of his kingdom? If he were hungry he would
not tell you. "The cattle upon ten thousand hills are mine," he says (Psalms
50:10). Your goodness may please your fellow-creatures, and your charity may
make them grateful, but will God owe anything to you for your gifts, or be in
debt to you for your influence? Absurd questions! When you have done everything,
what will you be but a poor, unworthy, unprofitable servant? You will not have
done what you ought, much less will there be any balance in your favour to make
atonement for sin, or to purchase for you an inheritance in the realms of light.

You that are going to save yourselves by reforms, and by earnest attempts and
endeavours, let me ask you, if a man could not perform a certain work when his
arm had strength in it, how will he be able to perform it when the bone is
broken? When you were young and inexperienced, you had not yet fallen into evil
habits and customs. Though there was depravity in your nature then, you had not
become bound in the iron net of habit, yet even then you went astray like a lost
sheep and you followed after evil. What reason have you to suppose that you can
suddenly change the bias of your heart, the course of your actions and the tenor
of your life, and become a new man? "Can the Ethiopian change his skin, or the
leopard his spots?" (Jeremiah 13:23). Are there not ten thousand probabilities
against one that as you sinned before you will sin still? You found the pathway
of evil to be so attractive and fascinating that you were enticed into it, and
you will still be enticed and drawn away from that path of integrity which you
are now so firmly resolved to tread. The way to heaven by following the law
given at Mount Sinai is very steep and narrow, and it takes only one wrong step
for a man to be dashed to pieces. Stand at the foot and look up at it if you
dare. On its brow of stone there is the black cloud, out of which lightning
leaps and the blast of the trumpet sounds loud and long. Do you not see Moses
tremble, and you will dare to stand unabashed where Moses is fearful and afraid?
Look upwards, and give up the thought of climbing those steep crags, for no one
has ever striven to clamber up there in the hope of salvation without finding
destruction among the terrors of the way! Be wise, give up that deceitful hope
of salvation which your pride leads you to choose and your presumption would
soon cause you to rue.

Suppose you could do some great thing, which I am sure you cannot, and it were
possible that you could from now on be perfect, and never sin again in thought,
or word, or deed; how would you be able to atone for your past delinquencies?
Shall I call for a resurrection in that graveyard of your memory? Let your sins
rise up for a moment, and pass in review before you. Ah, the sins of your youth
may well frighten you; those midnight sins; those midday sins; those sins
against light and knowledge; those sins of body; those sins of soul! You have
forgotten them, you say, but God has not. Behold at the file! they are all
placed there, all registered in God's daybook, not one forgotten—all to be read
against you in the day of the last assize. How can future obedience make up for
past transgression? The cliff has fallen and though the wave washes up ten
thousand times, it cannot set the cliff up again. The day is bright but still
there was a night, and the brightest day does not obliterate the fact that once
it was dark. The self-righteous man knows that what he is doing cannot satisfy
God, for it cannot satisfy himself; and though he may perhaps drug his
conscience, there is generally enough left of the divine element within the man
to make him feel and know that it is not satisfactory. To believe what God says,
to do what God commands, to take that salvation which God provides—this is man's
highest and best wisdom. Open your Bible. It is the pilgrim's guide, in which
God describes the glory yet to be revealed. This is the one message of the
gospel, "believe and live." Trust in the incarnate Saviour, whom God appointed
to stand in the place of sinners. Trust in him and you shall be saved.


========================================================================
  CHAPTER 45: 02. DESPISED ONES SEEKING JESUS
========================================================================

II. Despised ones Seeking Jesus The most depraved and despised classes of
society formed an inner ring of hearers around our Lord. I gather from this that
he was a most approachable person, that he welcomed human confidence and was
willing that men should commune with him.

Eastern monarchs affected great seclusion, and were likely to surround
themselves with impassible barriers of state. It was very difficult for even
their most loyal subjects to approach them. You remember the case of Esther,
who, even though the monarch was her husband, still risked her life when she
presented herself before King Ahasuerus, for there was a commandment that no one
should come before the king unless they were called, at peril of their lives. It
is not so with the King of kings. His court is far more splendid; his person is
far more worshipful; but you may draw near to him at all times without
hindrance. He has set no men-at-arms around his palace gate. The door of his
house of mercy is wide open. Over the lintel of his palace gate is written, "For
everyone that asketh receiveth; and he that seeketh findeth; and to him that
knocketh it shall be opened" (Matthew 7:7).

Even in our own day great men are not easily approached. There are so many back
stairs to be climbed before you can reach the official who might help you, so
many servants to be passed by, that it is very difficult to achieve your
objective. The good men may be affable enough themselves, but they remind us of
the old Russian fable of the hospitable house-holder in a village who was
willing to help all the poor who came to his door, but who kept so many big dogs
loose in his yard that nobody was able to get to the threshold, and therefore
his personal affability was of no use to anyone. It is not so with our Master.
Though the Lord Jesus Christ is greater than the greatest, and higher than the
highest, he has been pleased to put out of the way everything which might keep
the sinner from entering into his halls of gracious entertainment. From his lips
we hear no threats against intrusion, but hundreds of invitations to enter into
the dearest intimacy. Jesus is to be approached not every now and then, but at
all times, and not by some favoured few, but by all in whose hearts his Holy
Spirit has kindled the desire to enter into his secret presence. The
philosophical teachers of our Lord's day affected very great seclusion. They
considered their teachings to be so profound that they were not to be uttered in
the hearing of the common multitude. "Far hence, ye profane," was their scornful
motto. They stood on a lofty pillar of their fancied self conceit and
occasionally dropped down a stray thought upon the common herd beneath, but they
did not condescend to talk familiarly with them, considering it a dishonour to
their philosophy to communicate it to the multitude. One of the greatest
philosophers wrote over his door, "Let no one who is ignorant of geometry enter
here." But our Lord, compared with whom all wise men are fools—who is, in fact,
the wisdom of God—never drove away a sinner because of his ignorance, never
refused a seeker because he was not yet initiated and had not taken the previous
steps in the ladder of learning, and never permitted any thirsty spirit to be
chased away from the crystal spring of divine truth. His every word was a
diamond, and his lips dropped pearls, but he was never more at home than when
speaking to the common people, and teaching them about the kingdom of God. Our
Lord Jesus is said to be the Mediator between God and man. The office of
mediator implies at once that he should be approachable. A mediator is not a
mediator for one side—he must be close to both the parties between whom he
mediates. If Jesus Christ is to be a perfect mediator between God and man, he
must be able to come so near to God that God shall call him his fellow, and then
he must approach man so closely that he shall not be ashamed to call him
brother. This is precisely the case with our Lord. Do think of this, you who are
afraid of Jesus. He is a mediator, and as a mediator you may come to him.
Jacob's ladder reached from earth to heaven, but if he had cut away half a dozen
of the bottom rungs, what use would the ladder have been? Who could climb up it
to the hill of the Lord? Jesus Christ is the great conjunction between earth and
heaven, but if he will not touch the poor mortal man who comes to him, then of
what use is he to the sons of men? You do need a mediator between your soul and
God; you must not think of coming to God without a mediator; but you do not want
any mediator between yourselves and Christ. There is a necessary qualification
for coming to God—you must not come to God without a perfect righteousness; but
you may come to Jesus without any qualification, and without any righteousness,
because as Mediator he has in himself all the righteousness and fitness that you
require, and is ready to bestow them upon you. You may come boldly to him right
now; he waits to reconcile you to God by his blood.

Another of Christ's offices is that of Priest. That word priest has come to
smell very badly nowadays; but it is a very sweet word as we find it in Holy
Scripture. The word priest does not mean a gaudily-dressed pretender, who stands
apart from other worshippers, two steps higher than the rest of the people, and
professes to have power to dispense pardon for human sin. The true priest was
truly the brother of all the people. There was no man in the whole camp of
Israel so brotherly as Aaron. So much were Aaron and the priests who succeeded
him were so much the first points of contact with men, on God's behalf, that
when a leper became too unclean for anybody else to approach, the last man who
touched him was the priest. The house might be leprous, but the priest went into
it; the man might be leprous, but he talked with him and examined him; and if
afterwards that diseased man was cured, the first person who touched him must be
a priest. "Go, show thyself to the priest," was the command to every recovering
leper; and until the priest had entered into fellowship with him, and had given
him a certificate of health, he could not be received into the Jewish camp. The
priest was the true brother of the people, chosen from among themselves, at all
times to be approached; living in their midst, in the very centre of the camp,
ready to make intercession for the sinful and the sorrowful. Surely, you will
never doubt that if Jesus perfectly sustains the office of priest, as he
certainly does, he must be the most approachable of beings; approachable by the
poor sinner, who has given himself up to despair, whom only a sacrifice can
save; approachable by the foul harlot who is put outside the camp, whom only the
blood can cleanse; approachable by the miserable thief who has to suffer the
punishment of his crimes, whom only the great High Priest can absolve. No other
man may care to touch you, O trembling outcast, but Jesus will. You may be
separated from all of humankind, justly and righteously, by your iniquities, but
you are not separated from that great Friend of sinners who at this very time is
willing that publicans and sinners should draw near to him. As a third office,
let me mention that the Lord Jesus is our Saviour; but I do not see how he can
be a Saviour unless he can be approached by those who need to be saved. The
priest and the Levite passed by on the other side when the bleeding man lay on
the road to Jericho; they were not saviours, therefore, and could not be, but he
was the saviour who came where the man was, stooped over him, and took wine and
oil and poured them into the gaping fissures of his wounds, and lifted him up
with tender love and set him on his own beast, and led him to the inn. He was
the true saviour; and, O sinner, Jesus Christ will come just where you are, and
your wounds of sin, even though they are putrid, will not drive him away from
you. His love shall overcome the nauseating offensiveness of your iniquity, for
he is able and willing to save such as you are. I might mention many other
offices of Christ, but these three are sufficient. Certainly if the Spirit
blesses them, you will be led to see that Jesus is not hard to reach.


========================================================================
  CHAPTER 46: 03. SEEKERS TOUCHING CHRIST
========================================================================

III. Seekers Touching Christ

Some of us have ourselves been healed, and therefore speak from assured
experience. One man I know was secretly bowed down with despondency and
depression of an unusual sort—his life had been spent at the very gates of hell
because of a great sorrow of heart when he was a youth; yet, in a moment, he was
lifted into perfect peace by simply looking to him who was crucified upon the
cross. That one form of healing is typical of others; for all other evils are
overcome in the same manner. Jesus can heal you of your pride; he can deliver
you from anger; he can cure you of sluggishness; he can purge you from envy,
from lasciviousness, from malice, from gluttony, from every form of spiritual
malady. And this he can do, not by the torturing process of penance, or the
exhausting labours of superstitious performance, or the fiery ordeals of
suffering; but the method is simply a word from him, and a look from you, and
all is done. You have only to trust in Jesus and you are saved; made a new
creature in an instant; set on your feet again to start a new life with a new
power within you which shall conquer sin. We who bear this testimony claim to be
believed. We are not liars. Not even for God's honour would we palm a pious
fraud upon you. We have felt in ourselves the healing power of Christ. We have
seen it, and see it every day, in the cases of others, in persons of all ranks,
and of all ages. All who have obeyed the word of Jesus have been made new
creatures by his power. It is not one or two of us that bear this witness; there
are hundreds of thousands who certify to the self-same fact; and not ministers
alone, but other professions and callings. There are tradesmen, there are
gentlemen, there are working men, there are persons high and low, who could say,
"We too are witnesses that Christ can heal the soul."

Here, then, is the marvel—that those who know this do not immediately throng to
Christ to obtain the self-same blessing. The behaviour of those of whom we read
in the Gospels was a rational one. They heard that Christ had healed many, and
their practical logic was, "Let us be healed too!" Where is he? Let us reach
him. Are there crowds about him? Let us jostle one another, let us force our way
into the mass until we touch him, and feel the healing virtue flowing from him.
But now men seem to have taken leave of their reason. They know that the
blessing is available, an eternal blessing not to be weighed with gold, nor
compared with diamonds; and yet they turn their backs upon it! Selfishness
usually attracts men to places where good things are to be gained; but here is
the best thing of all—the possession of a sound soul, the gaining of a new
nature which will enable a man to share eternal glory with angels of light—which
is freely available, yet man, being untrue to himself, does not even let a
right-minded selfishness govern him, turns away from the fountain of all
goodness and goes into the wilderness to perish of eternal thirst. The gospel is
preached to you, and God has not sent it with the intention that after you have
heard it you should seek mercy and not find it. God does not tantalize, he does
not mock the sons of men. He asks you to come to him. Repent and believe, and
you shall be saved. If you come with a broken heart, trusting in Christ, there
is no possibility that he will reject you; otherwise he would not have sent the
gospel to you. There is nothing that so delights Jesus Christ as to save
sinners. I never find that Jesus was in a huff because the people pressed about
him to touch him. No, it gave him divine pleasure to give out his healing power.
You who are in a trade are never happier than when business is brisk; and my
Lord Jesus, who follows the trade of soul-winning, is never happier than when
his great business is moving on rapidly. What pleasure it gives a physician when
at last he brings a person through a severe illness into health! I think the
medical profession must be one of the happiest engagements in the world when a
man is skilful in it. Our Lord Jesus feels a most divine pleasure as he bends
over a broken heart and binds it up. It is the very heaven of Christ's soul to
be doing good to the sons of men. You misjudge him if you think he wants to be
argued with and persuaded to have mercy; he gives it as freely as the sun pours
out light, as the heavens drop with dew and as clouds yield their rain. It is
his honour to bless sinners; it makes him a name, and an everlasting sign that
shall never be removed.

I know that I, too, once belied him; when I felt my sins to be a great burden I
said within myself, "I will go to Jesus, but perhaps he will reject me." I
thought I had much to feel and to do to make myself ready for him, and I
therefore did this and that, but the more I did the worse I became. I was like
the woman who spent her money on physicians and did not get better, but rather
grew worse. I fully understood that there was life in a look at Christ, that all
I needed to do was simply to trust, to come as I was and put my case into his
dear pierced hands, and leave it there, yet I still did not think it could be
so; it seemed so simple—how could it be true? Was that all? I thought when I
came to him he would say to me, "Sinner, you have rejected me so long, you have
mocked me by saying prayers which you did not feel; you have been a hypocrite
and joined with God's people in singing my praises when you did not praise me in
your heart." I thought he would chide me and bring ten thousand sins to my
remembrance. Instead of that, it took only a word, and it was all done. I looked
to him, the burden was gone. I could have sung, "Hosanna! Blessed is he that
cometh in the name of the Lord, with pardon in his right hand and acceptance in
his left, with abundant blessings to the least deserving of the sons of men."
Now, I have to tell you that Jesus Christ still has the same ability to save as
he had when he walked on earth. He ever lives to make intercession for sinners.
He is therefore able to save those who come to him; and it is still true that he
who comes will not be cast out. There has never been an instance of a man who
trusted Christ and perished, and there never shall be an instance. Do not delay
in trusting Christ. Do not entertain a hope that it will ever be easier to trust
Jesus than it is now. Do not think that you will ever be in a better state for
coming to him than you are in now. The best state in all the world for washing
is to be filthy; the best state in all the world to obtain help from a physician
is to be terribly sick; the best state for asking for alms is to be a beggar. Do
not try to patch up those rags, nor to improve your character, nor to make
yourself better before you come to Christ. Come in all your poverty and
vileness, just as you are, and say to him, "My Lord and my God, you have
suffered as a man for all the sins of all those who trust you: I trust you;
accept me, give me peace and joy." And tell the world, I ask you, whether he
accepts you or not. If he casts you away, you will be the very first—then let us
know about it; but if he receives you, you will be only one among ten thousand
who have been accepted—then publish it so that our faith may be confirmed.

Never be content with merely coming close to Christ. When there is a gracious
season in a church, and people are converted, many others rest satisfied because
they have been in the congregation where works of mercy have been performed. It
is dreadful to reflect that there are in our churches men and women who are
perfectly satisfied with having spent Sunday in a place of worship. Now, suppose
a man has leprosy and he goes to the place where Jesus is: he sees the people
thronging to get near, and he joins the press; he pushes on for a certain length
of time, and then he returns home perfectly content because he has joined the
crowd. The next day the great Master is dispensing healing virtue right and
left, and this same man joins the throng, and once more elbows himself tolerably
near to the Saviour, and then retires. "Well," he says, "I got into the crowd; I
pressed and squeezed, and made my way, and so I was in the way, perhaps I might
have got a blessing." Now that would be precisely similar to the condition of
hundreds and thousands of people who go to a place of worship on Sunday. There
is the gospel; they come to hear it; they come next Sunday, there is the gospel
again; they listen to it, and they go their way each time. "Fool!" you say to
the man with leprosy, "Why, you did nothing; getting into the crowd was nothing;
if you did not touch the Lord who dispensed the healing, you lost all your time;
and besides, you incurred responsibility because you got near to him, and yet
for not putting out your hand to touch him, you lost the opportunity." It is the
same for you good people, who go where Jesus Christ is faithfully preached. You
come and go, and come and go continually; and what fools you are, what gross
fools, to get into the throng and to be satisfied with that, and never touch
Christ! Tell me of your church-goings and your chapel-goings! They are not a
morsel of use to you unless you touch the Saviour through them.

I must caution you not to be content with touching those who are healed. There
are many in the crowd who, having touched the Master, clapped their hands and
said, "Glory be to God, my withered arm is restored," "My eyes are opened," "My
dropsy has vanished," "My palsy is gone." One after another they praise God for
his great wonders; and sometimes their friends who were sick would go away with
them and say, "What a mercy! Let us go home together." They would hear all about
it, and talk about it, and tell it to others; but all the while, though they
rejoiced in the good that was done to others, and sympathized in it, they never
touched Jesus for themselves. Noah's carpenters built the ark, but were all
drowned. Oh, I beseech you, do not be satisfied with talking about revivals, and
hearing about conversions; get an interest in them. Let nothing content any one
of us but actual spiritual contact with the Lord Jesus Christ. Let us never
sleep or slumber until we have really looked to that great sacrifice which God
has lifted up for the sins of men. Let us not think of Christ as another man's
Saviour, but be passionately in earnest till we get him for our own. A young man
once said to me, "I want to know what I must do to be saved." I reminded of that
verse,

'A guilty, weak, and helpless worm, On Thy kind arms I fall.'

He said, "Sir, I cannot fall." "Oh," I said, "You do not understand me. I do not
mean a fall which demands any strength in you; I mean a fall caused by the
absence of all strength." It is to tumble down into Christ's arms because you
cannot stand upright. Faint into the arms of Christ; that is faith. Just give up
doing, give up depending upon anything that you are, or do, or ever hope to be,
and depend upon the complete merits, and finished work, and precious blood of
Jesus Christ. If you do this you are saved. Anything of your own doing spoils it
all. You must not have a jot or a tittle of your own; you must give up relying
upon your prayers, your tears, your baptism, your repentance, and even your
faith itself. Your reliance is to be on nothing but that which is in Jesus
Christ. Those dear hands, those blessed feet, are ensigns of his love—look to
them. That bleeding, martyred, murdered person is the grand display of the heart
of the ever blessed God. Look to it. Look to the Saviour's pangs, griefs and
groans. These are punishments for human sin. This is God's wrath spending itself
on Christ instead of spending itself on the believer. Believe in Jesus, and it
is certain that he suffered this for you. Trust in him to save you, and you are
saved.


========================================================================
  CHAPTER 47: 04. STILL NO LIGHT, AND WHY?
========================================================================

IV. Still no Light, and Why?

It shall be my happy task to endeavour to assist into the light those who want
to flee from darkness. We will do so by trying to answer the query, "How is it
that I, wanting light, have not found it yet? Why am I left to grope like a
blind man for the wall, and stumble at noon as if it were the night? Why has the
Lord not revealed himself to me?" You may have been seeking the light in the
wrong place. Many, like Mary, seek the living among the dead. It is possible
that you may have been the victim of the false doctrine that peace with God can
be found in the use of ceremonies.

It is possible, too, that you have been looking for salvation in the mere belief
of a certain creed. You have thought that if you could discover pure orthodoxy,
and could then consign your soul into its mould, you would be a saved man; and
you have consequently believed unreservedly, as far as you have been able to do
so, the set of truths which have been handed to you by the tradition of your
ancestors. It may be that your creed is Calvanistic, it is possible that it is
Arminian, it may be Protestant, it may be Romish, it may be truth, it may be a
lie; but, believe me, solid peace with God is not to be found through the mere
reception of any creed, however true or scriptural. Mere head-notion is not the
road to heaven. "Ye must be born again" means a good deal more than you must
believe certain dogmas. It is of the utmost possible importance, I grant you,
that you should search the Scriptures, for in them you think you have eternal
life; but recollect how our Lord upbraided the Pharisees. He told them that they
searched the Scriptures, but he added, "Ye will not come to Me that ye might
have life" (John 5:40). You stop short at the Scriptures, and therefore short of
eternal life. The study of these, good as it is, cannot save you; you must press
beyond this—you must come to the living, personal Christ, once crucified, but
now living to plead at the right hand of God, or else your acceptance of the
soundest creed cannot effect the salvation of your soul. You may be misled in
some other manner; some other mistaken way of seeking peace may have beguiled
you, and if so, I earnestly pray that you may see the mistake. You must
understand that there is only one door to salvation, and that is Christ; there
is one way, and that is Christ; one truth, and that is Christ; one life, and
that is Christ. Salvation lies in Jesus only; it does not lie in you, in your
doings, or your feelings, or your knowings, or your resolutions. In him all life
and light for the sons of men are stored up by the mercy of God the Father. This
may be one reason why you have not found the light; because you have sought it
in the wrong place.

It is possible that you may have sought it in the wrong spirit. When we ask for
pardon, reconciliation and salvation we must remember to whom we speak, and who
we are who ask the favour. Some appear to deal with God as if he were bound to
give them salvation; as if salvation indeed were the inevitable result of a
round of performances, or the deserved reward of a certain amount of virtue.
They refuse to see that salvation is a pure gift of God, not of works, not the
result of merit, but of free favour only; not of man, neither by man, but of the
Lord alone. Though the Lord has placed it on record in his Word, in the plainest
language, that "it is not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of
God that showeth mercy" (Romans 9:16) yet most men in their hearts imagine that
everlasting life is tied to duties and earned by service. You must abandon such
vainglorious notions; thou must sue out thy pardon, as our law courts put it, in
formâ pauperis, you must come before God as a humble petitioner, pleading the
promises of mercy, abhorring all idea of merit, confessing that if the Lord
condemns you he has a right to do it, and if he saves you, it will be an act of
pure gratuitous mercy, a deed of sovereign grace. Oh, too many of you seekers
hold your heads too high; to enter the lowly gate of light you must stoop. On
the bended knee is the penitent's true place—"God be merciful to me, a sinner,"
is the penitent's true prayer. If God should condemn you, you could never
complain of injustice, for you have deserved it a thousand times; and if those
prayers of yours were never answered, if no mercy ever came, you could not
accuse the Lord, for you have no right to be heard. He could righteously
withhold an answer of peace if he so willed. Confess that you are an
undeserving, ill-deserving, hell-deserving sinner and begin to pray as you have
never prayed before. Cry out of the depths of self-abasement if you want to be
heard. Come as a beggar, not as a creditor. Come to crave, not to demand. Use
only this argument, "Lord, hear me, for you are gracious, and Jesus died; I cry
to you as a condemned criminal who seeks pardon. Deliver me from going down into
the pit, that I may praise your name." This harbouring of a proud spirit, I
fear, has been a great source of mischief with many, and if it has been so with
you, amend it and go now with humble and contrite hearts, in lowliness and
brokenness of spirit, to your Father whom you have offended, for he will surely
accept you as his children.

Others have not obtained peace, I fear, because they do not yet have a clear
idea of the true way of finding it. Although it has been preached to us so
often, it is still little understood. The way of peace with God is seen through
a haze by most men, so that no matter how plainly you put it, they will, if it
is possible, misunderstand you. Your salvation does not depend upon what you do,
but upon what Christ did when he offered himself as a sacrifice for sin. All
your salvation takes root in the death throes of Calvary; the great Substitute
bore your sin and suffered its penalty. Your sin shall never destroy you if upon
that bloody tree the Lord's chosen High Priest made a full expiation for your
sins; they shall not be laid against you any more forever. What thou hast to do
is but to accept what Jesus has finished. I know your idea is that you are to
bring something to him; but that vainglorious idea has ruined many, and will
ruin more. When you are brought empty-handed, made willing to accept a free and
full salvation from the hand of the Crucified, then, and then only, will you be
saved.

'There is life for a look at the Crucified One.' But men will not look to the
cross. No, they conspire to raise another cross; or they aspire to adorn that
cross with jewels; or they labour to wreathe it with sweet flowers; but they
will not give a simple look to the Saviour, and rely alone on him. Yet no soul
can ever obtain peace with God by any other means; while this means is so
effectual that it has never failed, and never shall. The waters of Abana and
Pharpar are preferred by proud human nature, but the waters of Jordan alone can
take away the leprosy (see 2 Kings 5:1-14). Our repentings, our doings, our
resolutions, these are simply broken cisterns; but the only life-draught is to
be found in the fountain of living water opened up by our Immanuel's death. Do
you understand that a simple trust, a sincere dependence, a hearty reliance upon
Christ is the way of salvation? If you do know this, may the God who taught you
to understand the way give you grace to run in it, and then your light has come;
arise and shine. Your peace has come, for Christ has bought it with his blood.
For as many as trust in him he has been punished; their sins are gone:

Lost as in a shoreless flood, Drown'd in the Redeemer's blood;

Pardon'd soul, how bless'd art thou, Justified from all things now.

If none of these arguments have touched your case, let me further suggest that
perhaps you have not found light because you have sought it in a half-hearted
manner. None enter heaven who are only half-inclined to go there. Cold prayers
ask God to refuse them. When a man manifestly does not value the mercy which he
asks, and would be perfectly content not to receive it, it is small wonder if he
is denied. Many a sinner lies, year after year, freezing outside the door of
God's mercy, because he has never thoroughly bestirred himself to take the
kingdom of heaven by violence. If you are willing to be unsaved, you shall be
left to perish; but if you are inwardly set and resolved that you will give God
no rest until you win a pardon from him, he will give you your heart's desire.
The man who must be saved, shall be. The man whose heart is set on finding the
way to Zion's hill, shall find that way. I believe that usually a sense of our
pardon comes to us when, Samson-like, we grasp the posts of mercy's door with
desperate vehemence, as though we would pluck them up, post and bar and all,
rather than remain shut out any longer from peace and safety. Strong crying and
tears, groanings of spirit, vehement longings, and ceaseless pleadings—these are
the weapons which, through the blood of Jesus, win us the victory in our warfare
of seeking the Lord. Perhaps, then, you have not bestirred yourself as you
should have done. May the Lord help you to be a mighty wrestler and then a
prevailing prince!


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  CHAPTER 48: 05. “WE WAIT FOR LIGHT” (ISAIAH 59:9)
========================================================================

V. 'We wait for Light'

I address those who sincerely want to obtain the true and heavenly light, who
have waited hoping to receive it, but instead of obtaining it are in a worse, at
least in a sadder, state than they were. They are almost driven into the dark
foreboding that for them no light will ever come, they shall be prisoners
chained forever in the valley of the shadow of death.

These people are in some degree aware of their natural darkness. They are
looking for light. They are not content with their obscurity, they are waiting
for brightness. There are a few who are not content to be what their first birth
has made them; they discover in their nature much evil and would be glad to get
rid of it; they find in their understanding much ignorance, and they long to be
illuminated; they do not understand Scripture when they read it, and though they
hear gospel terms, they still fail to grasp gospel-thought. They pant to escape
from this ignorance, they desire to know the truth which saves the soul; and
their desire is not only to know it in theory, but to know it by its practical
power upon their inner selves. They really and anxiously want to be delivered
from the state of nature, which they feel to be a dangerous one, and to be
brought into the glorious liberty of the children of God. Oh, these are the best
kind of hearers, these in whom right desires have begun to be awakened. Men who
are dissatisfied with the darkness are evidently not altogether dead, for the
dead shall slumber in the catacombs, heedless as to whether it is noon or night.
Such men evidently have not fallen completely asleep, for they who slumber sleep
better because of the darkness; they ask for no sunbeams to molest their dreams.
Such people are evidently not completely blind, because it makes no difference
to the blind whether the sun floods the landscape with glory, or night conceals
it with her black veil. Those to whom our thoughts are directly turned are
somewhat awakened, aroused, and bestirred, and this is no small blessing for,
alas, most people are a stolid mass regarding spiritual things, and the preacher
might almost as hopefully strive to create a soul within the ribs of death, or
extort warm tears of pity from Sicilian marble, as evoke spiritual emotions from
the people of this generation. So these people are hopeful in their condition
who, just as the trees twist their branches toward the sunlight, they long after
Jesus, the light and life of men.

Moreover, these persons have a high idea of what the light is. They call it
brightness. They wait for it, and are grieved because it does not come. If you
greatly value spiritual life you have not made a mistake; if you count it a
priceless thing to obtain an interest in Christ, the forgiveness of your sins,
and peace with God, you judge according to solemness. You shall never exaggerate
in your valuation of the one thing necessary. It is true that those who trust in
God are a happy people; it is true that to be brought into sonship, and adopted
into the family of the great God, is a boon for which kings might well exchange
their diadems. You cannot think too highly of the blessings of grace; I would
rather incite in you a sacred covetousness after them than in the remotest
degree lower your estimate of their preciousness. Salvation is such a blessing
that heaven hangs upon it; if you win grace you have the germ of heaven within
you, the security, the pledge and earnest of everlasting bliss. So far, again,
there is much that is hopeful in you. It is good that you loathe the darkness
and prize the light. The people I want to speak with have some hope that they
may yet obtain this light; in fact, they are waiting for it, hopefully waiting,
and are somewhat disappointed that after waiting for the light, instead,
obscurity has come. They are evidently astonished at the failure of their hopes.
They are amazed to find themselves walking in darkness, when they had fondly
hoped that the candle of the Lord would shine round about them. I would
encourage in you that spark of hope, for despair is one of the most terrible
hindrances to the reception of the gospel. So long as awakened sinners cherish a
hope of mercy, we have hope for them. We hope, O seeker, that before long you
will be able to sing of pardon bought with blood, and when this scene is closed,
shall enter through the gates into the pearly city amongst the blessed who
forever see the face of the well-beloved. Though it may seem too good to be
true, yet even you, in your calmer moments, think that one day you will rejoice
that Christ is yours, and take your seat amongst his people, though the poorest
of them all, in your own estimation. Then you imagine in your heart how
fervently you will love your Redeemer, how rapturously you will kiss the very
dust of his feet, how gratefully you will bless him who has lifted the poor from
the dunghill and set him among princes. May you no longer look through the
window wistfully at the banquet, but come in to sit at the table, and feed upon
Christ, rejoicing with his chosen! The people I am describing are those who have
learned to plead their case with God. "We wait for light, but only see
obscurity; for brightness, but we walk in darkness." It is a declaration of
inward feelings, a laying bare of the hearts agonies to the Most High. Although
you have not yet found the peace you seek, it is good that you have begun to
pray. Perhaps you think it is poor praying; indeed, you hardly care to call it
prayer at all, but God does not judge as you do. A groan is heard in heaven; a
deep-fetched sigh and a falling tear are prevalent weapons at the throne of God.
Yes, your soul cries to God, and you cannot help it. When you are about your
daily work you find yourself sighing, "Oh, that my load of guilt were gone! Oh,
that I could call the Lord my Father with an unfaltering tongue!" Night after
night and day after day this desire rises from you like the morning mist from
the valleys. You would tear off your right arm, and pluck out your right eye, if
you might gain the unspeakable benefit of salvation in Jesus Christ. You are
sincerely anxious for reconciliation with God, and your anxiety reveals itself
in prayer and supplication. I hope these prayers will continue. I trust you will
never cease your crying. May the Holy Spirit constrain you to continue to sigh
and groan. Like the importunate woman (Luke 18:1-8), may you press your case
until the gracious answer is granted through the merits of Jesus. So far things
are hopeful for you; but when I say hopeful, I wish I could say much more, for
mere hopefulness is not enough. It is not enough to desire, it is not enough to
seek, it is not enough to pray; you must actually obtain, you must actually lay
hold on eternal life. You will never enjoy comfort and peace till you have
passed out of the merely hopeful stage into a better and a brighter one, by
making sure of your interest in the Lord Jesus by a living, appropriating faith.
In the exalted Saviour all the gifts and graces which you need are stored up, in
readiness to supply your wants. Oh, may you come to his fullness, and out of it
receive grace for grace! The person I wish to comfort may be described by one
other touch of the pen. He is one who is quite willing to lay bare his heart
before God, to confess his desires, whether right or wrong, and to expose his
condition, whether unhealthy or sound. While we try to cloak anything from God,
we are both wicked and foolish. It shows a rebellious spirit when we have a
desire to hide away from our Maker; but when a man uncovers his wound, invites
inspection of its sore, bids the surgeon cut away the leprous film which covered
its corruption, and says to him, "Here, probe into its depths, see what evil
there is in it; do not spare me, but make a sure cure of the wound," then he is
in a fair way to be recovered. When a man is willing to make God his confessor,
and freely, and without hypocrisy, pours out his heart like water before the
Lord, there is hope for him. You have told the Lord your position, you have
spread your petitions before him—I trust you will continue to do so until you
find relief; but I have yet a higher hope, namely, that you may soon obtain
peace with God through Jesus Christ our Lord.


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  CHAPTER 49: 06. THE INVITATION
========================================================================

VI. The Invitation

Soul dost thou desire eternal life? Is there within your soul a hungering and a
thirsting after such things that may satisfy your spirit and make you live
forever? Then "Come, for now all things are ready" (Luke 14:17)—all, not some,
but all. There is nothing that you need between here and heaven which is not
provided in Jesus Christ, in his person and in his work. All things are ready:
life for your death, forgiveness for your sin, cleansing for your filth,
clothing for your nakedness, joy for your sorrow, strength for your weakness,
indeed, more than anything you could ever want is stored up in the boundless
nature and work of Christ. You must not say,"I cannot come because I do not have
this, or do not have that." Are you to prepare the feast? Are you to provide
anything? Are you bringing even salt or water? You do not know your true
condition, or you would not dream of such a thing. The great householder himself
has provided the whole of the feast, you have nothing to do with the provision
but to enjoy it. If you lack anything, come and take what you lack; the greater
your need the greater is the reason why you should come where all things that
your need can possibly want will be at once supplied. If you are so needy that
you have nothing good at all about you, all things are ready. When God has
provided all things, what more could you possibly provide? It would be a
disgraceful insult if you thought of adding to his "all things"; it would be a
presumptuous competing with the provisions of the Great King, and this he will
not endure. All that you are lacking between the gates of hell, where you now
lie, and the gates of heaven, to which grace will bring you if you believe—all
is provided and prepared in Jesus Christ the Saviour. And all things are ready.
Dwell on that word. The oxen and the fatlings were killed; and what is more,
they were prepared to be eaten, they were ready to be feasted on, they smoked on
the board. It is something when the king gives orders for the slaughter of so
many bullocks for the feast, but the feast is not ready then; and when the
victims fall beneath the axe, and they are stripped and hung up ready for the
fire, something has been done, but they are still not ready. It is only when the
joints are served hot and steaming upon the table, and everything else that is
wanted is brought out and laid in proper order for the banquet that all things
are ready, and this is the case now. At this very moment you will find the feast
is in the best possible condition; it was never better and never can be better
than it is now. All things are ready, in the exact condition that you need them
to be, in exactly the right condition that is best for your soul's comfort and
enjoyment. All things are ready; nothing needs to be further mellowed or
sweetened, everything is as perfect as eternal love can make it. But notice the
word "now." "All things are now ready"—just now, at this moment. At feasts, you
know, the good housewife is often troubled if the guests come late. She would be
sorry if they came half an hour too soon, but half an hour too late spoils
everything, and she is in a great state of fret and worry when all things are
ready yet her friends still delay. Leave food in the oven awhile, and it does
not seem to be "now ready," but more than ready, and even spoiled. So the great
householdler lays stress upon this, all things are now ready, therefore come at
once. He does not say that if you delay for another seven years all things will
then be ready: God grant that long before that space of time you may have got
beyond the need to be persuaded to become a taster of the feast, but he says
that everything is ready now, just now. Just now that your heart is so heavy and
your mind is so careless, that your spirit is so wandering—all things are ready
now.

If the reason why a sinner is to come is because all things are ready, then it
is idle for him to say, "But I am not ready." It is clear that all the readiness
required on man's part is a willingness to come and receive the blessing which
God has provided. There is nothing else necessary; if men are willing to come,
they may come, they will come. Where the Lord has been pleased to touch the will
so that man has a desire towards Christ, where the heart really hungers and
thirsts after righteousness, that is all the readiness which is wanted. All the
fitness he requires is that first you feel your need of him (and that he gives
you), and that secondly, in feeling your need of him you are willing to come to
him. Willingness to come is everything. A readiness to believe in Jesus, a
willingness to cast the soul on him, a preparedness to accept him just as he is,
because you feel that he is just the Saviour that you need—that is all: there
was no other readiness, there could have been none, in the case of those who
were poor and blind, and lame and maimed, yet came to the feast. The text does
not say, "You are ready, therefore come"; that is a legal way of putting the
gospel; but it says, "All things are ready, the gospel is ready, therefore you
are to come." As for your readiness, all the readiness that is possibly wanted
is a readiness which the Spirit gives us—namely, willingness to come to Jesus.

Now notice that the unreadiness of those who were asked arose out of their
possessions and out of their abilities. One would not come because he had bought
a piece of land. What a great heap Satan casts up between the soul and the
Saviour! With worldly possessions and good deeds he builds an earthwork of huge
dimensions between the sinner and his Lord. Some gentlemen have too many acres
ever to come to Christ: they think too much of the world to think much of him.
Many have too many fields of good works in which they are growing crops on which
they pride themselves, and these cause them to feel that they are persons of
great importance. Many a man cannot come to Christ for all things because he has
so much already. Others could not come because they had so much to do, and could
do it well—one had bought five yoke of oxen and he was going to prove them. He
was a strong man well able to plow; the reason why he did not come was because
he had so much ability. Thousands are kept away from grace by what they have and
by what they can do. Emptiness is more preparatory to a feast than fullness. How
often does it happen that poverty and inability help to lead the soul to Christ.
When a man thinks he is rich he will not come to the Saviour. When a man dreams
that he is able at any time to repent and believe, and to do everything for
himself that is wanted, he is not likely to come and by a simple faith repose in
Christ. It is not what you have not, but what you have that keeps many of you
from Christ. Sinful Self is a devil, but Righteous Self is seven devils. The man
who feels himself guilty may for a while be kept away by his guilt, but the man
who is self-righteous will never come; until the Lord has taken his pride away
from him he will still refuse the feast of free grace. The possession of
abilities and honours and riches keeps men from coming to the Redeemer. But on
the other hand, personal condition does not constitute an unfitness for coming
to Christ, for the sad condition of those who became guests did not debar them
from the supper. Some were poor, and doubtless wretched and ragged; they did not
have a penny to bless themselves with, as we say. Their garments were tattered,
perhaps worse, they were filthy; they were not fit to be near respectable
people, they would certainly be no credit to my Lord's table; but those who went
to bring them in did not search their pockets, nor look at their coats, but they
fetched them in. They were poor, but the messengers were told to bring in the
poor, and therefore they brought them. Their poverty did not prevent their being
ready; and Oh, poor soul, if you are poor literally, or poor spiritually,
neither sort of poverty constitutes an unfitness for divine mercy. If you are
brought to your last penny, or even if that penny is spent and you have pawned
everything you have, yet are still up to your eyes in debt and think that there
is nothing left for you but to be laid by the heels in prison forever,
nevertheless you may come, poverty and all.

Another class of them were maimed, and so were not very attractive in
appearance: an arm had been lopped off, or an eye had been gouged out. One had
lost a nose, and another a leg. They were in all stages and shapes of
dismemberment. Sometimes we turn our heads away, and feel that we would rather
give anything than look upon beggars who show their wounds, and describe how
they were maimed. But it did not matter how badly they were disfigured; they
were brought in, and not one of them was repulsed because of the ugly cuts he
had received. So, poor soul, however Satan may have torn and lopped you, and
whatsoever condition he may have brought you to, so that you feel ashamed to
live; nevertheless this does not make you unfit for coming, you may come to his
table of grace just as you are. Moral disfigurements are soon rectified when
Jesus takes the character in hand. Come to him, however sadly you are injured by
sin.

There were others who were lame. They had lost a leg, or it was of no use to
them, and they could not come except with the help of a crutch; but nevertheless
that was no reason why they were not welcome. Ah, if you find it difficult to
believe, that is no reason why you should not come and receive the grand
absolution which Jesus Christ is ready to bestow upon you. Lame with doubting
and distrusting, nevertheless come to the supper and say, "Lord, I believe; help
my unbelief."

Others were blind, and when they were told to come they could not see the way,
but in that case the messenger was not told to tell them to come, he was
commanded to bring them, and a blind man can come if he is brought. All that was
wanted was willingness to be led by the hand in the right direction. Now you who
cannot fully understand the gospel as you wish to do, who are puzzled and
muddled, put your hand into the hand of Jesus, and be willing to believe what
you cannot comprehend, and to grasp in confidence that which you are not yet
able to measure with your understanding. The blind, however ignorant or
uninstructed they are, shall not be kept away because of that.

Then there were the men in the highways, I suppose they were beggars; and the
men in the hedges, I suppose they were hiding, and were probably thieves; but
nevertheless they were told to come, and though they were highwaymen and
hedge-birds, even that did not prevent their coming and finding welcome. Though
outcasts, spiritual gypsies, people that nobody cared for; whatever they might
be, that was not the question, they were to come because all things were ready.
Come in rags, come in filth, come maimed, come covered with sores, come in all
sorts of filthiness and abomination, yet because all things are ready they were
to be brought or to be compelled to come in.

I think it was the very thing, which in any one of these people looked like
unfitness, which was a help to them. It is a great truth that what we regard as
unfitness is often our truest fitness. I want you to notice these poor, blind
and lame people. Some of those who were invited would not come because they had
bought some land, or five yoke of oxen, but when the messenger went up to the
poor man in rags and said, "Come to the supper," it is quite clear he would not
say he had bought a field, or oxen, for he could not do it, he did not have a
penny to do the thing with, so he was delivered from that temptation. And when a
man is invited to come to Christ and he says, "I do not want him, I have a
righteousness of my own," he will stay away; but when the Lord Jesus came along
to me I was never tempted in that way, because I had no righteousness of my own,
and could not have made one if I had tried. I know some who could not patch up a
garment of righteousness if they were to put all their rags together, and this
is a great help to their receiving the Lord Jesus. What a blessedness it is to
have such a sense of soul-poverty that you will never stay away from Christ
because of what you possess.

Some could not come because they had married a wife. Now I think it very likely
that those people who were maimed and cut were so injured that they had no wife,
and perhaps could not get anybody to have them. Well then, they did not have
that temptation to stay away. They were too maimed to attract the eye of anybody
who was looking for beauty, and therefore they were not tempted that way. But
they found at the ever-blessed supper of the Lamb an everlasting wedlock which
was infinitely better. Thus do souls lose earthly joys and comforts, and by the
loss they gain supremely: they are therefore made willing to close in with
Christ and find a higher comfort and a higher joy. That maiming which looked
like unfitness turned out to be fitness.

One excuse made was, "I have bought five yoke of oxen, and I go to prove them."
The lame could not do that. When the messenger touched the lame man on the
shoulder and said, "Come," he could not say, "I am going out tonight to plow
with my new teams." He had never been over the fields since he had lost his leg,
so he could not make such an excuse. The blind man could not say, "I have bought
a piece of land and I must go to see it"; he was free from all lusts of the eye,
and so was all the more ready to be led to the supper. When a soul feels its own
sinfulness, and wretchedness and lost estate, it thinks itself unfit to come to
Christ, but this is an assistance to it, since it prevents its looking to
anything else but Christ, kills its excuses, and makes it free to accept
salvation by grace. But how about the men that were in the highway? Well, it
seems to me that they were already on the road, and at least out of their
houses, if they had any. If they were out there begging, they were more ready to
accept an invitation to a meal of victuals, for it was that they were singing
for. A man who is out of the house of his own self-righteousness, though he be a
great sinner, is in a more favourable position and more likely to come to Christ
than he who prides himself on his supposed self-righteousness.


========================================================================
  CHAPTER 50: 07. SOMETHING TO BE SET RIGHT
========================================================================

VII. Something to be set Right When a man does wrong, and yet will not confess
it, how wrong he must be! Or when, having confessed it, he does not feel proper
shame; or after feeling ashamed for a while he returns to the same evil like the
dog to his vomit, how deep must the evil be in his moral nature, how terribly
diseased he must be, inasmuch as he does not feel sin to be sin at all! When a
man has done wrong and knows it, and stands with bitter repentance to confess
the evil, why, you think hopefully of him; after all, there are good points
about the man; there is a vitality in him that will throw out the disease. But
when the villain, having perpetrated a grave and causeless offence, does not for
a moment acknowledge he has done wrong, but continues calmly to perpetrate the
offence again; ah, then, where is there any good in him? Is he not thoroughly
bad? Now, you are like that. If you were at all right with God, you would fall
at your Father's feet, and never rise until you were forgiven; your tears would
flow day and night until you had the assurance of pardon. But since your heart
seems to yourself to be made of hell-hardened steel, and to be like a millstone
that feels nothing, then there is need for healing, and you seem the very man
whom Christ came to save, for he came not to call the righteous but sinners to
repentance, not to save those who had no need for healing but to heal those like
you, whose need is desparate indeed. As if to prove your own need of healing,
you are, according to your own statement, unable to pray. You have been trying
to pray lately, and wished you could. You put yourself upon your knees, but your
heart does not talk with God; a horrible dread comes over you, or else frivolous
and vain thoughts distract you. "Oh," you have said, "I would give a thousand
pounds for one tear of repentance; I would be ready to pluck out my eyes if I
could call upon God as the poor publican did, with 'God be merciful to me a
sinner.' I once thought it the easiest thing in the world to pray, but now I
find that a true prayer is beyond my power." You do need healing indeed,
possessed with a dumb devil, and all your other devils also, and unable to cry
out for mercy; yours is a sad case. You need healing, and I cannot help
repeating to you, "He healed them that had need of healing"; why should he not
heal you?

Ah, but you tell me your feelings, your desires after good things are very often
dampened. Perhaps you are sincerely in earnest, but tomorrow you may be just as
careless as ever. The other day you went into your chamber and wrestled with
God, but a temptation came across your path, and you were as thoughtless about
divine things as if you had never been aroused to a sense of their value. Ah!
this shows your need for healing. You are vile indeed when you dare to trifle
with eternity, to sport with death and judgment, and to be at ease while in
danger of hell—your heart indeed needs healing; and though I grieve that you
should be in such a plight, yet I rejoice that I am able to add, "He healed
those who had need of healing."

Though you know your case is bad, at times you set up a kind of self-repentance
and try to justify yourself in the sight of God. You say, "I have repented, or
tried to do so; I have prayed, or tried to pray; I have done all I can to be
saved, and God will not save me." That is to say, you throw the blame of your
damnation upon God, and make yourself out to be righteous in his sight. You know
this is wrong. If you are not saved, it is because you will not believe in
Jesus. There is the only hitch and the only difficulty. Your damnation is not of
God, but of yourself; it is necessitated by your own wilful wickedness in not
believing in Christ; but inasmuch as you are so wicked as to dare to excuse
yourself, you do need healing, you do urgently need to be saved. But, then, the
minute that you have thus excused yourself, you rush to the opposite extreme;
you declare that you have sinned past hope, that you deserve to be now in hell,
and that God can never forgive you. You deny the mercy of God, you deny the
power of Christ to forgive you and cleanse you; you fly in the face of God's
Word, and you make him out to be a liar. When he tells you that if you trust
Jesus you shall find peace, you tell him it is not possible there can be any
peace to you; when he reminds you that he never rejected one, you insinuate that
he will reject you; you thus insult the Divine Majesty by denying the
truthfulness and honesty of God. You do need healing when you allow wicked
despair to get the mastery of you like this; you are far gone, very far gone,
but I rejoice to know that you are still among those Jesus is able to heal. He
came to those who needed healing, and you cannot deny you are one of those. Why,
even Satan himself will not have the impudence to tell you that you have no need
of healing. Oh, if only you would cast yourself into the Saviour's arms—not
trying to make yourself out to be good, but acknowledging all that I have laid
to your charge, and then, trusting as a sinner to that Lamb of God that takes
away the sin of the world.

Remember you need healing, for unless you are healed of these sins, and of all
these wicked tendencies and thoughts, as sure as you are a living man you will
be cast into hell. I know of no truth that ever causes me such pain to preach as
this, not that sinners will be damned, awful though the truth of that is, but
that awakened sinners will be damned unless they believe in Jesus. You must not
make a Christ out of your tears, you must not hope to find safety in your bitter
thoughts and cruel despairs. Unless you believe you shall never be established.
Unless you come to Christ, you may be convinced of sin, of righteousness and
judgment too, but those convictions will only be preludes to your destruction.
You call yourself a seeker, but until you are a finder you are an enemy to God,
and God is angry with you every day. I have no alternative for you, however
tender and broken-hearted you may be, but this one—believe and live; refuse to
believe, and you must perish, for your broken-heartedness, and tears, and
professed contrition can never stand in the place of Christ. You must have faith
in Jesus, or you must die eternally.

I need not enter into what your case is. Remember, Jesus has saved a parallel
case to yours. Yours may seem to yourself to be exceedingly odd, but somewhere
or other in the New Testament you will find one as singular as yours. You tell
me that you are full of so much wickedness. Did he not cast seven devils out of
Mary Magdalen? Yes, but your wickedness seems to be greater than even seven
devils. Did he not drive a whole legion of devils out of the demoniac of Gadara?
You tell me that you cannot pray, but he healed one possessed of a dumb devil;
you feel hardened and insensible, but he cast out a deaf devil. You tell me you
cannot believe; neither could the man with the withered arm stretch it out, but
he did it when Jesus ordered him to. You tell me you are dead in sin, but Jesus
made even the dead live. Your case cannot be so bad that it has not been
matched, and Christ has conquered something like it.

Remember again, Christ can save you, for there is no record in the world, nor
has there ever been handed down to us by tradition a single case in which Jesus
has failed. If I could meet anywhere in my wanderings a soul which had cast
itself on Christ alone, and yet had received no pardon—if there could be found
in hell a solitary spirit that relied upon the precious blood and found no
salvation, then the gospel might well be laid by in the dark, and no longer
gloried in; but as that has not happened, and never shall happen, sinner, you
shall not be the first exception. If you come to Christ—and to come to him is
only to trust him wholly and simply—you cannot perish, for he has said, "Him
that cometh to me I will in nowise cast out." Will he prove a liar? Will you
dare think so? O come, for he cannot cast you out. Think for a moment, sinner,
and this may comfort you: he whom I preach to you as the healer of your soul is
God. What can be impossible with God? What sin cannot he forgive who is God over
all? If your transgressions were to be dealt with by an angel, they might
surpass all Gabriel's power; but it is Immanuel, God with us, who has come to
save.

Moreover, you cannot doubt his will. Have you heard of him—he who was God and
became man? He was as gentle as a woman,

His heart is made of tenderness, It overflows with love.

It was not in him to be harsh. When the woman found in the very act of adultery
was brought to him, what did he say? "Neither do I condemn thee, go and sin no
more." It was said of him, "This man receiveth sinners, and eateth with them,"
and he is not changed now that he reigns above; he is just as willing to receive
sinners now as when he was here below. Was the atonement a fiction? Was the
death of the eternal Son of God ineffectual? There must be power enough there to
take away sin. Come and wash, come and wash, you who are vile and stained with
sin, come and wash, and you shall find instant cleansing the moment that by
faith, you touch his purifying blood.

Jesus demands your trust. He deserves it, let him have it. You need healing; he
came to heal those who need healing: he can heal you. What is to be done in
order that you may be healed, that all your sins may be forgiven and yourself
saved? All that is to be done is to leave off your own doing, and let him do for
you; leave off looking to yourself, or looking to others, and just come and cast
yourself on him.

"Oh," you say, "but I cannot believe." Cannot believe! Then do you know what you
are doing? You are making him a liar. If you tell a man, "I cannot believe you,"
that is only another way of saying, "You are a liar." Oh, you will dare not say
that of Christ. No, my friend, I take you by the hand and say another word—you
must believe him. He is God, dare you doubt him? He died for sinners. Can you
doubt the power of his blood? He has promised. Will you insult him by
mistrusting his word? "Oh, no," you say, "I feel I must believe, I must trust
him; but suppose that trust of mine should not be of the right kind? Suppose it
should be a natural trust? Ah, my friend, a humble trust in Jesus is a thing
that never grew in natural ground. For a poor soul to come and trust in Christ
is always the fruit of the Spirit. You need not raise a question about that.
Never did the devil, never did mere nature empty a man of himself and bring him
to Jesus. Do not be anxious on that point. "But,"says one," the Spirit must lead
me to believe him! "Yes, but you cannot see the Spirit; his work is a secret and
a mystery. What you have to do is to believe in Jesus; there he stands, God and
yet a suffering man, making atonement, and he tells you if you trust him you
shall be saved. You must trust him; you cannot doubt him. Why should you? What
has he done that should make you doubt him?

'O believe the record true, God to you his Son has given.'

And if you trust him, you need not raise the question as to where your faith
came from. It must have come from the Holy Spirit, who is not seen in his
workings, for he works where he chooses. You see the fruit of his work, and that
is enough for you. Do you believe that Jesus is the Christ? If so, you are born
of God. If you have cast yourself, sink or swim, on him, then you are saved. We
read how a man was saved from being shot. He had been condemned in a Spanish
court, but being an American citizen, and also of English birth, the consuls of
the two countries interposed, and declared that the Spanish authorities had no
power to put him to death. And what did they do to secure his life? They wrapped
him up in their flags, they covered him with the Stars and Stripes and the Union
Jack, and defied the executioners. "Now fire a shot if you dare, for if you do,
you defy the nations represented by those flags, and you will bring the powers
of those two great nations upon you." There stood the man, and before the
soldiers, and though a single shot might have ended his life, yet he was as
invulnerable as though in a coat of triple steel. In the same way, Jesus Christ
has taken my poor guilty soul ever since I believed in him, and has wrapped
around me the blood-red flag of his atoning sacrifice, and before God can
destroy me, or any other soul that is wrapped in the atonement, he must insult
his Son and dishonour this sacrifice; and that he never will do, blessed be his
name.


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  CHAPTER 51: 08. HINDRANCES TO COMING TO THE LIGHT
========================================================================

VIII. Hindrances to Coming to the Light

There may be some sin within you which you are harbouring to your soul's peril.
When a soldier's foot has refused to heal, the surgeon has been known to examine
it very minutely, and manipulate every part. Each bone is there, and in its
place; there is no apparent cause for the inflammation, but yet the wound
refuses to heal. The surgeon probes and probes again, until his lancet comes
into contact with a hard foreign substance. "Here it is," he says, "a bullet is
lodged here; this must come out, or the wound will never close." So my probe may
discover a secret in you, and if so, it must come out, or you must die. You
cannot expect to have peace with God, and still indulge in that drunkard's
glass. What, a drunkard reconciled to God? You cannot hope to enjoy peace with
God, and yet refuse to speak with that relative who offended you years ago.
What, look to be forgiven, when you will not yourself forgive? There are
doubtful practices in your trade behind the counter; do you dare to hope that
God will accept a thief?—for that is what you are, a thief and a liar. You brand
your goods dishonestly, call them twenty when they are fifteen; do you expect
God to be your friend while you remain a rogue? Do you think he will smile on
you in your knavery, and walk with you when you choose dirty ways? Perhaps you
indulge a haughty spirit, or it may be an idle disposition; it does not matter
which kind of devil is in you, it must come out, or else the peace of God cannot
come in. Now, are you willing to give sin up? If not, it is all lost time to
preach Christ to you, for he is not meant to be a Saviour of those who persevere
in sin. He came to save his people from their sins, not in them; and if you
still cling to a darling sin, do not be deceived, for you can never enter within
the gates of heaven. Have Iyet to seek a reason why have some not found the
light? It may be that you have sought peace with God only occasionally; after an
earnest sermon you have been awakened; but when the sermon has been concluded,
you have gone back to your slumber like the sluggard who turns again upon his
bed. After a sickness, or when there has been a death in the family, you have
then zealously bestirred yourself; but before long you have declined into the
same carelessness as before. Remember he who wins the race is not the one who
runs in spurts, but the one who continues running to the end. No man gets Christ
by thinking of him only now and then, and in the mean time regards vanity and
falsehood in his heart. He only shall have Christ who must have him, who must
have him now, and who gives his whole heart to him, and cries, "I will seek him
till I find him, and when I find him I will never let him go."

Let me remind you that the great reason why earnest souls do not get speedy rest
lies in this: they are disobedient to the one plain gospel precept, "Believe on
the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved." I would pin them to this point.
It is not necessary at all to combat their doubts and fears; we may do it, but I
do not know that we are called upon to do so; the plain matter of fact is, God
lays down a way of peace, and you will not have it. God says by believing in
Jesus you shall live: you will not believe in Christ, and yet hope to live! God
reveals to you his dear Son and says, "Trust him," and moreover, "He that
believeth not God hath made him a liar" (1 John 5:10), and yet you dare to make
God a liar; every minute that you live in a state of unbelief, you, as far as
you can, make God to be a liar! What an atrocity for any one of us to fall into!
What an amazing presumption for a sinner to live in who professes to be seeking
peace with God!

I will suppose that I have you by the hand, and am gazing intently into your
eyes. I fear for you because of the danger that you will become frost-bitten by
your long sorrow, and fall into a fatal slumber.You have been seeking rest, but
you have not found it; what an unhappy state you are in! You are now
unreconciled to God; your sin clamours for punishment; you are among those with
whom God is angry every day. Can you bear to be in such a condition? Does
something not bid you arise and flee out of this city of destruction in case you
are consumed? What happiness you are missing every day! If you lay hold on
Christ by faith, you would possess a joy and peace passing all understanding.
You are fretting in this low and miserable dungeon; you have been in the dark
year after year, when the sun is shining, the sweet flowers are blooming, and
everything is waiting to lead you forth with gladness. Oh, what joys you lose by
being an unbeliever! Why do you stay so long in this evil state? Meanwhile, what
good you might have done! Oh, if you had been led to look to Jesus Christ these
months ago, instead of sitting in darkness yourself, you would have been leading
others to Christ, and pointing other eyes to that dear cross that brought peace
to you.

What sin you are daily committing! For you are daily an unbeliever, daily
denying the ability of Christ, and so doing injury to his honour.Does the Spirit
of God within you not make you say, "I will arise, and go to my Father?" Oh, if
there is such a thought trembling in your soul, do not quench it, obey it, arise
and go, and may your Father's arms be wrapped around your neck before today's
sun goes down. Meanwhile, permit me to say, what a hardening process is
insensibly going on within! If not better, you are certainly worse than twelve
months ago. Why, those promises that cheered you then now yield no comfort!
Those threats which once startled now cause you no alarm! Will you dawdle any
longer? You have waited to be better, and you are growing worse and worse. You
have said, "I will come at a more convenient season," and every season is more
inconvenient than the one which came before it. You doubted then—you are the
victim of deeper and more dastardly doubts today. Oh, that you could believe in
him who must be true! Oh, that you could trust in him who ought to be trusted,
for he can never deceive! I pray the day may come, even this very moment, when
you will shake yourself from the dust, arise and put on your beautiful garments,
for every hour you sit on the dunghill of your soul-destroying doubts you are
being fastened by strong bands of iron to the seat of despair. Your eye is
growing dimmer, your hand more palsied; and the poison in your veins is raging
more furiously. Yonder is the Saviour's cross, and there is efficacy in his
blood for you. Trust Jesus now, and this moment you will enter into peace. The
gate of mercy swings readily on its hinge and opens wide to every soul which
casts itself upon the bosom of the Saviour. Oh, why are you waiting? Mischief
will befall you. The sun is going down; hurry, traveller, in case you are
overtaken with everlasting night.

There are many people around you, some of whom you may know, who have trusted
Jesus and they have found light. They once suffered your disappointments, but
they have now found rest to their souls. They came to Jesus just as they were,
and at this moment they can tell you that they are satisfied in him. If others
have found such peace, why not you? Jesus is still the same. It is not to
Christ's advantage to reject a sinner, it is not for God's glory to destroy a
seeker; rather, it is for his honour and glory to receive those who humbly rest
in the sacrifice of his dear Son. What is holding you back? You are called,
come. You are pressed to come, come. In the courts of law I have sometimes heard
a man called as a witness, and no sooner is he called, though he may be at the
end of the court, than he begins to press his way up to the witness-box. Nobody
says, "Who is this man pushing here?" or, if they should say, "Who are you?" it
would be a sufficient answer to say, "My name was called." "But you are not
rich, you have no gold ring upon your finger!" "No, but that is not it, I was
called." "But you are not a man of repute, or rank, or character!" "It does not
matter, I was called. Make way." So make way, doubts and fears; make way, devils
of the infernal lake; Christ calls the sinner. Sinner, come. Though you have
nothing to recommend you, because it is written, "Him that cometh to me I will
in no wise cast out," come, and the Lord will bless you, for Christ's sake.


========================================================================
  CHAPTER 52: 09. SEEKERS ENCOURAGED—THE SUBSTITUTE
========================================================================

IX. Seekers Encouraged... The Substitute The whole pith and marrow of the
religion of Christianity lies in the doctrine of "substitution," and I do not
hesitate to affirm my conviction that a very large proportion of "Christians"
are not Christians at all, for they do not understand the fundamental doctrine
of the Christian creed; and, alas, there are preachers who do not preach, or
even believe this cardinal truth. They speak of the blood of Jesus in an
indistinct kind of way, and talk about the death of Christ in a hazy style of
poetry, but they do not strike this nail on the head, and lay it down that the
way of salvation is by Christ's becoming a Substitute for guilty man. This shall
make me the more plain and definite. Sin is an accursed thing. God, from the
necessity of his holiness, must curse it; he must punish men for committing it;
but the Lord's Christ, the glorious Son of the everlasting Father, became a man
and suffered in his own proper person the curse which was due to the sons of
men, so that, by a vicarious offering God, having been just in punishing sin,
could extend his bounteous mercy towards those who believe in the Substitute.

Now for this point. But, you inquire, how was Jesus Christ a curse? The answer
is, "He was made a curse." Christ was no curse in himself. In his person he was
spotlessly innocent, and nothing of sin could belong personally to him. In him
was no sin. God "made him who knew no sin to be sin for us" (2 Corinthians
5:21). There must never be supposed to be any degree of blame-worthiness or
censure in the person or character of Christ as he stands as an individual. He
is in that respect without spot or wrinkle, the immaculate Lamb of God's
Passover. Nor was Christ made a curse out of necessity. There was no necessity
for him ever to suffer the curse; no necessity except that which his own loving
pledge created. His own intrinsic holiness kept him from sin, and that same
holiness kept him from the curse. He was made sin for us, not on his own
account, not with any view to himself, but wholly because he loved us and chose
to put himself in the place which we ought to have occupied. He was made a curse
for us, not out of any personal desert or out of any personal necessity, but
because he had voluntarily undertaken to be the covenant head of his people, and
to be their representative, and as their representative, to bear the curse which
was due to them.

We would be very clear here, because very strong expressions have been used by
those who hold the great truth which I am endeavouring to preach; strong
expressions which have conveyed the truth they meant to convey, but also a great
deal more. Martin Luther prized the Epistle to the Galatians so much that he
called it his Catherine von Bora (that was the name of his beloved wife, and he
gave this book the name of the dearest one he knew). In his book on that epistle
he says plainly, but be reassured he did not mean what he said to be literally
understood, that, "Jesus Christ was the greatest sinner that ever lived; that
all the sins of man were so laid upon Christ that he became all the thieves, and
murderers, and adulterers that ever were, in one." Now he meant this: that God
treated Christ as if he had been a great sinner; as if he had been all the
sinners in the world in one; and such language teaches that truth very plainly.
But Luther—like in his boisterousness, he overshoots his mark, and leaves room
for the censure that he has almost spoken blasphemy against the blessed person
of our Lord. Now, Christ never was and never could be a sinner; and in his
person and in his character, in himself considered, he never could be anything
but well beloved of God, and blessed forever and well pleasing in Jehovah's
sight; so that when we say today that he was a curse, we must lay stress on
those words, "He was made a curse"—constituted a curse, set as a curse; and then
again we must emphasize those other words, for us—not on his own account at all;
but entirely out of love to us, that we might be redeemed; he stood in the
sinner's place and was reckoned to be a sinner, and treated as a sinner and made
a curse for us.

How was Christ made a curse? In the first place, he was made a curse because all
the sins of his people were actually laid on him. "He made him to be sin for
us"; and let me quote from Isaiah, "The Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us
all"; and yet another statement from the same prophet, "He shall bear their
iniquities." The sins of God's people were lifted from off them and imputed to
Christ, and their sins were looked upon as if Christ had committed them. He was
regarded as if he had been the sinner; he actually and in very deed stood in the
sinner's place. Next to the imputation of sin came the curse of sin. The law,
looking for sin to punish, with its quick eye detected sin laid upon Christ and,
as it must curse sin wherever it was found, it cursed the sin as it was laid on
Christ. So Christ was made a curse. Wonderful and awful words, but, as they are
scriptural words, we must receive them. Sin being on Christ, the curse came on
Christ, and in consequence, our Lord felt an unutterable horror of soul. Surely
it was that horror which made him sweat great drops of blood when he saw and
felt that God was beginning to treat him as if he had been a sinner. The holy
soul of Christ shrank with deepest agony from the slightest contact with sin. So
pure and perfect was our Lord, that never an evil thought had crossed his mind,
nor had his soul been stained by the glances of evil, and yet he stood in God's
sight a sinner and therefore a solemn horror fell upon his soul. Then he began
to be made a curse for us, nor did he cease till he had suffered all the penalty
which was due on our account. We have been accustomed to divide the penalty into
two parts, the penalty of loss and the penalty of actual suffering. Christ
endured both of these. It was due to sinners that they should lose God's favour
and presence, and therefore Jesus cried, "My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken
me?" It was due to sinners that they should lose all personal comfort; Christ
was deprived of every consolation and even the last rag of clothing was torn
from him and he was left, like Adam, naked and forlorn. It was necessary that
the soul should lose everything that could sustain it, and so Christ lost every
comfortable thing; he looked and there was no man to pity or help; he was made
to cry, "But I am a worm and no man; a reproach of men, and despised of the
people" (Psalms 22:6). As for the second part of the punishment—namely, an
actual infliction of suffering—our Lord endured this also to the extreme, as the
evangelists clearly show. You have often read the story of his bodily
sufferings; take care that you never depreciate them. There was an amount of
physical pain endured by our Saviour which his body could never have borne
unless it had been sustained and strengthened by union with his Godhead; yet the
sufferings of his soul were the soul of his sufferings. That soul of his endured
a torment equivalent to hell itself. The punishment that was due to the wicked
was that of hell, and though Christ did not suffer hell, he suffered an
equivalent for it; and now, can your minds conceive what that must have been? It
was an anguish never to be measured, an agony never to be comprehended. It is to
God, and God alone that his griefs were fully known. The Greek liturgy puts it
well, "Thine unknown sufferings," for they must forever remain beyond human
imagination. The consequences are that he has redeemed us from the curse of the
law. Those for whom Christ died are forever free from the curse of the law; for
when the law comes to curse a man who believes in Christ, he says, "What have I
to do with you, O law? You say, 'I will curse you,' but I reply, 'You have
cursed Christ instead of me. Can you curse twice for one offence?' " And the law
is silenced! God's law having received all it can demand is not so unrighteous
as to demand anything more. All that God can demand of a believing sinner,
Christ has already paid, and there is no voice in earth or heaven that can
accuse a soul that believes in Jesus after that. You were in debt, but a friend
paid your debt; no writ can be served on you. It does not matter that you did
not pay it, it is paid, and you have the receipt. That is sufficient in any fair
court. So all the penalty that was due to us has been borne by Christ. It is
true I have not borne it; I have not been to hell and suffered the full wrath of
God, but Christ has suffered that wrath for me, and I am as clear as if I had
paid the debt to God and suffered his wrath. Here is a glorious bottom to rest
upon! Here is a rock upon which to lay the foundation of eternal comfort! Let a
man get to this truth: my Lord outside the city's gate bled for me as my Surety,
and on the cross discharged my debt. Why then, great God, I no longer fear your
thunder. How can you condemn me now? You have exhausted the quiver of your
wrath; every arrow has already been used against my Lord, and I am in him clear
and clean, absolved and delivered, as if I had never sinned. "He hath redeemed
us," says the text. How often I have heard certain gentry of the modern school
of theology sneer at the atonement, because they charge us with the notion of
its being a sort of business transaction, or what they choose to call "the
mercantile view of it." I do not hesitate to say that the mercantile metaphor
rightly expresses God's view of redemption, for we find it so in Scripture; the
atonement is a ransom—that is to say, a price paid; and in the present case the
original word is more than unusually expressive; it is a payment for, a price
instead of. Jesus in his sufferings performed what may be forcibly and fitly
described as the payment of a ransom, the giving to justice a quid pro quo for
what was due on our behalf for our sins. Christ suffered what we ought to have
suffered. The sins that were ours were made his; he stood as a sinner in God's
sight; though not a sinner in himself, he was punished as a sinner, and died as
a sinner upon the tree of the curse.

You have only to trust Christ, and you shall live. Whoever, or whatever, or
wherever you are, even though you lie at hell's dark door to despair and die,
the message comes to you: "God hath made Christ to be a propitiation for sin. He
made him to be sin for us who knew no sin, that we might be made the
righteousness of God in him. Christ has delivered us from the curse of the law,
being made a curse for us." He who believes no longer has a curse upon him. He
may have been an adulterer, a swearer, a drunkard, a murderer; but the moment he
believes, God sees none of those sins in him. He sees him as an innocent man,
and regards his sins as having been laid on the Redeemer, and punished in Jesus
as he died on the tree. If you believe in Christ, though you are one of the most
damnable wretches who ever polluted the earth, you shall not have a sin
remaining on you after believing. God will look at you as pure; even Omniscience
shall not detect a sin in you, for your sin shall be put on the scapegoat, even
Christ, and carried away into forgetfulness.

Put away your accursed and idolatrous dependence upon yourself; Christ has
finished salvation-work, altogether finished it. Do not hold your rags in
competition with his fair white linen. Christ has borne the curse; do not bring
your pitiful penances, and your tears all full of filth, to mingle with the
precious fountain flowing with his blood. Lay down what is your own, and come
and take what is Christ's. Put away now everything that you have thought of
being or doing by way of winning acceptance with God; humble yourselves, and
take Jesus Christ to be the Alpha and Omega, the first and last, the beginning
and end of your salvation. If you do this, not only will you be saved, but you
are saved. Rest, O weary one, for your sins are forgiven; rise, you lame man,
lame through want of faith, for your transgression is covered; rise from the
dead, you corrupt one, rise, like Lazarus from the tomb, for Jesus calls you!
Believe and live.


========================================================================
  CHAPTER 53: 10. SEEKING
========================================================================

X. Seeking My main intention, to which I have set my whole soul, is to deal with
those mourners who are seeking Christ, but until now have sought him in vain.
Convinced of sin, awakened and alarmed, these unhappy ones wait for a long time
outside the gate of mercy, shivering in the cold, pining to enter into the
banquet which invites them, but declining to pass through the gate which stands
wide open for them. Tremblingly, they refuse to enter within mercy's open door,
although infinite love itself cries to them, "Come, and welcome: enter and be
blessed." It is a most surprising thing that there should be in this world
persons who have the richest consolation near to hand, and persistently refuse
to take it. It seems so unnatural, that, if we had not been convinced by
abundant observation, we should think it impossible that any miserable soul
should refuse to be comforted. Does the ox refuse its fodder? Will the lion turn
from his meat, or the eagle loathe its nest? The refusal of consolation is even
more strange because the most admirable comfort is within reach. Sin can be
forgiven; sin has been forgiven; Christ has made an atonement for it. God is
graciously willing to accept any sinner who comes to him confessing his
transgressions, and trusting in the blood of the Lord Jesus. God waits to be
gracious, he is not hard nor harsh; he is full of mercy; he delights to pardon
the penitent, and is never more revealed in the glory of his God-head than when
he is accepting the unworthy through the righteousness of Jesus Christ. There is
so much comfort in the Word of God that it is as easy to set the limits of space
as it is to measure the grace revealed there. You may seek to comprehend all the
sweetness of divine love, but you cannot, for it passes knowledge. The abounding
goodness of God made manifest in Jesus Christ is like the vast expanse of the
ocean. It is extraordinary, then, that men refuse to receive what is so lavishly
provided. It is said that, some years ago, a vessel sailing on the northern
coast of the South American continent was observed to make signals of distress.
When hailed by another vessel, they reported themselves as "Dying for water!"
"Dip it up, then," was the response; "you are in the mouth of the Amazon River."
There was fresh water all around them, they had nothing to do but dip it up, and
yet they were dying of thirst, because they thought themselves to be surrounded
by the salt sea. How often are men ignorant of their mercies! How sad that they
should perish for lack of knowledge! But suppose, after the sailors had received
the joyful information, they had still refused to draw up the water which was in
boundless plenty all around them, would it not have been a marvel? Would you not
at once conclude that madness had taken hold of the captain and his crew? Yet
this is the sort of madness of many who hear the gospel. They know that there is
mercy provided for sinners; that unless the Holy Spirit interferes they will
perish, not through ignorance, but because, for some reason or other, like the
Jews of old, they judge themselves "unworthy of everlasting life"; yet they
still exclude themselves from the gospel, refusing to be comforted. This is even
more remarkable because the comfort provided is so safe. If there were
suspicions that the comforts of the gospel would prove delusive, that they would
only foster presumption and so destroy the soul, men would be wise to retreat as
if from a cup of poison. But many have satisfied themselves at this life-giving
stream; not one has been injured, but all who have drunk have been eternally
blessed.

Why, then, does the thirsty soul hesitate, while the river, clear as crystal,
flows at his feet? Moreover, the comfort of the gospel is entirely suitable, it
is fully adapted to the sinful, the weak, and the broken-hearted, adapted to
those who are crushed by their need of mercy, and adapted equally as much to
those who are least aware of their need of it. The gospel bears a balm in its
hand suited to the sinner in his worst state, when he has nothing good about
him, and nothing within him can possibly be a ground of hope. Does the gospel
not declare that Christ died for the ungodly? Is it not a faithful saying and
worthy of all acceptation that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners,
of whom, said the apostle, "I am chief"? Is the gospel not intended even for
those who are dead in sin? Do we not read words such as these, "God, who is rich
in mercy, for his great love wherewith he loved us, even when we were dead in
sins, hath quickened us together with Christ (by grace ye are saved)"? Are the
invitations of the gospel, so far as we can judge, not the kindest, tenderest,
and most attractive that could be penned and addressed to the worst emergency in
which a sinner can be placed? "Ho, everyone that thirsteth, come ye to the
waters, and he that hath no money; come ye, buy, and eat; yea, come, buy wine
and milk without money and without price" (Isaiah 55:1). "Let the wicked forsake
his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts; and let him return unto the Lord,
and he will have mercy upon him; and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon"
(Isaiah 55:7). No qualifying adjectives are used to set forth a degree of
goodness in the person invited, but the wicked are asked to come, and the
unrighteous are commanded to turn to God. The invitation deals with base, naked,
unimproved sinnership. Grace seeks for misery, unworthiness, guilt,
helplessness, and nothing else. Not because we are good, but because the Lord is
gracious, we are bidden to believe in the infinite mercy of God in Christ Jesus,
and so to receive comfort. It is strange that where consolation is so
plentiful—where comfort is so safe, where the heart-cheer is so
suitable—thousands of souls should be found who refuse to be comforted. This
fact grows still more remarkable because these persons greatly need comfort, and
from what they say, and I trust also from what they feel, you might infer that
comfort was the very thing they would clutch at, as a drowning man does at a
rope. Why, they scarcely sleep at night by reason of their fears. By day their
faces betray the sorrow which, like a tumultuous sea, rages within them. They
can scarcely speak a cheerful sentence. They make their household miserable; the
infection of their sorrow is caught by others. You would think that the very
moment the word "hope" was whispered in their ears, they would leap towards it
at once; but it is not so. You may put the gospel into whatever shape you
please, and yet these poor souls who need your pity, though, I fear, they must
also have your blame, refuse to be comforted. Though food is placed before them,
their soul abhors all kinds of meat, and they draw near to the gates of death;
indeed, you may even put the heavenly cordial into their mouths, but they will
not receive the spiritual nutrition; they pine in hunger rather than take what
divine love provides. When the dove was weary, she remembered the ark and flew
into Noah's hand at once; these people are weary and they know the ark, but they
will not fly into it. When an Israelite had killed, inadvertently, his fellow,
he knew the city of refuge, he feared the avenger of blood, and he fled along
the road to the place of safety. These sinners know the refuge, and every
Sabbath we set up the signposts along the road, but still they do not come to
find salvation. The destitute waifs and strays of the streets of London find out
the night-refuge and ask for shelter; they cluster round our workhouse doors
like sparrows under the eaves of a building on a rainy day; they piteously crave
for lodging and a crust of bread; yet crowds of poor benighted spirits, when the
house of mercy is lit up and the invitation is plainly written in bold letters,
"Whosoever will, let him turn in hither," will not come. For many sinners, their
refusal to be comforted arises from bodily and mental disease. It is vain to ply
with scriptural arguments those who are in more urgent need of healing medicine,
or a generous diet. There is so close a connection between the sphere of the
physician and the divine that they do well to hunt in couples when chasing the
delusions of morbid humanity; and I am persuaded that there are many cases in
which the minister's presence is of little use until the physician has first
wisely discharged his part. In some people, the monstrous refusal is suggested
by a proud dislike to the plan of salvation. They would be comforted, but may
they not do something to earn eternal life? May they not at least contribute a
feeling or emotion? May they not prepare themselves for Christ? Must salvation
be all gratis? Must they be received into the house of mercy as paupers? Must
they come with no other cry but, "God be merciful to me a sinner"? Must it come
to this—to be stripped, to have every rag of one's own righteousness torn away,
even the righteousness of feeling as well as the righteousness of doing? Must
the whole head be confessedly sick, and the whole heart faint, and the man lie
before Jesus as utterly undone and ruined, to take everything from the hand of
the crucified Saviour? Ah then, says flesh and blood, I will not have it. The
banner of self is held up by a giant standard-bearer; it floats on long after
the battle has been lost. But what folly! For the sake of indulging a foolish
dignity we will not be comforted. Down with you and your dignity! I beseech you,
bow down now before the feet of Jesus and kiss the feet which were nailed for
your sins. In others it is not pride, but an unholy resolve to retain some
favourite sin. In most cases when the Christian minister tries to heal a wound
that has long been bleeding, he probes and probes again with his lancet,
wondering why the wound will not heal. It seems to him that all the
circumstances argue a successful healing of the wound. He cannot imagine why it
still continues to bleed, but at last he finds out the secret: "Ah, here I have
it; here is an extraneous substance which continually frets and aggravates the
wounds; it cannot heal while this grit of sin lies within it." In some cases we
have found out that the sorrowing person still indulged in a secret vice, or
kept the society of the ungodly, or was undutiful to parents, or unforgiving, or
slothful, or practised that hideous sin, secret drunkenness. In such a case, if
the man resolves, "I will not give up this sin," is it any wonder he is not
comforted? Would it not be an awful thing if he were? When a man carries a
corroding substance within his soul, if his wound is filmed over, an internal
disease will come of it and prove deadly. Confess to Jesus, who will forgive all
your foolishness and accept you, so that you shall refuse to be comforted no
longer.

Some refuse to be comforted because of an obstinate determination only to be
comforted in a way of their own selecting. They have read the life of a certain
good man who was saved with a particular kind of experience. "Now," they say,
"if I feel like that man, then I shall conclude I am saved." Many have hit upon
the experience in Grace Abounding; they have said, "Now, I must be brought just
as John Bunyan was, or else I will not believe." Another has said, "I must tread
the path which John Newton trod—my feet must be placed in the very marks where
his feet went down, or else I cannot believe in Jesus Christ." But what reason
have you for expecting that God will yield to your self-will, and what
justification have you for prescribing to the Great Physician the methods of his
cure? Oh, if he brings me to heaven I will bless him, even though he may conduct
me there by the gates of hell. If I am brought to see the King in his beauty, in
the land which is very far off, it shall not trouble my heart by what method of
experience he brought me there. Come, lay aside this foolish choosing of yours,
and say, "Lord, have mercy on me, enable me to trust your dear Son, and my whims
and my fancies will be given up."

I fear, in many, there is another reason for refusing to be comforted, namely, a
dishonouring unbelief in the love and goodness and truthfulness of God. They do
not believe God to be gracious; they think him a tyrant, or if not quite that,
One so stern that a sinner needed to plead and beg for a long time before the
heart of God will be touched. Oh, but you do not know my God! What is he? He is
love. I tell you he wants no persuading to have mercy, any more than the sun
needs to be persuaded to shine, or a fountain to pour out its streams. It is the
nature of God to be gracious. He is never so godlike as when he is bestowing
mercy. "Judgment is his strange work"; it is his left-handed work; but mercy,
the last manifested of his attributes, is his Benjamin, the child of his right
hand, he delights to exercise it. Is it not written, "He delighteth in mercy"?
Alas! alas! that God should be slandered by those to whom he speaks so lovingly!
"As I live, saith the Lord," here he takes an oath, and will you not believe
him? "As I live, saith the Lord God, I have no pleasure in the death of the
wicked; but that the wicked turn from his way and live. Turn ye, turn ye!...for
why will ye die, O house of Israel?" (Ezekiel 33:11). He even seems to turn
beggar to his own creatures, and to plead with them to come to him. He yearns
for their salvation as he cries, "How shall I give thee up, Ephraim? how shall I
deliver thee, Israel? how shall I make thee as Admah? how shall I set thee as
Zeboim? Mine heart is turned within me, my repentings are kindled together. I
will not execute the fierceness of mine anger, I will not return to destroy
Ephraim, for I am God, and not man" (Hosea 11:8-9). Oh, do not, I beseech you,
be unbelieving any longer, but believe God's word and oath, and accept the
comfort which he freely offers to you in the word of his gospel!

Some however, have refused comfort so long, that they have grown into the habit
of despair. Ah, it is a dangerous habit, and trembles on the brink of hell.
Every moment in which it is indulged a man grows inured to it. It is like the
cold of the frigid zone, which benumbs the traveller after a while, till he
feels nothing and drops into slumber, and from that into death. Some have
despaired and despaired until they had reason for despair, and until despair
brought them into hell. Despair has hardened some men's hearts till they have
been ready to commit sins which hope would have rendered impossible to them.
Beware of nursing despondency. Does it creep upon you through unbelief? Oh,
shake if off, if possible! Cry to the Holy Spirit, the Comforter, to loose you
from this snare of the fowler; for, depend upon it, doubting God is a net of
Satan, and blessed is he who escapes its toils. Believing in God strengthens the
soul and brings us both holiness and happiness, but distrusting, and suspecting,
and surmising, and fearing, hardens the heart, and renders us less likely ever
to come to God. Beware of despair; and may you, if you have fallen into this
evil habit, be snatched from it as the brand from the burning fire, and
delivered by the Lord, who looses his prisoner.


========================================================================
  CHAPTER 54: 11. HOW LUTHER SOUGHT AND FOUND
========================================================================

XI. How Luther Sought and Found

Luther's voice through four hundred years still sounds in the ears of men, and
quickens our pulses like the beat of a drum in martial music: he lives because
he was a man of faith.

I would like to illustrate this by describing certain incidents of Luther's
life. Gospel light broke by slow degrees upon the reformer's life. It was in the
monastery that, in turning over the old Bible that was chained to a pillar, he
came upon this passage: "The just shall live by his faith." This heavenly
sentence stuck to him; but he hardly understood all its significance. He could
not, however, find peace in his religious profession and monastic habits.
Knowing no better, he persevered in so many penances and such arduous
mortifications that sometimes he was found fainting through exhaustion. He
brought himself to death's door. He must make a journey to Rome, for in Rome
there is a fresh church for every day, and you may be sure to win the pardon of
sins and all sorts of benedictions in these holy shrines. He dreamed of entering
a city of holiness; but he found it to be a haunt of hypocrites and a den of
iniquity. To his horror he heard men say that if there was a hell, Rome was
built on top of it, for it was the nearest approach to it that could be found in
this world; but still he believed in its Pope and he went on with his penances,
seeking rest but finding none.

One day he was climbing upon his knees the Scala Sancta, which still stands in
Rome. I have stood amazed at the bottom of the staircase to see poor creatures
go up and down on their knees in the belief that it is the very staircase that
our Lord descended when he left Pilate's house, and certain steps are said to be
marked with drops of blood; these the poor souls kiss most devoutly. Well,
Luther was crawling up these steps one day, when that same text which he had met
with before in the monastery sounded like a clap of thunder in his ears, "The
just shall live by faith." He rose from his prostration, and went down the steps
never to grovel upon them again. At that moment the Lord brought him a full
deliverance from superstition, and he saw that he was to live not by priests,
nor priestcraft, nor penances, nor by anything that he could do, but that he
must live by his faith. No sooner did he believe this than he began to live, in
the sense of being active. Tetzel was going about all over Germany selling the
forgiveness of sins for so much ready cash. No matter what your offence, as soon
as your money touched the bottom of the box your sins were gone. Luther heard of
this, grew indignant, and exclaimed, "I will make a hole in his drum," which
assuredly he did, and in several other drums. The nailing up of his Theses on
the church door was a sure way of silencing the indulgence music. Luther
proclaimed pardon of sin by faith in Christ without money and without price, and
the pope's indulgences were soon objects of derision. Luther lived by his faith,
and therefore he who otherwise might have been quiet, denounced error as
furiously as a lion roars upon his prey. The faith that was in him filled him
with intense life, and he plunged into war with the enemy. After a while they
summoned him to Augsburg, and to Augsburg he went, though his friends advised
him not to go. They summoned him, as a heretic, to answer for himself at the
Diet of Worms, and everybody urged him to stay away, for he would be sure to be
burned; but he felt it necessary that the testimony should be borne, and so in a
wagon he went, from village to village and town to town, preaching as he went,
the poor people coming out to shake hands with the man who was standing up for
Christ and the gospel at the risk of his life. You remember how he stood before
that august assembly, and though he knew, as far as human power went, that his
defence would cost him his life, for he would probably be committed to the
flames like John Huss, yet he stood for the Lord his God. That day in the German
Diet, Luther did a work for which ten thousand times ten thousand mothers'
children have blessed his name, and blessed yet more the name of the Lord his
God. To put him out of harm's way for a while a prudent friend took him
prisoner, and kept him out of the strife in the castle of Wartburg. There he had
a good time of it, resting, studying, translating, making music, and preparing
himself for the future which was to be so eventful. He did all that a man can do
who is outside of the fray; but "the just shall live by his faith," and Luther
could not be buried alive in ease, he had to be getting on with his life-work.

He sent word to his friends that he would soon be with them, and then he
appeared at Wittenberg. The prince meant to have kept him in retirement somewhat
longer; and when the Elector feared that he could not protect him, Luther wrote:
"I come under far higher protection than yours; nay, I hold that I am more
likely to protect your Grace than your Grace to protect me. He who has the
strongest faith is the best protector." Luther had learned to be independent of
all men, for he cast himself upon his God. He had all the world against him, and
yet he lived happily—if the Pope excommunicated him, he burned the bull; if the
Emperor threatened him, he rejoiced because he remembered the word of the Lord:
"The kings of the earth set themselves, and the rulers take counsel
together...He that sitteth in the heavens shall laugh" (Psalms 2:2; Psalms 2:4).
When they said to him, "Where will you find shelter if the Elector does not
protect you?" he answered, "Under the broad shield of God."

Luther could not be still; he had to speak, and write, and thunder; and oh, with
what confidence he spoke! Doubts about God and Scripture he abhorred.
Melanchthon says he was not dogmatical. I rather differ from Melanchthon there,
and reckon Luther to be the chief of dogmatics. He called Melancthon the "soft
treader," and I wonder what we should have done if Luther had been Melanchthon,
and had trodden softly too. The times needed a firmly assured leader, and faith
made Luther all that for years, notwithstanding his many sorrows and
infirmities. He was a Titan, a giant, a man of splendid mental calibre and
strong physique: and yet his main life and force lay in his faith. He suffered
greatly in exercises of the mind and through diseases of body, and these might
well have occasioned a display of weakness; but that weakness did not appear;
for when he believed, he was as sure of what he believed as of his own
existence, and therefore he was strong. If every angel in heaven had passed
before him and each one had assured him of the truth of God he would not have
thanked them for their testimony, for he believed God without the witness of
either angels or men: he thought the word of divine testimony more sure than
anything that seraphim could say. This man was forced to live by his faith, for
he was a man of stormy soul and only faith could speak peace to him. Those
stirring excitements of his brought on him afterwards fearful depressions of
spirit, and then he needed faith in God. If you read a spiritual life of him you
will find that it was hard work sometimes for him to keep his soul alive. Being
a man of like passions with us, and full of imperfections, he was at times as
despondent and despairing as the weakest among us; and the swelling grief within
him threatened to burst his mighty heart. But both he and John Calvin frequently
sighed for the rest of heaven, for they did not love the strife in which they
lived, but would have been glad peacefully to feed the flock of God on earth and
then to enter into rest. These men dwelt with God in holy boldness of believing
prayer, or they could not have lived at all.

Luther's faith laid hold upon the cross of our Lord, and would not be stirred
from it. He believed in the forgiveness of sins, and could not afford to doubt
it. He cast anchor upon Holy Scripture, and rejected all the inventions of
clerics and all the traditions of the fathers. He was assured of the truth of
the gospel, and never doubted that it would prevail, though earth and hell were
leagued against it. When he came to die his old enemy assailed him fiercely, but
when they asked him if he held the same faith his "yes" was positive enough.
They need not have asked him, they should have been sure of that. And now today
the truth proclaimed by Luther continues to be preached, and will be till our
Lord himself shall come. Then the holy city will need no candle, nor the light
of the sun, because the Lord himself will be the light of his people; but till
then we must shine with gospel light to our utmost.


========================================================================
  CHAPTER 55: 12. SAVED THROUGH FAITH
========================================================================

XII. Saved Through Faith The way of salvation has always been the same. No man
has ever been saved by his good works. The way by which the just have lived has
always been the way of faith. There has not been the slightest advance upon this
truth; it is established and settled, ever the same, like the God who uttered
it. At all times, and everywhere, the gospel is and must forever be the same.
"Jesus Christ the same yesterday, and today, and for ever" (Hebrews 13:8). We
read of "the gospel" as one; never of two or three gospels. Heaven and earth
shall pass away, but Christ's Word shall never pass away.

It is also noteworthy not only that this truth should be so old, and should
continue so unchanged, but that it should possess such vitality. This one
sentence, "The just shall live by his faith," produced the Reformation. Out of
this one line, as from the opening of one of the apocalyptic seals, came forth
all that sounding of gospel trumpets, and all that singing of gospel songs,
which sounded like the noise of many waters in the world. This one seed,
forgotten and hidden away in the dark medieval times, was brought out, dropped
into the human heart, and made to grow by the Spirit of God so that it produced
great results. The least bit of truth, thrown anywhere, will live! Certain
plants are so full of vitality that if you only take a fragment of a leaf and
place it on the soil, the leaf will take root and grow. It is utterly impossible
that such vegetation should become extinct; and so it is with the truth of
God—it is living and incorruptible, and therefore there is no destroying it. As
long as one Bible remains, the religion of free grace will live; indeed, if they
could burn all printed Scriptures, as long as there remained a child who
remembered a single text of the Word, the truth would rise again. Even in the
ashes of truth the fire is still living, and when the breath of the Lord blows
upon it, the flame will burst forth gloriously. In the Old Testament we are told
that Abraham "believed in the Lord; and he counted it to him for righteousness"
(Genesis 15:6). This is the universal plan of justification. Faith lays hold
upon the righteousness of God, by accepting God's plan of justifying sinners
through the sacrifice of Jesus Christ, and thus makes the sinner righteous.
Faith accepts and appropriates for itself the whole system of divine
righteousness which is unfolded in the person and work of the Lord Jesus. Faith
rejoices to see him coming into the world in our nature and in that nature
obeying the law in every jot and tittle, though not himself under that law until
he chose to put himself there on our behalf; faith is further pleased when it
sees the Lord, who had come under the law, offering up himself as a perfect
atonement and making a complete vindication of divine justice by his suffering
and death. Faith lays hold upon the person, life and death of the Lord Jesus as
its sole hope, and in the righteousness of Christ it arrays itself. It cries,
"The chastisement of my peace was upon him, and by his stripes I am healed."
Now, the man who believes in God's method of making men righteous through the
righteousness of Jesus, and accepts Jesus and leans upon him is a just man. He
who makes the life and death of God's great propitiation his sole reliance and
confidence is justified in the sight of God, and is written down among the just
by the Lord himself. His faith is imputed to him for righteousness because his
faith grasps the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus. "All that believe are
justified from all things, from which ye could not be justified by the law of
Moses" (Acts 13:39). This is the testimony of the inspired Word, and who shall
deny it? But the believer is also just in another sense, which the outside world
appreciates more, though it is no more valuable than the former. The man who
believes in God becomes by that faith moved to everything that is right, and
good, and true. His faith in God rectifies his mind, and makes him just. In
judgment, in desire, in aspiration, in heart, he is just. His sin has been
forgiven him freely and now, in the hour of temptation, he cries, "How then can
I do this great wickedness, and sin against God?" He believes in the
blood-shedding which God has provided for the cleansing of sin, and, being
washed in that blood, he cannot choose to defile himself again. The love of
Christ constrains him to seek after whatever is true, and right, and good, and
loving, and honourable in the sight of God. Having received by faith the
privilege of adoption, he strives to live as a child of God. Having obtained by
faith a new life, he walks in the newness of life. "Immortal principles forbid
the child of God to sin." If any man lives in sin and loves it, he does not have
the faith of God's elect; for true faith purifies the soul. The faith which is
worked out in us by the Holy Spirit is the greatest sin-killer under heaven. By
the grace of God it affects the inmost heart, changes the desires and the
affections, and makes the man a new creature in Christ Jesus. If there are on
earth any who can truly be called just, they are those who are made so by faith
in God through Jesus Christ our Lord. Indeed, no other men are "just" except
those to whom the holy God gives the title, and these live by faith. Faith
trusts God, and therefore loves him, and therefore obeys him, and therefore
grows like him. It is the root of holiness, the spring of righteousness, the
life of the just.

God is so true that to doubt him is an injustice: and he who does the Lord such
an injustice is not a just man. A just man must first be just with the greatest
of all beings. It would be idle for him to be just to his fellow creatures only,
if he did a wilful injustice to God. In fact, he would be unworthy of the name
of just. Faith is what the Lord justly deserves to receive from his creatures:
it is his due that we believe in what he says, and specially in reference to the
gospel. When the great love of God in Christ Jesus is forth plainly expressed,
it will be believed by the pure in heart. If the great love of Christ in dying
for us is fully understood, it must be believed by every honest mind. To doubt
the witness of God concerning his Son is to do the sorest injustice to infinite
love. He who does not believe has rejected God's witness to the unspeakable gift
and rejected that which deserves man's adoring gratitude, since it alone can
satisfy the justice of God and give peace to the conscience of man. A truly just
man must, in order to be completely just, believe in God, and in all that he has
revealed.

Some dream that his matter of justness only concerns the outer life, and does
not touch man's belief. I say this is not so; righteousness concerns the inner
parts of a man, the central region of his manhood; and truly just men desire to
be made clean in the secret parts, and in the hidden parts they would know
wisdom. Is it not so? We hear it continually asserted that the understanding and
the belief constitute a province exempt from the jurisdiction of God. Is it
indeed true that I may believe what I like without being accountable to God for
my belief? No single part of our manhood is beyond the range of the divine law.
Our whole capacity as men lies under the sovereignty of him who created us, and
we are bound as much to believe rightly as we are bound to act rightly; in fact,
our actions and our thoughts are so intertwined and entangled that it is
impossible to divide one from the other. To say that the rightness of the
outward life suffices is to argue contrary to the whole tenor of the Word of
God. I am bound as much to serve God with my mind as with my heart. I am bound
as much to believe what God reveals as I am to do what God enjoins.

"The just shall live by faith." This sentence savours of the strait gate which
stands at the head of the way—the narrow way which leads into eternal life. At
one blow this ends all claims of righteousness apart from one mode of life. The
best men in the world can only live by faith, there is no other way of being
just in the sight of God. We cannot live in righteousness by self. If we are
going to trust ourselves, or anything that comes from ourselves, we have not
known the life of God according to the teaching of Holy Writ. You must abandon
all confidence in everything that you are or hope to be. You must tear off the
leprous garment of legal righteousness, and part with self in any and every
form. Self-reliance as to the things of religion will be found to be
self-destruction; you must rest in God as he is revealed in his Son Jesus
Christ, and there alone. The just shall live by faith; but those who look to the
works of the law are under the curse, and cannot live before God. The same is
also true of those who endeavour to live by sense or feeling. They judge God by
what they see: if he is bountiful to them in providence, he is a good God; if
they are poor, they have nothing good to say of him, for they measure him by
what they feel, and taste, and see. If God works steadily to a purpose, and they
can see his purpose, they commend his wisdom; but when they either cannot see
the purpose, or cannot understand the way by which the Lord is working to attain
it, immediately they judge him to be unwise. Living by sense turns out to be a
senseless mode of life, bringing death to all comfort and hope.

Too many say, "I am my own guide, I shall make doctrines for myself, and I shall
shift them and shape them according to my own devices." This is death to the
spirit. To be abreast of the times is to be an enemy to God. The way of life is
to believe what God has taught, especially to believe in him whom God has set
forth to be a propitiation for sin; for that is making God to be everything and
ourselves nothing. Resting on an infallible revelation and trusting in an
omnipotent Redeemer, we have rest and peace; but on the other unsettled
principle we become wandering stars, for whom is appointed the blackness of
darkness forever. By faith the soul can live; in all other ways we have a name
to live and are dead. The same is equally true of fancy. We often meet with a
fanciful religion in which people trust impulses, dreams, noises and mystic
things which they imagine they have seen: fiddle-faddle all of it, and yet they
are quite wrapped up in it. I pray that you may cast out this chaffy stuff, for
there is no food for the spirit in it. The life of my soul lies not in what I
think, or what I fancy, or what I imagine, or what I enjoy of fine feeling, but
only in that which faith apprehends to be the Word of God. We live before God by
trusting a promise, depending on a person, accepting a sacrifice, wearing a
righteousness, and surrendering ourselves up to God—Father, Son, and Holy
Spirit. Implicit trust in Jesus, our Lord, is the way of life, and every other
way leads to death. Let those who call this statement narrow or intolerant say
what they please; it will be just as true when they have execrated it as it is
now.

Much is comprehended in the saying, "The just shall live by his faith." It does
not say what part of his life hangs on his believing, or what phase of his life
best proves his believing: it comprehends the beginning, continuance, increase,
and perfecting of spiritual life as being all by faith. The moment a man
believes, he begins to live in the sight of God: he trusts his God, he accepts
God's revelation of himself, he confides, reposes, leans upon his Saviour, and
that moment he becomes a spiritually living man, quickened with spiritual life
by God the Holy Spirit. All his existence before that belief was only a form of
death: when he comes to trust in God he enters upon eternal life, and is born
from above. Yes, but that is not all, nor even half of it; for if that man is to
continue living before God, if he is to hold on his way in holiness, his
perseverance must be the result of continued faith. The faith which saves is not
one single act done and ended on a certain day: it is an act continued and
persevered in throughout the entire life of a man. The just not only commences
to live by his faith, but he continues to live by his faith: he does not begin
in the spirit and end in the flesh, nor go so far by grace, and the rest of the
way by the works of the law. "The just shall live by faith," says the text in
Hebrews, "but if any man draw back, my soul shall have no pleasure in him. But
we are not of them who draw back unto perdition; but of them that believe to the
saving of the soul" (Hebrews 10:38-39). Faith is essential all along; every day
and all day, in all things. Our natural life begins by breathing, and it must be
continued by breathing: what the breath is to the body, faith is to the soul.


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  CHAPTER 56: 13. MAY I BELIEVE?
========================================================================

XIII. May I Believe?

You know who Jesus is, and you believe him to be the Son of God, the Saviour of
men. You are sure that "he is able to save them to the uttermost that come unto
God by him." You have no doubt about those eternal truths which surround his
Godhead, his birth, his life, his death, his resurrection, and his Second
Advent. The doubt is concerning yourself personally—"If I may be a partaker of
this salvation." You feel quite certain that faith in Jesus Christ will save
anyone—will save you if you exercise it. You have no doubt about the doctrine of
justification by faith. You have learned it, and you have received it as a
matter beyond all dispute, that he who believes in him has everlasting life; and
you know that he who comes to him will not be cast out. You know the remedy, and
believe in its efficacy; but then comes the doubt—may I be healed by it? At the
back of your belief in faith hides the gloomy thought: "May I believe? May I
trust? I see the door is open: many are entering. May I? I see that there is
washing from the worst of sins in the sacred fount. Many are being cleansed. May
I wash and be clean?" Without formulating a doubt so as to express it, it comes
up in all sorts of ways, and robs you of all comfort, and indeed, of all hope.
When a sermon is preached it is like when someone sets a table out with all
manner of dainties, and you look at it but do not feel that you have any right
to sit down and begin eating. This is a wretched delusion. Its result will be
deadly unless you are delivered from it. Like a rapacious monster it preys upon
you. When you see the brooks flowing with their sparkling streams, and you are
thirsty, do you think that you are not permitted to drink? If so, you are out of
your mind; you talk and think like one bereft of reason. Yet many are in this
state spiritually. This doubting your liberty to come to Jesus is a wretched
business; it mars and spoils your reading and your hearing and your attempts to
pray; and you will never get any comfort until this question has been answered
in your heart once for all, "May I?"

I defy you, if you read all the Old and New Testaments through, to put your
finger upon a single verse in which God has said that you may not come and put
your trust in Christ. Perhaps you will reply that you do not expect to read it
in the Bible, but God may have said it somewhere where it is not recorded. Well,
he says, "I have not spoken in secret, in a dark place of the earth: I said not
unto the seed of Jacob, Seek ye me in vain" (Isaiah 45:19). Now, he has
commanded you over and over again to seek his face, but he has never said that
you shall seek his face in vain. Dismiss that thought. Again I return to what I
have said: there is nothing in Scripture that refuses you permission to come and
repose your soul once for all upon Christ. It is written, "Whosoever will, let
him take the water of life freely" (Revelation 22:17). Does that exclude you? It
is written, "Whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved"
(Romans 10:13). Does that shut you out? No, it includes you; it invites you; it
encourages you. Nowhere in the Word of God is it written that you will be cast
out if you come, or that Jesus Christ will not remove your burden of sin if you
come and lay it at his feet.

Ah, no; a thousand passages of Scripture welcome you, but not one stands with a
drawn sword to keep you back from the tree of life. Our heavenly Father sets his
angels at the gates of his house to welcome all comers; but there are no dogs to
bark at poor beggars nor notices that trespassers must be aware. Come and be
welcome. Don't you think that the very nature of the Lord Jesus Christ should
forbid your raising a doubt about your being permitted to come and touch his
garment's hem? Surely, if anyone were to paint the Lord Jesus Christ as an
ascetic, repelling with lofty pride the humbler folk who had never reached his
dignity of consecration; if any were to paint him as a Pharisee driving off
publicans and sinners, or as an iceberg of righteousness chilling the sinful, it
would be a foul slander upon his divine character. If anyone were to say that
Jesus Christ is exacting—that he will not receive to himself the guilty just as
they are, but requires a great deal of them and will only welcome to himself
those who are, like himself, good and true and excellent—that would not be
truth, but the direct opposite of it. For the accusation that "this man
receiveth sinners, and eateth with them" was thrown in his face when he lived on
earth; and what the prophet said of him was most certainly true: "A bruised reed
shall he not break, and the smoking flax shall he not quench" (Isaiah 42:3).
Little children are wonderful judges of character; they know intuitively who is
kind. And so are loving women. They do not go through the processes of
reasoning, but they come to a conclusion very soon as to a man's personal
character. Now, the children came and clambered on our Redeemer's knee, and the
mothers brought their infants for his blessing. How can you dream that he will
repel you? The women wept and beseeched him, and felt pity for those who refused
him, so I am sure that he is not hard to move. Therefore I want you to feel sure
of this—that there is nothing in the Saviour's character which can for a moment
lead him to discard you and to drive you from his presence. Those who know him
best will say that it is impossible for him ever to refuse the poor and needy. A
blind man could not cry to him without receiving sight, nor a hungry man look to
him without being fed. He was touched with a feeling of our infirmities—the most
gentle, and loving, and tender of all who ever lived upon this earth. I beseech
you, therefore, to take it for granted that you may come boldly to him without
fear of a rebuff. If he has power to heal you when you touch him, rest assured
that you may touch him. There is no question that you may believe; for Jesus is
too loving to refuse you. It will give him joy to receive you. It is not
possible that he should refuse you; it is not in his nature to spurn you from
his presence. Will you think, yet again, of the fullness of Christ's power to
save, and make a little argument of it? Christ was so full of power to bless
that the secret virtue even saturated his clothes. It overflowed his blessed
person; it ran down to the skirts of his garments, even to that hem which every
Jew wore around his dress—that fringe of blue. It went into that border so that
when the woman simply touched the ravelings of his garment, virtue streamed into
her (Luke 8:42-48). If the touch was a touch of faith, it did not matter where
the contact was made. You often judge a man's willingness to help by the power
that he has. When a person has little to give he is bound to be economical in
his giving. He must look at every penny before he gives it, if he has so few
pence to spare. But when a nobleman has no limit to his estate, you feel sure
that he will freely give if his heart is generous and tender. The blessed Lord
is so full of healing power that he cannot stop himself working healing
miracles; and according to the goodness of his nature he is delighted to
overflow, glad to communicate to those who come. You know that if a city is
straitened of water, the corporation sends out an order that only so much may be
used, and there is a restriction imposed upon public baths and factories,
because there is a scarcity of the precious fluid. But if you go along the
Thames River when we have had a rainy season, you laugh at the notion of a short
supply and economical rules. If a dog wants to drink from a river, nobody ever
questions his right to do so. He comes down to the water and he laps, and, what
is more, he runs right into it, regardless of those who may have to drink after
him. Look at the cattle, how they stand knee-deep in the stream and drink, and
drink again; and nobody ever says, as he goes up the Thames, that these poor
London people will run short of water, for the dogs and the cattle are drinking
it up before it gets down to London. No, it never enters our head to petition
the owners of these dogs and cows to restrain them; for there is so much water
that there must be liberty to everyone to drink to the full. Your question is,
"May I? May I?" I answer that question by saying this: there is nothing to
forbid you; there is everything in the nature of Christ to encourage you; and
there is so much mercy in him that you cannot think that he can have the
slightest motive for withholding his infinite grace.

Moreover, suppose you come to Christ as this woman came, and touch the hem of
his garment, you will not injure him. You ought to hesitate in gaining benefit
for yourself if you would injure the person through whom you obtain that good.
But you will not injure the Lord Jesus Christ. He perceived that virtue had gone
out of him, but he did not perceive it by any pain he felt: I believe that he
perceived it by the pleasure which it caused him. Something gave him unusual
joy. A faith-touch had reached him through his clothes, and he rejoiced to
respond by imparting healing virtue from himself.

You will not defile my Lord, O sinner, if you bring him all your sin. He will
not have to die again to put away your fresh burden of transgression. He will
not have to shed one drop of blood to atone for your multiplied sin: the one
sacrifice on Calvary anticipated all possible guiltiness. If you will come just
as you are, he will not have to leave heaven again, and be born again on earth,
and live another sorrowful life in order to save you. He will not need to wear
another crown of thorns, or bear another wound in his hands, or feet, or side.
He has done all his atoning work: do you not remember his victorious cry—"It is
finished"? You cannot injure him though all your injurious thoughts, words and
speeches be laid upon him. You will not be robbing him of anything, though your
faith-touch conveys life to you. He has such a fullness about him, that if all
you poor sinners come at once, when you have taken away all the merit that you
need there will be as much merit left as there was before. When you deal with
the infinite you may divide and subtract, but you cannot diminish. If the whole
race were washed in the infinite fountain of Jesus' merit, the infinite would
still remain.

Others just like you have ventured to him, and there has not been a case in
which they have been refused. I thought, like you, when I was a child, that the
gospel was a very wonderful thing, and free to everybody but myself. I should
not have wondered at all if my brother and sisters as well as my father and
mother had been saved; but, somehow, I could not get a hold of it myself. It was
a precious thing, as much out of my reach as the Queen's diamonds. So I thought.
To many the gospel is like a tram-car in motion, and they cannot jump upon it. I
thought surely everybody would be saved, but I should not; and yet, soon after I
began to cry for mercy, I found it. My expectations of difficulty were all
sweetly disappointed. I believed and found immediate rest to my soul. When I
once understood, "There was life for a look at the Crucified One," I gave that
look, and I found eternal life.

Nobody ever bears a different witness. I challenge the universe to produce a man
who was chased from Christ's door, or forbidden to find in him a Saviour. I beg
you, therefore, to observe that since others have come this way to life and
peace, God has appointed it to be the common thoroughfare of grace. Poor guilty
sinners, there is a sign set up,"This way for sinners. This way for the guilty.
This way for the hungry. This way for the thirsty. This way for the lost. Come
to me, all you who labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest." Why,
surely, you need not say, "If I may." There is no room to say, "If I may,"
because, first of all, you are invited to come and accept Christ as your
Saviour—invited over and over again in the Word of God. "The Spirit and the
bride say, Come. And let him that heareth say, Come. And let him that is athirst
come. And whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely" (Revelation
22:17). "Ho, every one that thirsteth, come ye to the waters, and he that hath
no money; come ye, buy, and eat; yea, come, buy wine and milk without money and
without price" (Isaiah 55:1). Jesus Christ invites all those who labour and are
heavy laden to come to him, and he will them rest. God is honest in his
invitations. Be sure of that. If God invites you, he wants you to accept the
invitation. After reading the many invitations of the Word of God to you, you
may not say, "If I may." It will be a wicked questioning of the sincerity of
God. In addition to being invited, you are entreated. Many passages of Scripture
go far beyond a mere invitation. God persuades and entreats you to come to him.
He seems to cry like someone who is weeping, "As I live, says the Lord God, I
have no pleasure in the death of the wicked; but that the wicked turn from his
way and live; turn ye, turn ye... for why will ye die, O house of Israel?"
(Ezekiel 33:11). Our Lord and Master when he made the feast, and those who were
asked did not come, sent out his servants to compel them to come in. He used
more than a bare invitation, he put forth a divine compulsion. I would entreat,
persuade, exhort all of you who have not believed in Jesus to do so now. In the
name of Jesus, I beseech you to seek the Lord. I do not merely put it to you,
"Will you or will you not?" but I would lay my whole heart by the side of the
request and say to you, "Come to Jesus. Come and rest your guilty souls on him."
Do you not understand the gospel message? Do you know what it asks and what it
gives? You shall receive perfect pardon in a moment if you believe in Jesus. You
shall receive a life that will never die—receive it now, quick as a lightning
flash, if only you trust in the Son of God. Whoever you may be, and whatever you
may have done, if with your heart you will believe in him whom God has raised
from the dead, and obey him thereafter as your Lord and Saviour, every kind of
sin and iniquity shall be forgiven you. God will blot out your iniquities like a
cloud. He will make you begin de novo—fresh, anew. He will make you a new
creature in Christ Jesus. Old things shall pass away and all things become new.
But there is the point—believing in Jesus; and you may look me in the face and
cry, "But may I?" May you? Why, you are exhorted, invited, entreated to do so.
Nor is this all. You are even commanded to do it. This is the commandment—that
you believe on Jesus, whom he has sent. This is the gospel: "He that believeth
and is baptized shall be saved; but he that believeth not shall be damned" (Mark
16:16). There is a command, with a threatened punishment for disobedience. Shall
anybody say, "May I?" after that? If I read, "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God
with all thy heart," do I say, "May I love God?" If I read, "Honour thy father
and thy mother," do I say, "May I honour my father and my mother?" No. A command
is a permit and something more. It gives full allowance and much more. As you
will be damned if you do not believe, you have therefore been given a right to
believe—not only a permission, but a warrant of the most practical kind. Oh, can
you not see it? Will you not cry to God: "Lord, if you will damn me if I do not
believe, you have given me a full gospel liberty to believe. Therefore I come
and put my trust in Jesus." "If I may"—I think that this questioning ought to
come to an end now. Will you not give it up? May the Holy Spirit show you, poor
sinner, that you may now lay your burden down at Jesus' feet, and be saved at
once. You may believe. You have full permission now to confess your sin and to
receive immediate pardon: see if it is not so. Cast your guilty soul on him, and
rise forgiven and renewed, henceforth to live in fervent gratitude, a miracle of
love.


========================================================================
  CHAPTER 57: 14. A NEEDLESS QUESTION ANSWERED
========================================================================

XIV. A Needless Question Answered

"If I may be permitted to touch the hem of his garment, I shall be made whole."
But there arises this bitter question, "but can i? I know that I may if I can;
but I cannot." Now that is the question I am going to answer. The will to
believe in Christ is as much a work of grace as faith itself, and where the will
is given and a strong desire, a measure of grace is already received, and with
it the power to believe. Do you not know that the will to commit adultery is,
according to Scripture, reckoned as adultery? He "hath committed adultery with
her already in his heart." Now, if the very thought of uncleanness and the will
towards it is the thing itself, then a desire or will to believe contains within
itself the major part of faith. I do not say that it is all, but I do say
this—that if the power of God has made a man will to believe, the greater work
has been done, and his actually believing will follow in due course. The entire
willingness to believe is nine-tenths of believing. Inasmuch as to will is
present with you, the power which you do not find as yet will certainly come to
you. The man is dead, and the hardest thing is to make him live; but in the case
before us the quickening is accomplished, for the man lives so far as to will:
he wills to believe, he yearns to believe, he longs to believe; how much has
been done for him! Rising from the dead is a greater thing than the performance
of an act of life. Faith in Christ is the simplest action that anybody ever
performs. It is the action of a child; indeed, it is the action of a new-born
babe in grace. A new-born babe never performs an action that is very
complicated. We say, "Oh, it is such a babyish thing," meaning that it is so
small. Now faith comes at the moment that the child is born into God's family;
it occurs at the same time as the new birth. One of the first signs and tokens
of being born again is faith; therefore it must be a very, very simple thing. I
venture to say that faith in Christ differs in no respect from faith in anybody
else, except in the person upon whom that faith is set. You believe in your
mother: you may in the same way believe in Jesus Christ, the Son of God. You
believe in your friend: it is the same act that you have to do toward your
higher and better Friend. You believe the news that is commonly reported and
printed in the daily journals: it is the same act which believes Scripture and
the promise of God. The reason why faith in the Lord Jesus is a superior act, to
faith in anyone else, lies in this fact—that it is a superior person whom you
believe in and superior news that you believe; and your natural heart is more
averse to believe in Jesus than to believing in any one else. The Holy Spirit
must teach your faith to grasp the high things of Christ Jesus; but that grasp
is by the hand of a simple, childlike faith. But it is the same faith. It is the
gift of God in so far as this—that God gives you the understanding and the
judgment to exercise it upon his Son, and to receive him. The faith of a child
in his father is almost always a wonderful faith, just the faith that we would
ask for our Lord Jesus. Many children believe that there is no other man in the
world so great and good, and right and kind, and rich and everything else, as
their father is; and if anybody were to say that their father was not so
wonderful, they would become quite grieved; for if their father is not a king,
it is a mistake that he is not. Children think so of their parents, and that is
the kind of faith we would have you exercise towards the Lord Jesus Christ, who
deserves such confidence, and much more. We should give to Jesus a faith by
which we do him honour and magnify him exceedingly. As the child never thinks
where the bread and butter is to come from tomorrow, and it never enters its
little head to fret about where it will get new socks when the present ones are
worn out, so you must trust in Jesus Christ for every thing you want between
here and heaven—trust him without asking questions. He can and will provide.
Just give yourself up to him entirely, as a child gives itself up to a parent's
care, and feels itself to be at ease. Oh, what a simple act it is, this act of
faith! I am sure that it must be a very simple act, and cannot require great
wisdom because I notice that the wise people cannot do it; the strong people
cannot do it; the people who are righteous in themselves cannot reach it. Faith
is a kind of act which is performed by those who are childlike in heart, whom
the world calls fools, and ridicules and persecutes for their folly. "Not many
wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are called: but
God... hath chosen the weak things of the world...And base things... and things
which are despised hath God chosen" (1 Corinthians 1:26-27). There are people
with no education whatever who just know their Bibles are true, and have an
abundant faith: they are poor in this world, but rich in faith. Happy people!
Alas, for those wise people whose wisdom prevents faith in Jesus! They have been
to more than one university, and have earned all the degrees that carnal wisdom
can bestow upon them, and yet they cannot believe in Jesus Christ, the Son of
God. Oh, friend, do not think that faith is some difficult and puzzling thing,
for then these senior wranglers and doctors of divinity would have it. It is the
simplest act that the mind can perform.

"But shall I not have to do many good works?" says somebody. You shall do as
many as you like when you are saved; but in this matter of your salvation you
must fling all self-righteousness away as so much devilry that will ruin and
injure you, and come simply to Christ, and Christ alone, and trust in him.

"Oh," says another, "I think I see a little light. If I am enabled—if I get
enough power to trust in Jesus, I shall be made whole." I will ask another
question: Do you not know that you are bound to believe in Christ—that it is
Christ's due that he be believed in? My own conviction is that a great many of
you can, and that already, to a large extent, you do; only you are looking for
signs and wonders which will never come. Why not exert that power a little
farther? The Spirit of God has given to you a measure of faith; oh, believe more
fully, more unreservedly. Why, you shiver at the very thought of doubting
Christ. You felt how unjust and wrong it was; there is latent in you already a
faith in him. "He that believeth not God hath made him a liar" (1 John 5:10).
Would you make Christ a liar? Why not bring faith to the front and say, "I do
believe, I will believe, that the Christ who is the Son of the Highest, and who
died for the guilt of men, is able to save those who trust him, and therefore I
trust him to save me. Sink or swim, I trust him. Lost or saved, I will trust
him. Just as I am, with no other plea but that I am sure that he is able and
willing to save, I cast my guilty soul on him"? You have the power to trust
Jesus when you have already yielded to the conviction that he is worthy to be
trusted. You have only to push to its practical conclusion what God the Holy
Spirit has already wrought in you, and you will at once find peace.

Still, if you think that there is something that prevents your having faith in
Christ, though you know that if you had it you would be saved, I earnestly
entreat you not to stay contentedly for a single hour without a full, complete,
and saving faith in Christ; for if you die as an unbeliever, you are lost, and
lost forever. Your only safety lies in believing in the Lord Jesus Christ with
all your heart, and obeying his commandments.


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  CHAPTER 58: BOOK: ALL OF GRACE (19 SERMONS)
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ALL OF GRACE

An Earnest Word with Those Who Are Seeking Salvation by the Lord Jesus Christ

by Charles Spurgeon

“Where sin abounded, grace did much more abound.”Romans 5:20 All of Grace: An
Earnest Word with Those Who Are Seeking Salvation by the Lord Jesus Christ.

To You I. What Are We At?

II. God Justifieth The Ungodly III. "It Is God That Justifieth"

IV. Just and the Justifier V. Concerning Deliverance from Sinning VI. By Grace
Through Faith VII. Faith, What Is It?

VIII. How May Faith Be Illustrated?

IX. Why Are We Saved by Faith?

X. Alas! I Can Do Nothing!

XI. The Increase of Faith XII. Regeneration and the Holy Spirit XIII. "My
Redeemer Liveth"

XIV. Repentance Must Go with Forgiveness XV. How Repentance Is Given XVI. The
Fear of Final Falling XVII. Confirmation XVIII. Why Saints Persevere

XIX. Close


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  CHAPTER 59: TO YOU
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TO YOU

HE WHO SPOKE and wrote this message will be greatly disappointed if it does not
lead many to the Lord Jesus. It is sent forth in childlike dependence upon the
power of God the Holy Ghost, to use it in the conversion of millions, if so He
pleases. No doubt many poor men and women will take up this little volume, and
the Lord will visit them with grace. To answer this end, the very plainest
language has been chosen, and many homely expressions have been used. But if
those of wealth and rank should glance at this book, the Holy Ghost can impress
them also; since that which can be understood by the unlettered is none the less
attractive to the instructed. Oh that some might read it who will become great
winners of souls! Who knows how many will find their way to peace by what they
read here? A more important question to you, dear reader, is this—Will you be
one of them? A certain man placed a fountain by the wayside, and he hung up a
cup near to it by a little chain. He was told some time after that a great
art-critic had found much fault with its design. “But,” said he, “do many
thirsty persons drink at it?” Then they told him that thousands of poor people,
men, women, and children, slaked their thirst at this fountain; and he smiled
and said, that he was little troubled by the critic’s observation, only he hoped
that on some sultry summer’s day the critic himself might fill the cup, and he
refreshed, and praise the name of the Lord.

Here is my fountain, and here is my cup: find fault if you please; but do drink
of the water of life. I only care for this. I had rather bless the soul of the
poorest crossing-sweeper, or rag-gatherer, than please a prince of the blood,
and fail to convert him to God.

Reader, do you mean business in reading these pages? If so, we are agreed at the
outset; but nothing short of your finding Christ and Heaven is the business
aimed at here. Oh that we may seek this together! I do so by dedicating this
little book with prayer. Will not you join me by looking up to God, and asking
Him to bless you while you read? Providence has put these pages in your way, you
have a little spare time in which to read them, and you feel willing to give
your attention to them. These are good signs. Who knows but the set time of
blessing is come for you? At any rate, “The Holy Ghost saith, Today, if ye will
hear his voice, harden not your hearts.”


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  CHAPTER 60: I. WHAT ARE WE AT?
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I. WHAT ARE WE AT?

I HEARD A STORY; I think it came from the North Country: A minister called upon
a poor woman, intending to give her help; for he knew that she was very poor.
With his money in his hand, he knocked at the door; but she did not answer. He
concluded she was not at home, and went his way. A little after he met her at
the church, and told her that he had remembered her need: “I called at your
house, and knocked several times, and I suppose you were not at home, for I had
no answer.” “At what hour did you call, sir?” “It was about noon.” “Oh, dear,”
she said, “I heard you, sir, and I am so sorry I did not answer; but I thought
it was the man calling for the rent.” Many a poor woman knows what this meant.
Now, it is my desire to be heard, and therefore I want to say that I am not
calling for the rent; indeed, it is not the object of this book to ask anything
of you, but to tell you that salvation is all of grace, which means, free,
gratis, for nothing.

Oftentimes, when we are anxious to win attention, our hearer thinks, “Ah! now I
am going to be told my duty. It is the man calling for that which is due to God,
and I am sure I have nothing wherewith to pay. I will not be at home.” No, this
book does not come to make a demand upon you, but to bring you something. We are
not going to talk about law, and duty, and punishment, but about love, and
goodness, and forgiveness, and mercy, and eternal life. Do not, therefore, act
as if you were not at home: do not turn a deaf ear, or a careless heart. I am
asking nothing of you in the name of God or man. It is not my intent to make any
requirement at your hands; but I come in God’s name, to bring you a free gift,
which it shall be to your present and eternal joy to receive. Open the door, and
let my pleadings enter. “Come now, and let us reason together.” The Lord himself
invites you to a conference concerning your immediate and endless happiness, and
He would not have done this if He did not mean well toward you. Do not refuse
the Lord Jesus who knocks at your door; for He knocks with a hand which was
nailed to the tree for such as you are. Since His only and sole object is your
good, incline your ear and come to Him. Hearken diligently, and let the good
word sink into your soul. It may be that the hour is come in which you shall
enter upon that new life which is the beginning of heaven. Faith cometh by
hearing, and reading is a sort of hearing: faith may come to you while you are
reading this book. Why not? O blessed Spirit of all grace, make it so!


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  CHAPTER 61: II. GOD JUSTIFIETH THE UNGODLY
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II. GOD JUSTIFIETH THE UNGODLY THIS MESSAGE is for you. You will find the text
in the Epistle to the Romans, in the fourth chapter and the fifth verse: To him
that worketh not, but believeth on him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is
counted for righteousness.

I call your attention to those words, “Him that justifieth the ungodly.” They
seem to me to be very wonderful words. Are you not surprised that there should
be such an expression as that in the Bible, “That justifieth the ungodly?” I
have heard that men that hate the doctrines of the cross bring it as a charge
against God, that He saves wicked men and receives to Himself the vilest of the
vile. See how this Scripture accepts the charge, and plainly states it! By the
mouth of His servant Paul, by the inspiration of the Holy Ghost, He takes to
Himself the title of “Him that justifieth the ungodly.” He makes those just who
are unjust, forgives those who deserve to be punished, and favors those who
deserve no favor. You thought, did you not, that salvation was for the good?
that God’s grace was for the pure and holy, who are free from sin? It has fallen
into your mind that, if you were excellent, then God would reward you; and you
have thought that because you are not worthy, therefore there could be no way of
your enjoying His favor. You must be somewhat surprised to read a text like
this: “Him that justifieth the ungodly.” I do not wonder that you are surprised;
for with all my familiarity with the great grace of God, I never cease to wonder
at it. It does sound surprising, does it not, that it should be possible for a
holy God to justify an unholy man? We, according to the natural legality of our
hearts, are always talking about our own goodness and our own worthiness, and we
stubbornly hold to it that there must be somewhat in us in order to win the
notice of God. Now, God, who sees through all deceptions, knows that there is no
goodness whatever in us. He says that “there is none righteous, no not one.” He
knows that “all our righteousnesses are as filthy rags,” and, therefore the Lord
Jesus did not come into the world to look after goodness and righteousness with
him, and to bestow them upon persons who have none of them. He comes, not
because we are just, but to make us so: he justifieth the ungodly. When a
counsellor comes into court, if he is an honest man, he desires to plead the
case of an innocent person and justify him before the court from the things
which are falsely laid to his charge. It should be the lawyer’s object to
justify the innocent person, and he should not attempt to screen the guilty
party. It lies not in man’s right nor in man’s power truly to justify the
guilty. This is a miracle reserved for the Lord alone. God, the infinitely just
Sovereign, knows that there is not a just man upon earth that doeth good and
sinneth not, and therefore, in the infinite sovereignty of His divine nature and
in the splendor of His ineffable love, He undertakes the task, not so much of
justifying the just as of justifying the ungodly. God has devised ways and means
of making the ungodly man to stand justly accepted before Him: He has set up a
system by which with perfect justice He can treat the guilty as if he had been
all his life free from offence, yea, can treat him as if he were wholly free
from sin. He justifieth the ungodly.

Jesus Christ came into the world to save sinners. It is a very surprising
thing—a thing to be marveled at most of all by those who enjoy it. I know that
it is to me even to this day the greatest wonder that I ever heard of, that God
should ever justify me. I feel myself to be a lump of unworthiness, a mass of
corruption, and a heap of sin, apart from His almighty love. I know by a full
assurance that I am justified by faith which is in Christ Jesus, and treated as
if I had been perfectly just, and made an heir of God and a joint heir with
Christ; and yet by nature I must take my place among the most sinful. I, who am
altogether undeserving, am treated as if I had been deserving. I am loved with
as much love as if I had always been godly, whereas aforetime I was ungodly. Who
can help being astonished at this? Gratitude for such favor stands dressed in
robes of wonder.

Now, while this is very surprising, I want you to notice how available it makes
the gospel to you and to me. If God justifieth the ungodly, then, dear friend,
He can justify you. Is not that the very kind of person that you are? If you are
unconverted at this moment, it is a very proper description of you; you have
lived without God, you have been the reverse of godly; in one word, you have
been and are ungodly. Perhaps you have not even attended a place of worship on
Sunday, but have lived in disregard of God’s day, and house, and Word—this
proves you to have been ungodly. Sadder still, it may be you have even tried to
doubt God’s existence, and have gone the length of saying that you did so. You
have lived on this fair earth, which is full of the tokens of God’s presence,
and all the while you have shut your eyes to the clear evidences of His power
and Godhead. You have lived as if there were no God. Indeed, you would have been
very pleased if you could have demonstrated to yourself to a certainty that
there was no God whatever. Possibly you have lived a great many years in this
way, so that you are now pretty well settled in your ways, and yet God is not in
any of them. If you were labeled

UNGODLY it would as well describe you as if the sea were to be labeled salt
water. Would it not?

Possibly you are a person of another sort; you have regularly attended to all
the outward forms of religion, and yet you have had no heart in them at all, but
have been really ungodly. Though meeting with the people of God, you have never
met with God for yourself; you have been in the choir, and yet have not praised
the Lord with your heart. You have lived without any love to God in your heart,
or regard to his commands in your life. Well, you are just the kind of man to
whom this gospel is sent—this gospel which says that God justifieth the ungodly.
It is very wonderful, but it is happily available for you. It just suits you.
Does it not? How I wish that you would accept it! If you are a sensible man, you
will see the remarkable grace of God in providing for such as you are, and you
will say to yourself, “Justify the ungodly! Why, then, should not I be
justified, and justified at once?”

Now, observe further, that it must be so—that the salvation of God is for those
who do not deserve it, and have no preparation for it. It is reasonable that the
statement should be put in the Bible; for, dear friend, no others need
justifying but those who have no justification of their own. If any of my
readers are perfectly righteous, they want no justifying. You feel that you are
doing your duty well, and almost putting heaven under an obligation to you. What
do you want with a Saviour, or with mercy? What do you want with justification?
You will be tired of my book by this time, for it will have no interest to you.

If any of you are giving yourselves such proud airs, listen to me for a little
while. You will be lost, as sure as you are alive. You righteous men, whose
righteousness is all of your own working, are either deceivers or deceived; for
the Scripture cannot lie, and it saith plainly, “There is none righteous, no,
not one.” In any case I have no gospel to preach to the self-righteous, no, not
a word of it. Jesus Christ himself came not to call the righteous, and I am not
going to do what He did not do. If I called you, you would not come, and,
therefore, I will not call you, under that character. No, I bid you rather look
at that righteousness of yours till you see what a delusion it is. It is not
half so substantial as a cobweb. Have done with it! Flee from it! Oh believe
that the only persons that can need justification are those who are not in
themselves just! They need that something should be done for them to make them
just before the judgment seat of God. Depend upon it, the Lord only does that
which is needful. Infinite wisdom never attempts that which is unnecessary.
Jesus never undertakes that which is superfluous. To make him just who is just
is no work for God—that were a labor for a fool; but to make him just who is
unjust—that is work for infinite love and mercy. To justify the ungodly—this is
a miracle worthy of a God. And for certain it is so.

Now, look. If there be anywhere in the world a physician who has discovered sure
and precious remedies, to whom is that physician sent? To those who are
perfectly healthy? I think not. Put him down in a district where there are no
sick persons, and he feels that he is not in his place. There is nothing for him
to do. “The whole have no need of a physician, but they that are sick.” Is it
not equally clear that the great remedies of grace and redemption are for the
sick in soul? They cannot be for the whole, for they cannot be of use to such.
If you, dear friend, feel that you are spiritually sick, the Physician has come
into the world for you. If you are altogether undone by reason of your sin, you
are the very person aimed at in the plan of salvation. I say that the Lord of
love had just such as you are in His eye when He arranged the system of grace.
Suppose a man of generous spirit were to resolve to forgive all those who were
indebted to him; it is clear that this can only apply to those really in his
debt. One person owes him a thousand pounds; another owes him fifty pounds; each
one has but to have his bill receipted, and the liability is wiped out. But the
most generous person cannot forgive the debts of those who do not owe him
anything. It is out of the power of Omnipotence to forgive where there is no
sin. Pardon, therefore, cannot be for you who have no sin. Pardon must be for
the guilty. Forgiveness must be for the sinful. It were absurd to talk of
forgiving those who do not need forgiveness—pardoning those who have never
offended. Do you think that you must be lost because you are a sinner? This is
the reason why you can be saved. Because you own yourself to be a sinner I would
encourage you to believe that grace is ordained for such as you are. One of our
hymn-writers even dared to say: A sinner is a sacred thing; The Holy Ghost hath
made him so.

It is truly so, that Jesus seeks and saves that which is lost. He died and made
a real atonement for real sinners. When men are not playing with words, or
calling themselves “miserable sinners,” out of mere compliment, I feel overjoyed
to meet with them. I would be glad to talk all night to bona fide sinners. The
inn of mercy never closes its doors upon such, neither weekdays nor Sunday. Our
Lord Jesus did not die for imaginary sins, but His heart’s blood was spilt to
wash out deep crimson stains, which nothing else can remove.

He that is a black sinner—he is the kind of man that Jesus Christ came to make
white. A gospel preacher on one occasion preached a sermon from, “Now also the
axe is laid to the root of the trees,” and he delivered such a sermon that one
of his hearers said to him, “One would have thought that you had been preaching
to criminals. Your sermon ought to have been delivered in the county jail.” “Oh,
no,” said the good man, “if I were preaching in the county jail, I should not
preach from that text, there I should preach ‘This is a faithful saying, and
worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save
sinners.’ ” Just so. The law is for the self-righteous, to humble their pride:
the gospel is for the lost, to remove their despair.

If you are not lost, what do you want with a Saviour? Should the shepherd go
after those who never went astray? Why should the woman sweep her house for the
bits of money that were never out of her purse? No, the medicine is for the
diseased; the quickening is for the dead; the pardon is for the guilty;
liberation is for those who are bound: the opening of eyes is for those who are
blind. How can the Saviour, and His death upon the cross, and the gospel of
pardon, be accounted for, unless it be upon the supposition that men are guilty
and worthy of condemnation? The sinner is the gospel’s reason for existence.
You, my friend, to whom this word now comes, if you are undeserving,
ill-deserving, hell-deserving, you are the sort of man for whom the gospel is
ordained, and arranged, and proclaimed. God justifieth the ungodly.

I would like to make this very plain. I hope that I have done so already; but
still, plain as it is, it is only the Lord that can make a man see it. It does
at first seem most amazing to an awakened man that salvation should really be
for him as a lost and guilty one. He thinks that it must be for him as a
penitent man, forgetting that his penitence is a part of his salvation. “Oh,”
says he, “but I must be this and that,”—all of which is true, for he shall be
this and that as the result of salvation; but salvation comes to him before he
has any of the results of salvation. It comes to him, in fact, while he deserves
only this bare, beggarly, base, abominable description, “ungodly.” That is all
he is when God’s gospel comes to justify him. May I, therefore, urge upon any
who have no good thing about them—who fear that they have not even a good
feeling, or anything whatever that can recommend them to God—that they will
firmly believe that our gracious God is able and willing to take them without
anything to recommend them, and to forgive them spontaneously, not because they
are good, but because He is good. Does He not make His sun to shine on the evil
as well as on the good? Does He not give fruitful seasons, and send the rain and
the sunshine in their time upon the most ungodly nations? Ay, even Sodom had its
sun, and Gomorrah had its dew. Oh friend, the great grace of God surpasses my
conception and your conception, and I would have you think worthily of it! As
high as the heavens are above the earth; so high are God’s thoughts above our
thoughts. He can abundantly pardon. Jesus Christ came into the world to save
sinners: forgiveness is for the guilty. Do not attempt to touch yourself up and
make yourself something other than you really are; but come as you are to Him
who justifies the ungodly. A great artist some short time ago had painted a part
of the corporation of the city in which he lived, and he wanted, for historic
purposes, to include in his picture certain characters well known in the town. A
crossing-sweeper, unkempt, ragged, filthy, was known to everybody, and there was
a suitable place for him in the picture. The artist said to this ragged and
rugged individual, “I will pay you well if you will come down to my studio and
let me take your likeness.” He came round in the morning, but he was soon sent
about his business; for he had washed his face, and combed his hair, and donned
a respectable suit of clothes. He was needed as a beggar, and was not invited in
any other capacity. Even so, the gospel will receive you into its halls if you
come as a sinner, not otherwise. Wait not for reformation, but come at once for
salvation. God justifieth the ungodly, and that takes you up where you now are:
it meets you in your worst estate.

Come in your deshabille. I mean, come to your heavenly Father in all your sin
and sinfulness. Come to Jesus just as you are, leprous, filthy, naked, neither
fit to live nor fit to die. Come, you that are the very sweepings of creation;
come, though you hardly dare to hope for anything but death. Come, though
despair is brooding over you, pressing upon your bosom like a horrible
nightmare. Come and ask the Lord to justify another ungodly one. Why should He
not? Come for this great mercy of God is meant for such as you are. I put it in
the language of the text, and I cannot put it more strongly: the Lord God
Himself takes to Himself this gracious title, “Him that justifieth the ungodly.”
He makes just, and causes to be treated as just, those who by nature are
ungodly. Is not that a wonderful word for you? Reader, do not delay till you
have well considered this matter.


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  CHAPTER 62: III. "IT IS GOD THAT JUSTIFIETH"
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III. “IT IS GOD THAT JUSTIFIETH”

Romans 8:33 A WONDERFUL THING it is, this being justified, or made just. If we
had never broken the laws of God we should not have needed it, for we should
have been just in ourselves. He who has all his life done the things which he
ought to have done, and has never done anything which he ought not to have done,
is justified by the law. But you, dear reader, are not of that sort, I am quite
sure. You have too much honesty to pretend to be without sin, and therefore you
need to be justified.

Now, if you justify yourself, you will simply be a self-deceiver. Therefore do
not attempt it. It is never worth while.

If you ask your fellow mortals to justify you, what can they do? You can make
some of them speak well of you for small favors, and others will backbite you
for less. Their judgment is not worth much. Our text says, “It is God that
justifieth,” and this is a deal more to the point. It is an astonishing fact,
and one that we ought to consider with care. Come and see. In the first place,
nobody else but God would ever have thought of justifying those who are guilty.
They have lived in open rebellion; they have done evil with both hands; they
have gone from bad to worse; they have turned back to sin even after they have
smarted for it, and have therefore for a while been forced to leave it. They
have broken the law, and trampled on the gospel. They have refused proclamations
of mercy, and have persisted in ungodliness. How can they be forgiven and
justified? Their fellowmen, despairing of them, say, “They are hopeless cases.”
Even Christians look upon them with sorrow rather than with hope. But not so
their God. He, in the splendor of his electing grace having chosen some of them
before the foundation of the world, will not rest till He has justified them,
and made them to be accepted in the Beloved. Is it not written, “Whom he did
predestinate, them he also called: and whom he called them he also justified:
and whom he justified, them he also glorified”? Thus you see there are some whom
the Lord resolves to justify: why should not you and I be of the number?

None but God would ever have thought of justifying me. I am a wonder to myself.
I doubt not that grace is equally seen in others. Look at Saul of Tarsus, who
foamed at the mouth, against God’s servants. Like a hungry wolf, he worried the
lambs and the sheep right and left; and yet God struck him down on the road to
Damascus, and changed his heart, and so fully justified him that ere long, this
man became the greatest preacher of justification by faith that ever lived. He
must often have marveled that he was justified by faith in Christ Jesus; for he
was once a determined stickler for salvation by the works of the law. None but
God would have ever thought of justifying such a man as Saul the persecutor; but
the Lord God is glorious in grace.

But, even if anybody had thought of justifying the ungodly, none but God could
have done it. It is quite impossible for any person to forgive offences which
have not been committed against himself. A person has greatly injured you; you
can forgive him, and I hope you will; but no third person can forgive him apart
from you. If the wrong is done to you, the pardon must come from you. If we have
sinned against God, it is in God’s power to forgive; for the sin is against
Himself. That is why David says, in the fifty-first Psalm: “Against thee, thee
only, have I sinned, and done this evil in thy sight”; for then God, against
whom the offence is committed, can put the offence away. That which we owe to
God, our great Creator can remit, if so it pleases Him; and if He remits it, it
is remitted. None but the great God, against whom we have committed the sin, can
blot out that sin; let us, therefore, see that we go to Him and seek mercy at
His hands. Do not let us be led aside by those who would have us confess to
them; they have no warrant in the Word of God for their pretensions. But even if
they were ordained to pronounce absolution in God’s name, it must still be
better to go ourselves to the great Lord through Jesus Christ, the Mediator, and
seek and find pardon at His hand; since we are sure that this is the right way.
Proxy religion involves too great a risk: you had better see to your soul’s
matters yourself, and leave them in no man’s hands.

Only God can justify the ungodly; but He can do it to perfection. He casts our
sins behind His back, He blots them out; He says that though they be sought for,
they shall not be found. With no other reason for it but His own infinite
goodness, He has prepared a glorious way by which He can make scarlet sins as
white as snow, and remove our transgressions from us as far as the east is from
the west. He says, “I will not remember your sins.” He goes the length of making
an end of sin. One of old called out in amazement, “Who is a God like unto thee,
that pardoneth iniquity, and passeth by the transgression of the remnant of his
heritage? he retaineth not his anger for ever, because he delighteth in mercy”
(Micah 7:18).

We are not now speaking of justice, nor of God’s dealing with men according to
their deserts. If you profess to deal with the righteous Lord on law terms,
everlasting wrath threatens you, for that is what you deserve. Blessed be His
name, He has not dealt with us after our sins; but now He treats with us on
terms of free grace and infinite compassion, and He says, “I will receive you
graciously, and love you freely.” Believe it, for it is certainly true that the
great God is able to treat the guilty with abundant mercy; yea, He is able to
treat the ungodly as if they had been always godly. Read carefully the parable
of the prodigal son, and see how the forgiving father received the returning
wanderer with as much love as if he had never gone away, and had never defiled
himself with harlots. So far did he carry this that the elder brother began to
grumble at it; but the father never withdrew his love. Oh my brother, however
guilty you may be, if you will only come back to your God and Father, He will
treat you as if you had never done wrong! He will regard you as just, and deal
with you accordingly. What say you to this? Do you not see—for I want to bring
this out clearly, what a splendid thing it is—that as none but God would think
of justifying the ungodly, and none but God could do it, yet the Lord can do it?
See how the apostle puts the challenge, “Who shall lay anything to the charge of
God’s elect? It is God that justifieth.” If God has justified a man it is well
done, it is rightly done, it is justly done, it is everlastingly done. I read a
statement in a magazine which is full of venom against the gospel and those who
preach it, that we hold some kind of theory by which we imagine that sin can be
removed from men. We hold no theory, we publish a fact. The grandest fact under
heaven is this—that Christ by His precious blood does actually put away sin, and
that God, for Christ’s sake, dealing with men on terms of divine mercy, forgives
the guilty and justifies them, not according to anything that He sees in them,
or foresees will be in them, but according to the riches of His mercy which lie
in His own heart. This we have preached, do preach, and will preach as long as
we live. “It is God that justifieth”—that justifieth the ungodly; He is not
ashamed of doing it, nor are we of preaching it. The justification which comes
from God himself must be beyond question. If the Judge acquits me, who can
condemn me? If the highest court in the universe has pronounced me just, who
shall lay anything to my charge? Justification from God is a sufficient answer
to an awakened conscience. The Holy Spirit by its means breathes peace over our
entire nature, and we are no longer afraid. With this justification we can
answer all the roarings and railings of Satan and ungodly men. With this we
shall be able to die: with this we shall boldly rise again, and face the last
great assize.

Bold shall I stand in that great day, For who aught to my charge shall lay?

While by my Lord absolved I am From sin’s tremendous curse and blame.

Friend, the Lord can blot out all your sins. I make no shot in the dark when I
say this. “All manner of sin and of blasphemy shall be forgiven unto men.”
Though you are steeped up to your throat in crime, He can with a word remove the
defilement, and say, “I will, be thou clean.” The Lord is a great forgiver.

“I believe in the Forgiveness of Sins.” Do You?

He can even at this hour pronounce the sentence, “Thy sins be forgiven thee; go
in peace;” and if He do this, no power in Heaven, or earth, or under the earth,
can put you under suspicion, much less under wrath. Do not doubt the power of
Almighty love. You could not forgive your fellow man had he offended you as you
have offended God; but you must not measure God’s corn with your bushel; His
thoughts and ways are as much above yours as the heavens are high above the
earth.

“Well,” say you, “it would be a great miracle if the Lord were to pardon me.”
Just so. It would be a supreme miracle, and therefore He is likely to do it; for
He does “great things and unsearchable” which we looked not for.

I was myself stricken down with a horrible sense of guilt, which made my life a
misery to me; but when I heard the command, “Look unto me, and be ye saved, all
the ends of the earth, for I am God and there is none else”—I looked, and in a
moment the Lord justified me. Jesus Christ, made sin for me, was what I saw, and
that sight gave me rest. When those who were bitten by the fiery serpents in the
wilderness looked to the serpent of brass they were healed at once; and so was I
when I looked to the crucified Saviour. The Holy Spirit, who enabled me to
believe, gave me peace through believing. I felt as sure that I was forgiven, as
before I felt sure of condemnation. I had been certain of my condemnation
because the Word of God declared it, and my conscience bore witness to it; but
when the Lord justified me I was made equally certain by the same witnesses. The
word of the Lord in the Scripture saith, “He that believeth on him is not
condemned,” and my conscience bears witness that I believed, and that God in
pardoning me is just. Thus I have the witness of the Holy Spirit and my own
conscience, and these two agree in one. Oh, how I wish that my reader would
receive the testimony of God upon this matter, and then full soon he would also
have the witness in himself!

I venture to say that a sinner justified by God stands on even a surer footing
than a righteous man justified by his works, if such there be. We could never be
surer that we had done enough works; conscience would always be uneasy lest,
after all, we should come short, and we could only have the trembling verdict of
a fallible judgment to rely upon; but when God himself justifies, and the Holy
Spirit bears witness thereto by giving us peace with God, why then we feel that
the matter is sure and settled, and we enter into rest. No tongue can tell the
depth of that calm which comes over the soul which has received the peace of God
which passeth all understanding.


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  CHAPTER 63: IV. JUST AND THE JUSTIFIER
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JUST AND THE JUSTIFIER

WE HAVE SEEN the ungodly justified, and have considered the great truth, that
only God can justify any man; we now come a step further and make the
inquiry—How can a just God justify guilty men? Here we are met with a full
answer in the words of Paul, in Romans 3:21-26. We will read six verses from the
chapter so as to get the run of the passage:

“But now the righteousness of God without the law is manifested, being witnessed
by the law and the prophets; even the righteousness of God which is by faith of
Jesus Christ unto all and upon all them that believe: for there is no
difference; for all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God; being
justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus:
whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood, to
declare his righteousness for the remission of sins that are past, through the
forbearance of God; to declare, I say, at this time his righteousness; that he
might be just, and the justifier of him which believeth in Jesus.”

Here suffer me to give you a bit of personal experience. When I was under the
hand of the Holy Spirit, under conviction of sin, I had a clear and sharp sense
of the justice of God. Sin, whatever it might be to other people, became to me
an intolerable burden. It was not so much that I feared hell, but that I feared
sin. I knew myself to be so horribly guilty that I remember feeling that if God
did not punish me for sin He ought to do so. I felt that the Judge of all the
earth ought to condemn such sin as mine. I sat on the judgment seat, and I
condemned myself to perish; for I confessed that had I been God I could have
done no other than send such a guilty creature as I was down to the lowest hell.
All the while, I had upon my mind a deep concern for the honor of God’s name,
and the integrity of His moral government. I felt that it would not satisfy my
conscience if I could be forgiven unjustly. The sin I had committed must be
punished. But then there was the question how God could be just, and yet justify
me who had been so guilty. I asked my heart: “How can He be just and yet the
justifier?” I was worried and wearied with this question; neither could I see
any answer to it. Certainly, I could never have invented an answer which would
have satisfied my conscience. The doctrine of the atonement is to my mind one of
the surest proofs of the divine inspiration of Holy Scripture. Who would or
could have thought of the just Ruler dying for the unjust rebel? This is no
teaching of human mythology, or dream of poetical imagination. This method of
expiation is only known among men because it is a fact; fiction could not have
devised it. God Himself ordained it; it is not a matter which could have been
imagined.

I had heard the plan of salvation by the sacrifice of Jesus from my youth up;
but I did not know any more about it in my innermost soul than if I had been
born and bred a Hottentot. The light was there, but I was blind; it was of
necessity that the Lord himself should make the matter plain to me. It came to
me as a new revelation, as fresh as if I had never read in Scripture that Jesus
was declared to be the propitiation for sins that God might be just. I believe
it will have to come as a revelation to every newborn child of God whenever he
sees it; I mean that glorious doctrine of the substitution of the Lord Jesus. I
came to understand that salvation was possible through vicarious sacrifice; and
that provision had been made in the first constitution and arrangement of things
for such a substitution. I was made to see that He who is the Son of God,
co-equal, and co-eternal with the Father, had of old been made the covenant Head
of a chosen people that He might in that capacity suffer for them and save them.
Inasmuch as our fall was not at the first a personal one, for we fell in our
federal representative, the first Adam, it became possible for us to be
recovered by a second representative, even by Him who has undertaken to be the
covenant head of His people, so as to be their second Adam. I saw that ere I
actually sinned I had fallen by my first father’s sin; and I rejoiced that
therefore it became possible in point of law for me to rise by a second head and
representative. The fall by Adam left a loophole of escape; another Adam can
undo the ruin made by the first. When I was anxious about the possibility of a
just God pardoning me, I understood and saw by faith that He who is the Son of
God became man, and in His own blessed person bore my sin in His own body on the
tree. I saw the chastisement of my peace was laid on Him, and that with His
stripes I was healed. Dear friend, have you ever seen that? Have you ever
understood how God can be just to the full, not remitting penalty nor blunting
the edge of the sword, and yet can be infinitely merciful, and can justify the
ungodly who turn to Him? It was because the Son of God, supremely glorious in
His matchless person, undertook to vindicate the law by bearing the sentence due
to me, that therefore God is able to pass by my sin. The law of God was more
vindicated by the death of Christ than it would have been had all transgressors
been sent to Hell. For the Son of God to suffer for sin was a more glorious
establishment of the government of God, than for the whole race to suffer.

Jesus has borne the death penalty on our behalf. Behold the wonder! There He
hangs upon the cross! This is the greatest sight you will ever see. Son of God
and Son of Man, there He hangs, bearing pains unutterable, the just for the
unjust, to bring us to God. Oh, the glory of that sight! The innocent punished!
The Holy One condemned! The Ever-blessed made a curse! The infinitely glorious
put to a shameful death! The more I look at the sufferings of the Son of God,
the more sure I am that they must meet my case. Why did He suffer, if not to
turn aside the penalty from us? If, then, He turned it aside by His death, it is
turned aside, and those who believe in Him need not fear it. It must be so, that
since expiation is made, God is able to forgive without shaking the basis of His
throne, or in the least degree blotting the statute book. Conscience gets a full
answer to her tremendous question. The wrath of God against iniquity, whatever
that may be, must be beyond all conception terrible. Well did Moses say, “Who
knoweth the power of thine anger?” Yet when we hear the Lord of glory cry, “Why
hast thou forsaken me?” and see Him yielding up the ghost, we feel that the
justice of God has received abundant vindication by obedience so perfect and
death so terrible, rendered by so divine a person. If God himself bows before
His own law, what more can be done? There is more in the atonement by way of
merit, than there is in all human sin by way of demerit. The great gulf of
Jesus’ loving self-sacrifice can swallow up the mountains of our sins, all of
them. For the sake of the infinite good of this one representative man, the Lord
may well look with favor upon other men, however unworthy they may be in and of
themselves. It was a miracle of miracles that the Lord Jesus Christ should stand
in our stead and Bear that we might never bear His Father’s righteous ire. But
he has done so. “It is finished.” God will spare the sinner because He did not
spare His Son. God can pass by your transgressions because He laid those
transgressions upon His only begotten Son nearly two thousand years ago. If you
believe in Jesus (that is the point), then your sins were carried away by Him
who was the scapegoat for His people.

What is it to believe in Him? It is not merely to say, “He is God and the
Saviour,” but to trust Him wholly and entirely, and take Him for all your
salvation from this time forth and forever—your Lord, your Master, your all. If
you will have Jesus, He has you already. If you believe on Him, I tell you you
cannot go to hell; for that were to make the sacrifice of Christ of none effect.
It cannot be that a sacrifice should be accepted, and yet the soul should die
for whom that sacrifice has been received. If the believing soul could be
condemned, then why a sacrifice? If Jesus died in my stead, why should I die
also? Every believer can claim that the sacrifice was actually made for him: by
faith he has laid his hands on it, and made it his own, and therefore he may
rest assured that he can never perish. The Lord would not receive this offering
on our behalf, and then condemn us to die. The Lord cannot read our pardon
written in the blood of His own Son, and then smite us. That were impossible. Oh
that you may have grace given you at once to look away to Jesus and to begin at
the beginning, even at Jesus, who is the Fountain-head of mercy to guilty man!

“He justifieth the ungodly.” “It is God that justifieth,” therefore, and for
that reason only it can be done, and He does it through the atoning sacrifice of
His divine Son. Therefore it can be justly done—so justly done that none will
ever question it—so thoroughly done that in the last tremendous day, when heaven
and earth shall pass away, there shall be none that shall deny the validity of
the justification. “Who is he that condemneth? It is Christ that died. Who shall
lay anything to the charge of God’s elect? It is God that justifieth.”

Now, poor soul! will you come into this lifeboat, just as you are? Here is
safety from the wreck! Accept the sure deliverance. “I have nothing with me,”
say you. You are not asked to bring anything with you. Men who escape for their
lives will leave even their clothes behind. Leap for it, just as you are.

I will tell you this thing about myself to encourage you. My sole hope for
heaven lies in the full atonement made upon Calvary’s cross for the ungodly. On
that I firmly rely. I have not the shadow of a hope anywhere else. You are in
the same condition as I am; for we neither of us have anything of our own worth
as a ground of trust. Let us join hands and stand together at the foot of the
cross, and trust our souls once for all to Him who shed His blood for the
guilty. We will be saved by one and the same Saviour. If you perish trusting
Him, I must perish too. What can I do more to prove my own confidence in the
gospel which I set before you?


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  CHAPTER 64: V. CONCERNING DELIVERANCE FROM SINNING
========================================================================

V. CONCERNING DELIVERANCE FROM SINNING IN THIS PLACE I would say a plain word or
two to those who understand the method of justification by faith which is in
Christ Jesus, but whose trouble is that they cannot cease from sin. We can never
be happy, restful, or spiritually healthy till we become holy. We must be rid of
sin; but how is the riddance to be wrought? This is the life-or-death question
of many. The old nature is very strong, and they have tried to curb and tame it;
but it will not be subdued, and they find themselves, though anxious to be
better, if anything growing worse than before. The heart is so hard, the will is
so obstinate, the passions are so furious, the thoughts are so volatile, the
imagination is so ungovernable, the desires are so wild, that the man feels that
he has a den of wild beasts within him, which will eat him up sooner than be
ruled by him. We may say of our fallen nature what the Lord said to Job
concerning Leviathan: “Wilt thou play with him as with a bird? or wilt thou bind
him for thy maidens?” A man might as well hope to hold the north wind in the
hollow of his hand as expect to control by his own strength those boisterous
powers which dwell within his fallen nature. This is a greater feat than any of
the fabled labors of Hercules: God is wanted here.

“I could believe that Jesus would forgive sin,” says one, “but then my trouble
is that I sin again, and that I feel such awful tendencies to evil within me."
As surely as a stone, if it be flung up into the air, soon comes down again to
the ground, so do I, though I am sent up to heaven by earnest preaching, return
again to my insensible state. Alas! I am easily fascinated with the basilisk
eyes of sin, and am thus held as under a spell, so that I cannot escape from my
own folly.”

Dear friend, salvation would be a sadly incomplete affair if it did not deal
with this part of our ruined estate. We want to be purified as well as pardoned.
Justification without sanctification would not be salvation at all. It would
call the leper clean, and leave him to die of his disease; if would forgive the
rebellion and allow the rebel to remain an enemy to his king. It would remove
the consequences but overlook the cause, and this would leave an endless and
hopeless task before us. It would stop the stream for a time, but leave an open
fountain of defilement, which would sooner or later break forth with increased
power. Remember that the Lord Jesus came to take away sin in three ways; He came
to remove the penalty of sin, the power of sin, and, at last, the presence of
sin. At once you may reach to the second part—the power of sin may immediately
be broken; and so you will be on the road to the third, namely, the removal of
the presence of sin. “We know that he was manifested to take away our sins.” The
angel said of our Lord, “Thou shalt call his name Jesus, for he shall save his
people from their sins.” Our Lord Jesus came to destroy in us the works of the
devil. That which was said at our Lord’s birth was also declared in His death;
for when the soldier pierced His side forthwith came there out blood and water,
to set forth the double cure by which we are delivered from the guilt and the
defilement of sin.

If, however, you are troubled about the power of sin, and about the tendencies
of your nature, as you well may be, here is a promise for you. Have faith in it,
for it stands in that covenant of grace which is ordered in all things and sure.
God, who cannot lie, has said in Ezekiel 36:26 : A new heart also will I give
you, and a new spirit will I put within you: and I will take away the stony
heart out of your flesh, and I will give you an heart of flesh.

You see, it is all “I will,” and “I will.” “I will give,” and “I will take
away.” This is the royal style of the King of kings, who is able to accomplish
all His will. No word of His shall ever fall to the ground. The Lord knows right
well that you cannot change your own heart, and cannot cleanse your own nature;
but He also knows that He can do both. He can cause the Ethiopian to change his
skin, and the leopard his spots. Hear this, and be astonished: He can create you
a second time; He can cause you to be born again. This is a miracle of grace,
but the Holy Ghost will perform it. It would be a very wonderful thing if one
could stand at the foot of the Niagara Falls, and could speak a word which
should make the river Niagara begin to run up stream, and leap up that great
precipice over which it now rolls in stupendous force. Nothing but the power of
God could achieve that marvel; but that would be more than a fit parallel to
what would take place if the course of your nature were altogether reversed. All
things are possible with God. He can reverse the direction of your desires and
the current of your life, and instead of going downward from God, He can make
your whole being tend upward toward God. That is, in fact, what the Lord has
promised to do for all who are in the covenant; and we know from Scripture that
all believers are in the covenant. Let me read the words again: A new spirit
will I put within you: and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh,
and will give an heart of flesh. (Ezekiel 11:19).

What a wonderful promise! And it is yea and amen in Christ Jesus to the glory of
God by us. Let us lay hold of it; accept it as true, and appropriate it to
ourselves. Then shall it be fulfilled in us, and we shall have, in after days
and years, to sing of that wondrous change which the sovereign grace of God has
wrought in us.

It is well worthy of consideration that when the Lord takes away the stony
heart, that deed is done; and when that is once done, no known power can ever
take away that new heart which He gives, and that right spirit which He puts
within us. “The gifts and calling of God are without repentance”; that is,
without repentance on His part; He does not take away what He once has given.
Let Him renew you and you will be renewed. Man’s reformations and cleanings up
soon come to an end, for the dog returns to his vomit; but when God puts a new
heart into us, the new heart is there forever, and never will it harden into
stone again. He who made it flesh will keep it so. Herein we may rejoice and be
glad forever in that which God creates in the kingdom of His grace. To put the
matter very simply—did you ever hear of Mr. Rowland Hill’s illustration of the
cat and the sow? I will give it in my own fashion, to illustrate our Saviour’s
expressive words—“Ye must be born again.” Do you see that cat? What a cleanly
creature she is! How cleverly she washes herself with her tongue and her paws!
It is quite a pretty sight! Did you ever see a sow do that? No, you never did.
It is contrary to its nature. It prefers to wallow in the mire. Go and teach a
sow to wash itself, and see how little success you would gain. It would be a
great sanitary improvement if swine would be clean. Teach them to wash and clean
themselves as the cat has been doing! Useless task. You may by force wash that
sow, but it hastens to the mire, and is soon as foul as ever. The only way in
which you can get a sow to wash itself is to transform it into a cat; then it
will wash and be clean, but not till then! Suppose that transformation to be
accomplished, and then what was difficult or impossible is easy enough; the
swine will henceforth be fit for your parlor and your hearth-rug. So it is with
an ungodly man; you cannot force him to do what a renewed man does most
willingly; you may teach him, and set him a good example, but he cannot learn
the art of holiness, for he has no mind to it; his nature leads him another way.
When the Lord makes a new man of him, then all things wear a different aspect.
So great is this change, that I once heard a convert say, “Either all the world
is changed, or else I am.” The new nature follows after right as naturally as
the old nature wanders after wrong. What a blessing to receive such a nature!
Only the Holy Ghost can give it. Did it ever strike you what a wonderful thing
it is for the Lord to give a new heart and a right spirit to a man? You have
seen a lobster, perhaps, which has fought with another lobster, and lost one of
its claws, and a new claw has grown. That is a remarkable thing; but it is a
much more astounding fact that a man should have a new heart given to him. This,
indeed, is a miracle beyond the powers of nature. There is a tree. If you cut
off one of its limbs, another one may grow in its place; but can you change the
tree; can you sweeten sour sap; can you make the thorn bear figs? You can graft
something better into it and that is the analogy which nature gives us of the
work of grace; but absolutely to change the vital sap of the tree would be a
miracle indeed. Such a prodigy and mystery of power God works in all who believe
in Jesus.

If you yield yourself up to His divine working, the Lord will alter your nature;
He will subdue the old nature, and breathe new life into you. Put your trust in
the Lord Jesus Christ, and He will take the stony heart out of your flesh, and
He will give you a heart of flesh. Where everything was hard, everything shall
be tender; where everything was vicious, everything shall be virtuous: where
everything tended downward, everything shall rise upward with impetuous force.
The lion of anger shall give place to the lamb of meekness; the raven of
uncleanness shall fly before the dove of purity; the vile serpent of deceit
shall be trodden under the heel of truth.

I have seen with my own eyes such marvellous changes of moral and spiritual
character that I despair of none. I could, if it were fitting, point out those
who were once unchaste women who are now pure as the driven snow, and
blaspheming men who now delight all around them by their intense devotion.
Thieves are made honest, drunkards sober, liars truthful, and scoffers zealous.
Wherever the grace of God has appeared to a man it has trained him to deny
ungodliness and worldly lusts, and to live soberly, righteously, and godly in
this present evil world: and, dear reader, it will do the same for you.

“I cannot make this change,” says one. Who said you could? The Scripture which
we have quoted speaks not of what man will do, but of what God will do. It is
God’s promise, and it is for Him to fulfill His own engagements. Trust in Him to
fulfill His Word to you, and it will be done.

“But how is it to be done?” What business is that of yours? Must the Lord
explain His methods before you will believe him? The Lord’s working in this
matter is a great mystery: the Holy Ghost performs it. He who made the promise
has the responsibility of keeping the promise, and He is equal to the occasion.
God, who promises this marvellous change, will assuredly carry it out in all who
receive Jesus, for to all such He gives power to become the Sons of God. Oh that
you would believe it! Oh that you would do the gracious Lord the justice to
believe that He can and will do this for you, great miracle though it will be!
Oh that you would believe that God cannot lie! Oh that you would trust Him for a
new heart, and a right spirit, for He can give them to you! May the Lord give
you faith in His promise, faith in His Son, faith in the Holy Spirit, and faith
in Him, and to Him shall be praise and honor and glory forever and ever! Amen.


========================================================================
  CHAPTER 65: VI. BY GRACE THROUGH FAITH
========================================================================

BY GRACE THROUGH FAITH “By grace are ye saved, through faith” (Ephesians 2:8).

I THINK IT WELL to turn a little to one side that I may ask my reader to observe
adoringly the fountain-head of our salvation, which is the grace of God. “By
grace are ye saved.” Because God is gracious, therefore sinful men are forgiven,
converted, purified, and saved. It is not because of anything in them, or that
ever can be in them, that they are saved; but because of the boundless love,
goodness, pity, compassion, mercy, and grace of God. Tarry a moment, then, at
the well-head. Behold the pure river of water of life, as it proceeds out of the
throne of God and of the Lamb!

What an abyss is the grace of God! Who can measure its breadth? Who can fathom
its depth? Like all the rest of the divine attributes, it is infinite. God is
full of love, for “God is love.” God is full of goodness; the very name “God” is
short for “good.” Unbounded goodness and love enter into the very essence of the
Godhead. It is because “his mercy endureth for ever” that men are not destroyed;
because “his compassions fail not” that sinners are brought to Him and forgiven.

Remember this; or you may fall into error by fixing your minds so much upon the
faith which is the channel of salvation as to forget the grace which is the
fountain and source even of faith itself. Faith is the work of God’s grace in
us. No man can say that Jesus is the Christ but by the Holy Ghost. “No man
cometh unto me,” saith Jesus, “except the Father which hath sent me draw him.”
So that faith, which is coming to Christ, is the result of divine drawing. Grace
is the first and last moving cause of salvation; and faith, essential as it is,
is only an important part of the machinery which grace employs. We are saved
“through faith,” but salvation is “by grace.” Sound forth those words as with
the archangel’s trumpet: “By grace are ye saved.” What glad tidings for the
undeserving!

Faith occupies the position of a channel or conduit pipe. Grace is the fountain
and the stream; faith is the aqueduct along which the flood of mercy flows down
to refresh the thirsty sons of men. It is a great pity when the aqueduct is
broken. It is a sad sight to see around Rome the many noble aqueducts which no
longer convey water into the city, because the arches are broken and the
marvelous structures are in ruins. The aqueduct must be kept entire to convey
the current; and, even so, faith must be true and sound, leading right up to God
and coming right down to ourselves, that it may become a serviceable channel of
mercy to our souls.

Still, I again remind you that faith is only the channel or aqueduct, and not
the fountainhead, and we must not look so much to it as to exalt it above the
divine source of all blessing which lies in the grace of God. Never make a
Christ out of your faith, nor think of as if it were the independent source of
your salvation. Our life is found in “looking unto Jesus,” not in looking to our
own faith. By faith all things become possible to us; yet the power is not in
the faith, but in the God upon whom faith relies. Grace is the powerful engine,
and faith is the chain by which the carriage of the soul is attached to the
great motive power. The righteousness of faith is not the moral excellence of
faith, but the righteousness of Jesus Christ which faith grasps and
appropriates. The peace within the soul is not derived from the contemplation of
our own faith; but it comes to us from Him who is our peace, the hem of whose
garment faith touches, and virtue comes out of Him into the soul.

See then, dear friend, that the weakness of your faith will not destroy you. A
trembling hand may receive a golden gift. The Lord’s salvation can come to us
though we have only faith as a grain of mustard seed. The power lies in the
grace of God, and not in our faith. Great messages can be sent along slender
wires, and the peace-giving witness of the Holy Spirit can reach the heart by
means of a thread-like faith which seems almost unable to sustain its own
weight. Think more of Him to whom you look than of the look itself. You must
look away even from your own looking, and see nothing but Jesus, and the grace
of God revealed in Him.


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  CHAPTER 66: VII. FAITH, WHAT IS IT?
========================================================================

VII. FAITH, WHAT IS IT?

WHAT IS THIS FAITH concerning which it is said, “By grace are ye saved, through
faith?” There are many descriptions of faith; but almost all the definitions I
have met with have made me understand it less than I did before I saw them. The
Negro said, when he read the chapter, that he would confound it; and it is very
likely that he did so, though he meant to expound it. We may explain faith till
nobody understands it. I hope I shall not be guilty of that fault. Faith is the
simplest of all things, and perhaps because of its simplicity it is the more
difficult to explain.

What is faith? It is made up of three things—knowledge, belief, and trust.
Knowledge comes first. “How shall they believe in him of whom they have not
heard?” I want to be informed of a fact before I can possibly believe it. “Faith
cometh by hearing”; we must first hear, in order that we may know what is to be
believed. “They that know thy name shall put their trust in thee.” A measure of
knowledge is essential to faith; hence the importance of getting knowledge.
“Incline your ear, and come unto me; hear, and your soul shall live.” Such was
the word of the ancient prophet, and it is the word of the gospel still. Search
the Scriptures and learn what the Holy Spirit teacheth concerning Christ and His
salvation. Seek to know God: “For he that cometh to God must believe that he is,
and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him.” May the Holy Spirit
give you the spirit of knowledge, and of the fear of the Lord! Know the gospel:
know what the good news is, how it talks of free forgiveness, and of change of
heart, of adoption into the family of God, and of countless other blessings.
Know especially Christ Jesus the Son of God, the Saviour of men, united to us by
His human nature, and yet one with God; and thus able to act as Mediator between
God and man, able to lay His hand upon both, and to be the connecting link
between the sinner and the Judge of all the earth. Endeavour to know more and
more of Christ Jesus. Endeavour especially to know the doctrine of the sacrifice
of Christ; for the point upon which saving faith mainly fixes itself is
this—“God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing their
trespasses unto them.” Know that Jesus was “made a curse for us, as it is
written, Cursed is every one that hangeth on a tree.” Drink deep of the doctrine
of the substitutionary work of Christ; for therein lies the sweetest possible
comfort to the guilty sons of men, since the Lord “made him to be sin for us,
that we might be made the righteousness of God in him.” Faith begins with
knowledge. The mind goes on to believe that these things are true. The soul
believes that God is, and that He hears the cries of sincere hearts; that the
gospel is from God; that justification by faith is the grand truth which God
hath revealed in these last days by His Spirit more clearly than before. Then
the heart believes that Jesus is verily and in truth our God and Saviour, the
Redeemer of men, the Prophet, Priest, and King of His people. All this is
accepted as sure truth, not to be called in question. I pray that you may at
once come to this. Get firmly to believe that “the blood of Jesus Christ, God’s
dear Son, cleanseth us from all sin”; that His sacrifice is complete and fully
accepted of God on man’s behalf, so that he that believeth on Jesus is not
condemned. Believe these truths as you believe any other statements; for the
difference between common faith and saving faith lies mainly in the subjects
upon which it is exercised. Believe the witness of God just as you believe the
testimony of your own father or friend. “If we receive the witness of men, the
witness of God is greater.” So far you have made an advance toward faith; only
one more ingredient is needed to complete it, which is trust. Commit yourself to
the merciful God; rest your hope on the gracious gospel; trust your soul on the
dying and living Saviour; wash away your sins in the atoning blood; accept His
perfect righteousness, and all is well. Trust is the lifeblood of faith; there
is no saving faith without it. The Puritans were accustomed to explain faith by
the word “recumbency.” It meant leaning upon a thing. Lean with all your weight
upon Christ. It would be a better illustration still if I said, fall at full
length, and lie on the Rock of Ages. Cast yourself upon Jesus; rest in Him;
commit yourself to Him. That done, you have exercised saving faith. Faith is not
a blind thing; for faith begins with knowledge. It is not a speculative thing;
for faith believes facts of which it is sure. It is not an unpractical, dreamy
thing; for faith trusts, and stakes its destiny upon the truth of revelation.
That is one way of describing what faith is.

Let me try again. Faith is believing that Christ is what He is said to be, and
that He will do what He has promised to do, and then to expect this of Him. The
Scriptures speak of Jesus Christ as being God, God is human flesh; as being
perfect in His character; as being made of a sin-offering on our behalf; as
bearing our sins in His own body on the tree. The Scripture speaks of Him as
having finished transgression, made an end of sin, and brought in everlasting
righteousness. The sacred records further tell us that He “rose again from the
dead,” that He “ever liveth to make intercession for us,” that He has gone up
into the glory, and has taken possession of Heaven on the behalf of His people,
and that He will shortly come again “to judge the world in righteousness, and
his people with equity.” We are most firmly to believe that it is even so; for
this is the testimony of God the Father when He said, “This is my beloved Son;
hear ye him.” This also is testified by God the Holy Spirit; for the Spirit has
borne witness to Christ, both in the inspired Word and by divers miracles, and
by His working in the hearts of men. We are to believe this testimony to be
true.

Faith also believes that Christ will do what He has promised; that since He has
promised to cast out none that come to Him, it is certain that He will not cast
us out if we come to Him. Faith believes that since Jesus said, “The water that
I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up into everasting
life, it must be true; and if we get this living Water from Christ it will abide
in us, and will well up within us in streams of holy life. Whatever Christ has
promised to do He will do, and we must believe this, so as to look for pardon,
justification, preservation, and eternal glory from His hands, according as He
has promised them to believers in Him.

Then comes the next necessary step. Jesus is what He is said to be, Jesus will
do what He says He will do; therefore we must each one trust Him, saying, “He
will be to me what He says He is, and He will do to me what He has promised to
do; I leave myself in the hands of Him who is appointed to save, that He may
save me. I rest upon His promise that He will do even as He has said.” This is a
saving faith, and he that hath it hath everlasting life. Whatever his dangers
and difficulties, whatever his darkness and depression, whatever his infirmities
and sins, he that believeth thus on Christ Jesus is not condemned, and shall
never come into condemnation. May that explanation be of some service! I trust
it may be used by the Spirit of God to direct my reader into immediate peace.
“Be not afraid; only believe.” Trust, and be at rest. My fear is lest the reader
should rest content with understanding what is to be done, and yet never do it.
Better the poorest real faith actually at work, than the best ideal of it left
in the region of speculation. The great matter is to believe on the Lord Jesus
at once. Never mind distinctions and definitions. A hungry man eats though he
does not understand the composition of his food, the anatomy of his mouth, or
the process of digestion: he lives because he eats. Another far more clever
person understands thoroughly the science of nutrition; but if he does not eat
he will die, with all his knowledge. There are, no doubt, many at this hour in
Hell who understood the doctrine of faith, but did not believe. On the other
hand, not one who has trusted in the Lord Jesus has ever been cast out, though
he may never have been able intelligently to define his faith. Oh dear reader,
receive the Lord Jesus into your soul, and you shall live forever! “He that
believeth in Him hath everlasting life.”


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  CHAPTER 67: VIII. HOW MAY FAITH BE ILLUSTRATED?
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VIII. HOW MAY FAITH BE ILLUSTRATED? TO MAKE THE MATTER Of faith clearer still, I
will give you a few illustrations. Though the Holy Spirit alone can make my
reader see, it is my duty and my joy to furnish all the light I can, and to pray
the divine Lord to open blind eyes. Oh that my reader would pray the same prayer
for himself! The faith which saves has its analogies in the human frame.

It is the eye which looks. By the eye we bring into the mind that which is far
away; we can bring the sun and the far-off stars into the mind by a glance of
the eye. So by trust we bring the Lord Jesus near to us; and though He be far
away in Heaven, He enters into our heart. Only look to Jesus; for the hymn is
strictly true—

There is life in a look at the Crucified One, There is life at this moment for
thee.

Faith is the hand which grasps. When our hand takes hold of anything for itself,
it does precisely what faith does when it appropriates Christ and the blessings
of His redemption. Faith says, “Jesus is mine.” Faith hears of the pardoning
blood, and cries, “I accept it to pardon me.” Faith calls the legacies of the
dying Jesus her own; and they are her own, for faith is Christ’s heir; He has
given Himself and all that He has to faith. Take, O friend, that which grace has
provided for thee. You will not be a thief, for you have a divine permit:
“Whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely.” He who may have a
treasure simply by his grasping it will be foolish indeed if he remains poor.

Faith is the mouth which feeds upon Christ. Before food can nourish us, it must
be received into us. This is a simple matter—this eating and drinking. We
willingly receive into the mouth that which is our food, and then we consent
that it should pass down into our inward parts, wherein it is taken up and
absorbed into our bodily frame. Paul says, in his Epistle to the Romans, in the
tenth chapter, “The word is nigh thee, even in thy mouth.” Now then, all that is
to be done is to swallow it, to suffer it to go down into the soul. Oh that men
had an appetite! For he who is hungry and sees meat before him does not need to
be taught how to eat. “Give me,” said one, “a knife and a fork and a chance.” He
was fully prepared to do the rest. Truly, a heart which hungers and thirsts
after Christ has but to know that He is freely given, and at once it will
receive Him. If my reader is in such a case, let him not hesitate to receive
Jesus; for he may be sure that he will never be blamed for doing so: for unto
“as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God.” He
never repulses one, but He authorizes all who come to remain sons for ever. The
pursuits of life illustrate faith in many ways. The farmer buries good seed in
the earth, and expects it not only to live but to be multiplied. He has faith in
the covenant arrangement, that “seed-time and harvest shall not cease,” and he
is rewarded for his faith. The merchant places his money in the care of a
banker, and trusts altogether to the honesty and soundness of the bank. He
entrusts his capital to another’s hands, and feels far more at ease than if he
had the solid gold locked up in an iron safe. The sailor trusts himself to the
sea. When he swims he takes his foot from the bottom and rests upon the buoyant
ocean. He could not swim if he did not wholly cast himself upon the water. The
goldsmith puts precious metal into the fire which seems eager to consume it, but
he receives it back again from the furnace purified by the heat.

You cannot turn anywhere in life without seeing faith in operation between man
and man, or between man and natural law. Now, just as we trust in daily life,
even so are we to trust in God as He is revealed in Christ Jesus.

Faith exists in different persons in various degrees, according to the amount of
their knowledge or growth in grace. Sometimes faith is little more than a simple
clinging to Christ; a sense of dependence and a willingness so to depend. When
you are down at the seaside you will see limpets sticking to the rock. You walk
with a soft tread up to the rock; you strike the mollusk a rapid blow with your
walking-stick and off he comes. Try the next limpet in that way. You have given
him warning; he heard the blow with which you struck his neighbor, and he clings
with all his might. You will never get him off; not you! Strike, and strike
again, but you may as soon break the rock. Our little friend, the limpet, does
not know much, but he clings. He is not acquainted with the geological formation
of the rock, but he clings. He can cling, and he has found something to cling
to: this is all his stock of knowledge, and he uses it for his security and
salvation. It is the limpet’s life to cling to the rock, and it is the sinner’s
life to cling to Jesus. Thousands of God’s people have no more faith than this;
they know enough to cling to Jesus with all their heart and soul, and this
suffices for present peace and eternal safety. Jesus Christ is to them a Saviour
strong and mighty, a Rock immovable and immutable; they cling to him for dear
life, and this clinging saves them. Reader, cannot you cling? Do so at once.

Faith is seen when one man relies upon another from a knowledge of the
superiority of the other. This is a higher faith; the faith which knows the
reason for its dependence, and acts upon it. I do not think the limpet knows
much about the rock: but as faith grows it becomes more and more intelligent. A
blind man trusts himself with his guide because he knows that his friend can
see, and, trusting, he walks where his guide conducts him. If the poor man is
born blind he does not know what sight is; but he knows that there is such a
thing as sight, and that it is possessed by his friend and therefore he freely
puts his hand into the hand of the seeing one, and follows his leadership. “We
walk by faith, not by sight.” “Blessed are they which have not seen, and yet
have believed.” This is as good an image of faith as well can be; we know that
Jesus has about Him merit, and power, and blessing, which we do not possess, and
therefore we gladly trust ourselves to Him to be to us what we cannot be to
ourselves. We trust Him as the blind man trusts his guide. He never betrays our
confidence; but He “is made of God unto us wisdom, and righteousness, and
sanctification, and redemption.”

Every boy that goes to school has to exert faith while learning. His
schoolmaster teaches him geography, and instructs him as to the form of the
earth, and the existence of certain great cities and empires. The boy does not
himself know that these things are true, except that he believes his teacher,
and the books put into his hands. That is what you will have to do with Christ,
if you are to be saved; you must simply know because He tells you, believe
because He assures you it is even so, and trust yourself with Him because He
promises you that salvation will be the result. Almost all that you and I know
has come to us by faith. A scientific discovery has been made, and we are sure
of it. On what grounds do we believe it? On the authority of certain well-known
men of learning, whose reputations are established. We have never made or seen
their experiments, but we believe their witness. You must do the like with
regard to Jesus: because He teaches you certain truths you are to be His
disciple, and believe His words; because He has performed certain acts you are
to be His client, and trust yourself with Him. He is infinitely superior to you,
and presents himself to your confidence as your Master and Lord. If you will
receive Him and His words you shall be saved.

Another and a higher form of faith is that faith which grows out of love. Why
does a boy trust his father? The reason why the child trusts his father is
because he loves him. Blessed and happy are they who have a sweet faith in
Jesus, intertwined with deep affection for Him, for this is a restful
confidence. These lovers of Jesus are charmed with His character, and delighted
with His mission, they are carried away by the lovingkindness that He has
manifested, and therefore they cannot help trusting Him, because they so much
admire, revere, and love Him. The way of loving trust in the Saviour may thus be
illustrated. A lady is the wife of the most eminent physician of the day. She is
seized with a dangerous illness, and is smitten down by its power; yet she is
wonderfully calm and quiet, for her husband has made this disease his special
study, and has healed thousands who were similarly afflicted. She is not in the
least troubled, for she feels perfectly safe in the hands of one so dear to her,
and in whom skill and love are blended in their highest forms. Her faith is
reasonable and natural; her husband, from every point of view, deserves it of
her. This is the kind of faith which the happiest of believers exercise toward
Christ. There is no physician like Him, none can save as He can; we love Him,
and He loves us, and therefore we put ourselves into His hands, accept whatever
He prescribes, and do whatever He bids. We feel that nothing can be wrongly
ordered while He is the director of our affairs; for He loves us too well to let
us perish, or suffer a single needless pang.

Faith is the root of obedience, and this may be clearly seen in the affairs of
life. When a captain trusts a pilot to steer his vessel into port he manages the
vessel according to his direction. When a traveler trusts a guide to conduct him
over a difficult pass, he follows the track which his guide points out. When a
patient believes in a physician, he carefully follows his prescriptions and
directions. Faith which refuses to obey the commands of the Saviour is a mere
pretence, and will never save the soul. We trust Jesus to save us; He gives us
directions as to the way of salvation; we follow those directions and are saved.
Let not my reader forget this. Trust Jesus, and prove your trust by doing
whatever He bids you. A notable form of faith arises out of assured knowledge;
this comes of growth in grace, and is the faith which believes Christ because it
knows Him, and trusts Him because it has proved Him to be infallibly faithful.
An old Christian was in the habit of writing T and P in the margin of her Bible
whenever she had tried and proved a promise. How easy it is to trust a tried and
proved Saviour! You cannot do this as yet, but you will do so. Everything must
have a beginning. You will rise to strong faith in due time. This matured faith
asks not for signs and tokens, but bravely believes. Look at the faith of the
master mariner—I have often wondered at it. He looses his cable, he steams away
from the land. For days, weeks, or even months, he never sees sail or shore; yet
on he goes day and night without fear, till one morning he finds himself exactly
opposite to the desired haven toward which he has been steering. How has he
found his way over the trackless deep? He has trusted in his compass, his
nautical almanac, his glass, and the heavenly bodies; and obeying their
guidance, without sighting land, he has steered so accurately that he has not to
change a point to enter into port. It is a wonderful thing—that sailing or
steaming without sight. Spiritually it is a blessed thing to leave altogether
the shores of sight and feeling, and to say, “Good-by” to inward feelings,
cheering providences, signs, tokens, and so forth. It is glorious to be far out
on the ocean of divine love, believing in God, and steering for Heaven straight
away by the direction of the Word of God. “Blessed are they that have not seen,
and yet have believed”; to them shall be administered an abundant entrance at
the last, and a safe voyage on the way. Will not my reader put his trust in God
in Christ Jesus. There I rest with joyous confidence. Brother, come with me, and
believe our Father and our Saviour. Come at once.


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  CHAPTER 68: IX. WHY ARE WE SAVED BY FAITH?
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IX. WHY ARE WE SAVED BY FAITH?

WHY IS FAITH SELECTED as the channel of salvation? No doubt this inquiry is
often made. “By grace are ye saved through faith,” is assuredly the doctrine of
Holy Scripture, and the ordinance of God; but why is it so? Why is faith
selected rather than hope, or love, or patience?

It becomes us to be modest in answering such a question, for God’s ways are not
always to be understood; nor are we allowed presumptuously to question them.
Humbly we would reply that, as far as we can tell, faith has been selected as
the channel of grace, because there is a natural adaptation in faith to be used
as the receiver. Suppose that I am about to give a poor man an alms: I put it
into his hand—why? Well, it would hardly be fitting to put it into his ear, or
to lay it upon his foot; the hand seems made on purpose to receive. So, in our
mental frame, faith is created on purpose to be a receiver: it is the hand of
the man, and there is a fitness in receiving grace by its means. Do let me put
this very plainly. Faith which receives Christ is as simple an act as when your
child receives an apple from you, because you hold it out and promise to give
him the apple if he comes for it. The belief and the receiving relate only to an
apple; but they make up precisely the same act as the faith which deals with
eternal salvation. What the child’s hand is to the apple, that your faith is to
the perfect salvation of Christ. The child’s hand does not make the apple, nor
improve the apple, nor deserve the apple; it only takes it; and faith is chosen
by God to be the receiver of salvation, because it does not pretend to create
salvation, nor to help in it, but it is content humbly to receive it. “Faith is
the tongue that begs pardon, the hand which receives it, and the eye which sees
it; but it is not the price which buys it.” Faith never makes herself her own
plea, she rests all her argument upon the blood of Christ. She becomes a good
servant to bring the riches of the Lord Jesus to the soul, because she
acknowledges whence she drew them, and owns that grace alone entrusted her with
them.

Faith, again, is doubtless selected because it gives all the glory to God. It is
of faith that it might be by grace, and it is of grace that there might be no
boasting; for God cannot endure pride. “The proud he knoweth afar off,” and He
has no wish to come nearer to them. He will not give salvation in a way which
will suggest or foster pride. Paul saith, “Not of works, lest any man should
boast.” Now, faith excludes all boasting. The hand which receives charity does
not say, “I am to be thanked for accepting the gift”; that would be absurd. When
the hand conveys bread to the mouth it does not say to the body, “Thank me; for
I feed you.” It is a very simple thing that the hand does though a very
necessary thing; and it never arrogates glory to itself for what it does. So God
has selected faith to receive the unspeakable gift of His grace, because it
cannot take to itself any credit, but must adore the gracious God who is the
giver of all good. Faith sets the crown upon the right head, and therefore the
Lord Jesus was wont to put the crown upon the head of faith, saying, “Thy faith
hath saved thee; go in peace.”

Next, God selects faith as the channel of salvation because it is a sure method,
linking man with God. When man confides in God, there is a point of union
between them, and that union guarantees blessing. Faith saves us because it
makes us cling to God, and so brings us into connection with Him. I have often
used the following illustration, but I must repeat it, because I cannot think of
a better. I am told that years ago a boat was upset above the falls of Niagara,
and two men were being carried down the current, when persons on the shore
managed to float a rope out to them, which rope was seized by them both. One of
them held fast to it and was safely drawn to the bank; but the other, seeing a
great log come floating by, unwisely let go the rope and clung to the log, for
it was the bigger thing of the two, and apparently better to cling to. Alas! the
log with the man on it went right over the vast abyss, because there was no
union between the log and the shore. The size of the log was no benefit to him
who grasped it; it needed a connection with the shore to produce safety. So when
a man trusts to his works, or to sacraments, or to anything of that sort, he
will not be saved, because there is no junction between him and Christ; but
faith, though it may seem to be like a slender cord, is in the hands of the
great God on the shore side; infinite power pulls in the connecting line, and
thus draws the man from destruction. Oh the blessedness of faith, because it
unites us to God!

Faith is chosen again, because it touches the springs of action. Even in common
things faith of a certain sort lies at the root of all. I wonder whether I shall
be wrong if I say that we never do anything except through faith of some sort.
If I walk across my study it is because I believe my legs will carry me. A man
eats because he believes in the necessity of food; he goes to business because
he believes in the value of money; he accepts a check because he believes that
the bank will honor it. Columbus discovered America because he believed that
there was another continent beyond the ocean; and the Pilgrim Fathers colonized
it because they believed that God would be with them on those rocky shores. Most
grand deeds have been born of faith; for good or for evil, faith works wonders
by the man in whom it dwells. Faith in its natural form is an all-prevailing
force, which enters into all manner of human actions. Possibly he who derides
faith in God is the man who in an evil form has the most of faith; indeed, he
usually falls into a credulity which would be ridiculous, if it were not
disgraceful. God gives salvation to faith, because by creating faith in us He
thus touches the real mainspring of our emotions and actions. He has, so to
speak, taken possession of the battery and now He can send the sacred current to
every part of our nature. When we believe in Christ, and the heart has come into
the possession of God, then we are saved from sin, and are moved toward
repentance, holiness, zeal, prayer, consecration, and every other gracious
thing. “What oil is to the wheels, what weights are to a clock, what wings are
to a bird, what sails are to a ship, that faith is to all holy duties and
services.” Have faith, and all other graces will follow and continue to hold
their course.

Faith, again, has the power of working by love; it influences the affections
toward God, and draws the heart after the best things. He that believes in God
will beyond all question love God. Faith is an act of the understanding; but it
also proceeds from the heart. “With the heart man believeth unto righteousness”;
and hence God gives salvation to faith because it resides next door to the
affections, and is near akin to love; and love is the parent and the nurse of
every holy feeling and act. Love to God is obedience, love to God is holiness.
To love God and to love man is to be conformed to the image of Christ; and this
is salvation.

Moreover, faith creates peace and joy; he that hath it rests, and is tranquil,
is glad and joyous, and this is a preparation for heaven. God gives all heavenly
gifts to faith, for this reason among others, that faith worketh in us the life
and spirit which are to be eternally manifested in the upper and better world.
Faith furnishes us with armor for this life, and education for the life to come.
It enables a man both to live and to die without fear; it prepares both for
action and for suffering; and hence the Lord selects it as a most convenient
medium for conveying grace to us, and thereby securing us for glory.

Certainly faith does for us what nothing else can do; it gives us joy and peace,
and causes us to enter into rest. Why do men attempt to gain salvation by other
means? An old preacher says, “A silly servant who is bidden to open a door, sets
his shoulder to it and pushes with all his might; but the door stirs not, and he
cannot enter, use what strength he may. Another comes with a key, and easily
unlocks the door, and enters right readily. Those who would be saved by works
are pushing at heaven’s gate without result; but faith is the key which opens
the gate at once.” Reader, will you not use that key? The Lord commands you to
believe in His dear Son, therefore you may do so; and doing so you shall live.
Is not this the promise of the gospel, “He that believeth and is baptized shall
be saved”? (Mark 16:16). What can be your objection to a way of salvation which
commends itself to the mercy and the wisdom of our gracious God?


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  CHAPTER 69: X. ALAS! I CAN DO NOTHING!
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X. ALAS! I CAN DO NOTHING!

AFTER THE ANXIOUS HEART has accepted the doctrine of atonement, and learned the
great truth that salvation is by faith in the Lord Jesus, it is often sore
troubled with a sense of inability toward that which is good. Many are groaning,
“I can do nothing.” They are not making this into an excuse, but they feel it as
a daily burden. They would if they could. They can each one honestly say, “To
will is present with me, but how to perform that which I would I find not.” This
feeling seems to make all the gospel null and void; for what is the use of food
to a hungry man if he cannot get at it? Of what avail is the river of the water
of life if one cannot drink? We recall the story of the doctor and the poor
woman’s child. The sage practitioner told the mother that her little one would
soon be better under proper treatment, but it was absolutely needful that her
boy should regularly drink the best wine, and that he should spend a season at
one of the German spas. This, to a widow who could hardly get bread to eat! Now,
it sometimes seems to the troubled heart that the simple gospel of “Believe and
live,” is not, after all, so very simple; for it asks the poor sinner to do what
he cannot do. To the really awakened, but half instructed, there appears to be a
missing link; yonder is the salvation of Jesus, but how is it to be reached? The
soul is without strength, and knows not what to do. It lies within sight of the
city of refuge, and cannot enter its gate. Is this want of strength provided for
in the plan of salvation? It is. The work of the Lord is perfect. It begins
where we are, and asks nothing of us in order to its completion. When the good
Samaritan saw the traveler lying wounded and half dead, he did not bid him rise
and come to him, and mount the ass and ride off to the inn. No, “he came where
he was,” and ministered to him, and lifted him upon the beast and bore him to
the inn. Thus doth the Lord Jesus deal with us in our low and wretched estate.

We have seen that God justifieth, that He justifieth the ungodly and that He
justifies them through faith in the precious blood of Jesus; we have now to see
the condition these ungodly ones are in when Jesus works out their salvation.
Many awakened persons are not only troubled about their sin, but about their
moral weakness. They have no strength with which to escape from the mire into
which they have fallen, nor to keep out of it in after days. They not only
lament over what they have done, but over what they cannot do. They feel
themselves to be powerless, helpless, and spiritually lifeless. It may sound odd
to say that they feel dead, and yet it is even so. They are, in their own
esteem, to all good incapable. They cannot travel the road to Heaven, for their
bones are broken. “None of the men of strength have found their hands;” in fact,
they are “without strength.” Happily, it is written, as the commendation of
God’s love to us: When we were yet without strength, in due time Christ died for
the ungodly (Romans 5:6).

Here we see conscious helplessness succored—succored by the interposition of the
Lord Jesus. Our helplessness is extreme. It is not written, “When we were
comparatively weak Christ died for us”; or, “When we had only a little
strength”; but the description is absolute and unrestricted; “When we were yet
without strength.” We had no strength whatever which could aid in our salvation;
our Lord’s words were emphatically true, “Without me ye can do nothing.” I may
go further than the text, and remind you of the great love wherewith the Lord
loved us, “even when we were dead in trespasses and sins.” To be dead is even
more than to be without strength. The one thing that the poor strengthless
sinner has to fix his mind upon, and firmly retain, as his one ground of hope,
is the divine assurance that “in due time Christ died for the ungodly.” Believe
this, and all inability will disappear. As it is fabled of Midas that he turned
everything into gold by his touch, so it is true of faith that it turns
everything it touches into good. Our very needs and weaknesses become blessings
when faith deals with them.

Let us dwell upon certain forms of this want of strength. To begin with, one man
will say, “Sir, I do not seem to have strength to collect my thoughts, and keep
them fixed upon those solemn topics which concern my salvation; a short prayer
is almost too much for me. It is so partly, perhaps, through natural weakness,
partly because I have injured myself through dissipation, and partly also
because I worry myself with wordly cares, so that I am not capable of those high
thoughts which are necessary ere a soul can be saved.” This is a very common
form of sinful weakness. Note this! You are without strength on this point; and
there are many like you. They could not carry out a train of consecutive thought
to save their lives. Many poor men and women are illiterate and untrained, and
these would find deep thought to be very heavy work. Others are so light and
trifling by nature, that they could no more follow out a long process of
argument and reasoning, than they could fly. They could never attain to the
knowledge of any profound mystery if they expended their whole life in the
effort. You need not, therefore, despair: that which is necessary to salvation
is not continuous thought, but a simple reliance upon Jesus. Hold you on to this
one fact—“In due time Christ died for the ungodly.” This truth will not require
from you any deep research or profound reasoning, or convincing argument. There
it stands: “In due time Christ died for the ungodly.” Fix your mind on that, and
rest there.

Let this one great, gracious, glorious fact lie in your spirit till it perfumes
all your thoughts, and makes you rejoice even though you are without strength,
seeing the Lord Jesus has become your strength and your song, yea, He has become
your salvation. According to the Scriptures it is a revealed fact, that in due
time Christ died for the ungodly when they were yet without strength. You have
heard these words hundreds of times, maybe, and yet you have never before
perceived their meaning. There is a cheering savor about them, is there not?
Jesus did not die for our righteousness, but He died for our sins. He did not
come to save us because we were worth the saving, but because we were utterly
worthless, ruined, and undone. He came not to earth out of any reason that was
in us, but solely and only out of reasons which He fetched from the depths of
His own divine love. In due time He died for those whom He describes, not as
godly, but as ungodly, applying to them as hopeless an adjective as He could
well have selected. If you have but little mind, yet fasten it to this truth,
which is fitted to the smallest capacity, and is able to cheer the heaviest
heart. Let this text lie under your tongue like a sweet morsel, till it
dissolves into your heart and flavors all your thoughts; and then it will little
matter though those thoughts should be as scattered as autumn leaves. Persons
who have never shone in science, nor displayed the least originality of mind,
have nevertheless been fully able to accept the doctrine of the cross, and have
been saved thereby. Why should not you?

I hear another man cry, “Oh, sir my want of strength lies mainly in this, that I
cannot repent sufficiently!” A curious idea men have of what repentance is! Many
fancy that so many tears are to be shed, and so many groans are to be heaved,
and so much despair is to be endured. Whence comes this unreasonable notion?
Unbelief and despair are sins, and therefore I do not see how they can be
constituent elements of acceptable repentance; yet there are many who regard
them as necessary parts of true Christian experience. They are in great error.
Still, I know what they mean, for in the days of my darkness I used to feel in
the same way. I desired to repent, but I thought that I could not do it, and yet
all the while I was repenting. Odd as it may sound, I felt that I could not
feel. I used to get into a corner and weep, because I could not weep; and I fell
into bitter sorrow because I could not sorrow for sin. What a jumble it all is
when in our unbelieving state we begin to judge our own condition! It is like a
blind man looking at his own eyes. My heart was melted within me for fear,
because I thought that my heart was as hard as an adamant stone. My heart was
broken to think that it would not break. Now I can see that I was exhibiting the
very thing which I thought I did not possess; but then I knew not where I was.

Oh that I could help others into the light which I now enjoy! Fain would I say a
word which might shorten the time of their bewilderment. I would say a few plain
words, and pray “the Comforter” to apply them to the heart.

Remember that the man who truly repents is never satisfied with his own
repentance. We can no more repent perfectly than we can live perfectly. However
pure our tears, there will always be some dirt in them: there will be something
to be repented of even in our best repentance. But listen! To repent is to
change your mind about sin, and Christ, and all the great things of God. There
is sorrow implied in this; but the main point is the turning of the heart from
sin to Christ. If there be this turning, you have the essence of true
repentance, even though no alarm and no despair should ever have cast their
shadow upon your mind.

If you cannot repent as you would, it will greatly aid you to do so if you will
firmly believe that “in due time Christ died for the ungodly.” Think of this
again and again. How can you continue to be hard-hearted when you know that out
of supreme love “Christ died for the ungodly”? Let me persuade you to reason
with yourself thus: Ungodly as I am, though this heart of steel will not relent,
though I smite in vain upon my breast, yet He died for such as I am, since He
died for the ungodly. Oh that I may believe this and feel the power of it upon
my flinty heart!

Blot out every other reflection from your soul, and sit down by the hour
together, and meditate deeply on this one resplendent display of unmerited,
unexpected, unexampled love, “Christ died for the ungodly.” Read over carefully
the narrative of the Lord’s death, as you find it in the four evangelists. If
anything can melt your stubborn heart, it will be a sight of the sufferings of
Jesus, and the consideration that he suffered all this for His enemies.

Jesus! sweet the tears I shed,

at Thy feet I kneel,

on Thy wounded, fainting head,

all Thy sorrows feel.

heart dissolves to see Thee bleed,

heart so hard before;

hear Thee for the guilty plead,

grief o’erflows the more.

for the sinful Thou didst die,

I a sinner stand:

by Thine expiring eye,

by Thy piercèd hand.

Surely the cross is that wonder-working rod which can bring water out of a rock.
If you understand the full meaning of the divine sacrifice of Jesus, you must
repent of ever having been opposed to One who is so full of love. It is written,
“They shall look upon him whom they have pierced, and they shall mourn for him,
as one mourneth for his only son, and shall be in bitterness for him, as one
that is in bitterness for his firstborn.” Repentance will not make you see
Christ; but to see Christ will give you repentance. You may not make a Christ
out of your repentance, but you must look for repentance to Christ. The Holy
Ghost, by turning us to Christ, turns us from sin. Look away, then, from the
effect to the cause, from your own repenting to the Lord Jesus, who is exalted
on high to give repentance.

I have heard another say, “I am tormented with horrible thoughts. Wherever I go,
blasphemies steal in upon me. Frequently at my work a dreadful suggestion forces
itself upon me, and even on my bed I am startled from my sleep by whispers of
the evil one. I cannot get away from this horrible temptation.” Friend, I know
what you mean, for I have myself been hunted by this wolf. A man might as well
hope to fight a swarm of flies with a sword as to master his own thoughts when
they are set on by the devil. A poor tempted soul, assailed by satanic
suggestions, is like a traveler I have read of, about whose head and ears and
whole body there came a swarm of angry bees. He could not keep them off nor
escape from them. They stung him everywhere and threatened to be the death of
him. I do not wonder you feel that you are without strength to stop these
hideous and abominable thoughts which Satan pours into your soul; but yet I
would remind you of the Scripture before us—“When we were yet without strength,
in due time Christ died for the ungodly.” Jesus knew where we were and where we
should be; He saw that we could not overcome the prince of the power of the air;
He knew that we should be greatly worried by him; but even then, when He saw us
in that condition, Christ died for the ungodly. Cast the anchor of your faith
upon this. The devil himself cannot tell you that you are not ungodly; believe,
then, that Jesus died even for such as you are. Remember Martin Luther’s way of
cutting the devil’s head off with his own sword. “Oh,” said the devil to Martin
Luther, “you are a sinner.” “Yes,” said he, “Christ died to save sinners.” Thus
he smote him with his own sword. Hide you in this refuge, and keep there: “In
due time Christ died for the ungodly.” If you stand to that truth, your
blasphemous thoughts which you have not the strength to drive away will go away
of themselves; for Satan will see that he is answering no purpose by plaguing
you with them.

These thoughts, if you hate them, are none of yours, but are injections of the
Devil, for which he is responsible, and not you. If you strive against them,
they are no more yours than are the cursings and falsehoods of rioters in the
street. It is by means of these thoughts that the Devil would drive you to
despair, or at least keep you from trusting Jesus. The poor diseased woman could
not come to Jesus for the press, and you are in much the same condition, because
of the rush and throng of these dreadful thoughts. Still, she put forth her
finger, and touched the fringe of the Lord’s garment, and she was healed. Do you
the same.

Jesus died for those who are guilty of “all manner of sin and blasphemy,” and
therefore I am sure He will not refuse those who are unwillingly the captives of
evil thoughts. Cast yourself upon Him, thoughts and all, and see if He be not
mighty to save. He can still those horrible whisperings of the fiend, or He can
enable you to see them in their true light, so that you may not be worried by
them. In His own way He can and will save you, and at length give you perfect
peace. Only trust Him for this and everything else.

Sadly perplexing is that form of inability which lies in a supposed want of
power to believe. We are not strangers to the cry:

Oh that I could believe, Then all would easy be;

I would, but cannot; Lord, relieve, My help must come from thee.

Many remain in the dark for years because they have no power, as they say, to do
that which is the giving up of all power and reposing in the power of another,
even the Lord Jesus. Indeed, it is a very curious thing, this whole matter of
believing; for people do not get much help by trying to believe. Believing does
not come by trying. If a person were to make a statement of something that
happened this day, I should not tell him that I would try to believe him. If I
believed in the truthfulness of the man who told the incident to me and said
that he saw it, I should accept the statement at once. If I did not think him a
true man, I should, of course, disbelieve him; but there would be no trying in
the matter. Now, when God declares that there is salvation in Christ Jesus, I
must either believe Him at once, or make Him a liar. Surely you will not
hesitate as to which is the right path in this case, The witness of God must be
true, and we are bound at once to believe in Jesus. But possibly you have been
trying to believe too much. Now do not aim at great things. Be satisfied to have
a faith that can hold in its hand this one truth, “While we were yet without
strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly.” He laid down His life for
men while as yet they were not believing in Him, nor were able to believe in
Him. He died for men, not as believers, but as sinners. He came to make these
sinners into believers and saints; but when He died for them He viewed them as
utterly without strength. If you hold to the truth that Christ died for the
ungodly, and believe it, your faith will save you, and you may go in peace. If
you will trust your soul with Jesus, who died for the ungodly, even though you
cannot believe all things, nor move mountains, nor do any other wonderful works,
yet you are saved. It is not great faith, but true faith, that saves; and the
salvation lies not in the faith, but in the Christ in whom faith trusts. Faith
as a grain of mustard seed will bring salvation. It is not the measure of faith,
but the sincerity of faith, which is the point to be considered. Surely a man
can believe what he knows to be true; and as you know Jesus to be true, you, my
friend, can believe in Him. The cross which is the object of faith, is also, by
the power of the Holy Spirit, the cause of it. Sit down and watch the dying
Saviour till faith springs up spontaneously in your heart. There is no place
like Calvary for creating confidence. The air of that sacred hill brings health
to trembling faith. Many a watcher there has said:

I view Thee, wounded, grieving,

on the cursed tree,

I feel my heart believing

Thou suffer’dst thus for me.

“Alas!” cries another, “my want of strength lies in this direction, that I
cannot quit my sin, and I know that I cannot go to Heaven and carry my sin with
me.” I am glad that you know that, for it is quite true. You must be divorced
from your sin, or you cannot be married to Christ. Recollect the question which
flashed into the mind of young Bunyan when at his sports on the green on Sunday:
“Wilt thou have thy sins and go to hell, or wilt thou quit thy sins and go to
heaven?” That brought him to a dead stand. That is a question which every man
will have to answer: for there is no going on in sin and going to heaven. That
cannot be. You must quit sin or quit hope. Do you reply, “Yes, I am willing
enough. To will is present with me, but how to perform that which l would I find
not. Sin masters me, and I have no strength.” Come, then, if you have no
strength, this text is still true, “When we were yet without strength, in due
time Christ died for the ungodly.” Can you still believe that? However other
things may seem to contradict it, will you believe it? God has said it, and it
is a fact; therefore, hold on to it like grim death, for your only hope lies
there. Believe this and trust Jesus, and you shall soon find power with which to
slay your sin; but apart from Him, the strong man armed will hold you for ever
his bond slave. Personally, I could never have overcome my own sinfulness. I
tried and failed. My evil propensities were too many for me, till, in the belief
that Christ died for me, I cast my guilty soul on Him, and then I received a
conquering principle by which I overcame my sinful self. The doctrine of the
cross can be used to slay sin, even as the old warriors used their huge
two-handed swords, and mowed down their foes at every stroke. There is nothing
like faith in the sinner’s Friend: it overcomes all evil. If Christ has died for
me, ungodly as I am, without strength as I am, then I cannot live in sin any
longer, but must arouse myself to love and serve Him who hath redeemed me. I
cannot trifle with the evil which slew my best Friend. I must be holy for His
sake. How can I live in sin when He has died to save me from it?

See what a splendid help this is to you that are without strength, to know and
believe that in due time Christ died for such ungodly ones as you are. Have you
caught the idea yet? It is, somehow, so difficult for our darkened, prejudiced,
and unbelieving minds to see the essence of the gospel. At times I have thought,
when I have done preaching, that I have laid down the gospel so clearly, that
the nose on one’s face could not be more plain; and yet I perceive that even
intelligent hearers have failed to understand what was meant by “Look unto me
and be ye saved.” Converts usually say that they did not know the gospel till
such and such a day; and yet they had heard it for years. The gospel is unknown,
not from want of explanation, but from absence of personal revelation. This the
Holy Ghost is ready to give, and will give to those who ask Him. Yet when given,
the sum total of the truth revealed all lies within these words: “Christ died
for the ungodly.”

I hear another bewailing himself thus: “Oh, sir, my weakness lies in this, that
I do not seem to keep long in one mind! I hear the word on a Sunday, and I am
impressed; but in the week I meet with an evil companion, and my good feelings
are all gone. My fellow workmen do not believe in anything, and they say such
terrible things, and I do not know how to answer them, and so I find myself
knocked over.” I know this Plastic Pliable very well, and I tremble for him; but
at the same time, if he is really sincere, his weakness can be met by divine
grace. The Holy Spirit can cast out the evil spirit of the fear of man. He can
make the coward brave. Remember, my poor vacillating friend, you must not remain
in this state. It will never do to be mean and beggarly to yourself. Stand
upright, and look at yourself, and see if you were ever meant to be like a toad
under a harrow, afraid for your life either to move or to stand still. Do have a
mind of your own. This is not a spiritual matter only, but one which concerns
ordinary manliness. I would do many things to please my friends; but to go to
hell to please them is more than I would venture. It may be very well to do this
and that for good fellowship; but it will never do to lose the friendship of God
in order to keep on good terms with men. “I know that,” says the man, “but
still, though I know it, I cannot pluck up courage. I cannot show my colors. I
cannot stand fast.” Well, to you also I have the same text to bring: “When we
were yet without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly.” If Peter
were here, he would say, “The Lord Jesus died for me even when I was such a poor
weak creature that the maid who kept the fire drove me to lie, and to swear that
I knew not the Lord.” Yes, Jesus died for those who forsook him and fled. Take a
firm grip on this truth—“Christ died for the ungodly while they were yet without
strength.” This is your way out of your cowardice. Get this wrought into your
soul, “Christ died for me,” and you will soon be ready to die for Him. Believe
it, that He suffered in your place and stead, and offered for you a full, true,
and satisfactory expiation. If you believe that fact, you will be forced to
feel, “I cannot be ashamed of Him who died for me.” A full conviction that this
is true will nerve you with a dauntless courage. Look at the saints in the
martyr age. In the early days of Christianity, when this great thought of
Christ’s exceeding love was sparkling in all its freshness in the church, men
were not only ready to die, but they grew ambitious to suffer, and even
presented themselves by hundreds at the judgment seats of the rulers, confessing
the Christ. I do not say that they were wise to court a cruel death; but it
proves my point, that a sense of the love of Jesus lifts the mind above all fear
of what man can do to us. Why should it not produce the same effect in you? Oh
that it might now inspire you with a brave resolve to come out upon the Lord’s
side, and be His follower to the end! May the Holy Spirit help us to come thus
far by faith in the Lord Jesus, and it will be well!


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  CHAPTER 70: XI. THE INCREASE OF FAITH
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XI. THE INCREASE OF FAITH

HOW CAN WE OBTAIN an increase of faith? This is a very earnest question to many.
They say they want to believe, but cannot. A great deal of nonsense is talked
upon this subject. Let us be strictly practical in our dealing with it. Common
sense is as much needed in religion as anywhere else. “What am I to do in order
to believe?” One who was asked the best way to do a certain simple act, replied
that the best way to do it was to do it at once. We waste time in discussing
methods when the action is simple. The shortest way to believe is to believe. If
the Holy Spirit has made you candid, you will believe as soon as truth is set
before you. You will believe it because it is true. The gospel command is clear;
“Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved.” It is idle to evade
this by questions and quibbles. The order is plain; let it be obeyed. But still,
if you have difficulty, take it before God in prayer. Tell the great Father
exactly what it is that puzzles you, and beg Him by His Holy Spirit to solve the
question. If I cannot believe a statement in a book, I am glad to inquire of the
author what he means by it; and if he is a true man his explanation will satisfy
me; much more will the divine explanation of the hard points of Scripture
satisfy the heart of the true seeker. The Lord is willing to make himself known;
go to Him and see if it is not so. Repair at once to your closet, and cry, “O
Holy Spirit, lead me into the truth! What I know not, teach Thou me.”

Furthermore, if faith seems difficult, it is possible that God the Holy Spirit
will enable you to believe if you hear very frequently and earnestly that which
you are commanded to believe. We believe many things because we have heard them
so often. Do you not find it so in common life, that if you hear a thing fifty
times a day, at last you come to believe it? Some men have come to believe very
unlikely statements by this process, and therefore I do not wonder that the good
Spirit often blesses the method of often hearing the truth, and uses it to work
faith concerning that which is to be believed. It is written, “Faith cometh by
hearing”; therefore hear often. If I earnestly and attentively hear the gospel,
one of these days I shall find myself believing that which I hear, through the
blessed operation of the Spirit of God upon my mind. Only mind you hear the
gospel, and do not distract your mind with either hearing or reading that which
is designed to stagger you.

If that, however, should seem poor advice, I would add next, consider the
testimony of others. The Samaritans believed because of what the woman told them
concerning Jesus. Many of our beliefs arise out of the testimony of others. I
believe that there is such a country as Japan; I never saw it, and yet I believe
that there is such a place because others have been there. I believe that I
shall die; I have never died, but a great many have done so whom I once knew,
and therefore I have a conviction that I shall die also. The testimony of many
convinces me of that fact. Listen, then, to those who tell you how they were
saved, how they were pardoned, how they were changed in character. If you will
look into the matter you will find that somebody just like yourself has been
saved. If you have been a thief, you will find that a thief rejoiced to wash
away his sin in the fountain of Christ’s blood. If unhappily you have been
unchaste, you will find that men and women who have fallen in that way have been
cleansed and changed. If you are in despair, you have only to get among God’s
people, and inquire a little, and you will discover that some of the saints have
been equally in despair at times and they will be pleased to tell you how the
Lord delivered them. As you listen to one after another of those who have tried
the word of God, and proved it, the divine Spirit will lead you to believe. Have
you not heard of the African who was told by the missionary that water sometimes
became so hard that a man could walk on it? He declared that he believed a great
many things the missionary had told him; but he would never believe that. When
he came to England it came to pass that one frosty day he saw the river frozen,
but he would not venture on it. He knew that it was a deep river, and he felt
certain that he would be drowned if he ventured upon it. He could not be induced
to walk the frozen water till his friend and many others went upon it; then he
was persuaded, and trusted himself where others had safely ventured. So, while
you see others believe in the Lamb of God, and notice their joy and peace, you
will yourself be gently led to believe. The experience of others is one of God’s
ways of helping us to faith. You have either to believe in Jesus or die; there
is no hope for you but in Him. A better plan is this—note the authority upon
which you are commanded to believe, and this will greatly help you to faith. The
authority is not mine, or you might well reject it. But you are commanded to
believe upon the authority of God himself. He bids you believe in Jesus Christ,
and you must not refuse to obey your Maker. The foreman of a certain works had
often heard the gospel, but he was troubled with the fear that he might not come
to Christ. His good master one day sent a card around to the works—“Come to my
house immediately after work.” The foreman appeared at his master’s door, and
the master came out, and said somewhat roughly, “What do you want, John,
troubling me at this time? Work is done, what right have you here?” “Sir,” said
he, “I had a card from you saying that I was to come after work.” “Do you mean
to say that merely because you had a card from me you are to come up to my house
and call me out after business hours?” “Well, Sir,” replied the foreman, “I do
not understand you, but it seems to me that, as you sent for me, I had a right
to come.” “Come in, John,” said his master, “I have another message that I want
to read to you,” and he sat down and read these words: “Come unto me, all ye
that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.” “Do you think after
such a message from Christ that you can be wrong in coming to him?” The poor man
saw it all at once, and believed in the Lord Jesus unto eternal life, because he
perceived that he had good warrant and authority for believing. So have you,
poor soul! You have good authority for coming to Christ, for the Lord himself
bids you trust Him.

If that does not breed faith in you, think over what it is that you have to
believe—that the Lord Jesus Christ suffered in the place and stead of sinners,
and is able to save all who trust Him. Why, this is the most blessed fact that
ever men were told to believe; the most suitable, the most comforting, the most
divine truth that was ever set before mortal minds. I advise you to think much
upon it, and search out the grace and love which it contains. Study the four
Evangelists, study Paul’s epistles, and then see if the message is not such a
credible one that you are forced to believe it.

If that does not do, then think upon the person of Jesus Christ—think of who He
is, and what He did, and where He is, and what He is. How can you doubt Him? It
is cruelty to distrust the ever truthful Jesus. He has done nothing to deserve
distrust; on the contrary, it should be easy to rely upon Him. Why crucify Him
anew by unbelief? Is not this crowning Him with thorns again, and spitting upon
Him again? What! is He not to be trusted? What worse insult did the soldiers
pour upon Him than this? They made Him a martyr; but you make Him a liar—this is
worse by far. Do not ask how can I believe? But answer another question—How can
you disbelieve?

If none of these things avail, then there is something wrong about you
altogether, and my last word is, submit yourself to God! Prejudice or pride is
at the bottom of this unbelief. May the Spirit of God take away your enmity and
make you yield. You are a rebel, a proud rebel, and that is why you do not
believe your God. Give up your rebellion; throw down your weapons; yield at
discretion, surrender to your King. I believe that never did a soul throw up its
hands in self-despair, and cry, “Lord, I yield,” but what faith became easy to
it before long. It is because you still have a quarrel with God, and resolve to
have your own will and your own way, that therefore you cannot believe. “How can
ye believe,” said Christ, “that have honor one of another?” Proud self creates
unbelief. Submit, O man. Yield to your God, and then shall you sweetly believe
in your Saviour. May the Holy Ghost now work secretly but effectually with you,
and bring you at this very moment to believe in the Lord Jesus! Amen.


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  CHAPTER 71: XII. REGENERATION AND THE HOLY SPIRIT
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XII. REGENERATION AND THE HOLY SPIRIT

YE MUST BE BORN AGAIN.” This word of our Lord Jesus has appeared to flame in the
way of many, like the drawn sword of the cherub at the gate of Paradise. They
have despaired, because this change is beyond their utmost effort. The new birth
is from above, and therefore it is not in the creature’s power. Now, it is far
from my mind to deny, or ever to conceal, a truth in order to create a false
comfort. I freely admit that the new birth is supernatural, and that it cannot
be wrought by the sinner’s own self. It would be a poor help to my reader if I
were wicked enough to try to cheer him by persuading him to reject or forget
what is unquestionably true. But is it not remarkable that the very chapter in
which our Lord makes this sweeping declaration also contains the most explicit
statement as to salvation by faith? Read the third chapter of John’s Gospel and
do not dwell alone upon its earlier sentences. It is true that the third verse
says:

Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man
be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.

But, then, the fourteenth and fifteenth verses speak: And as Moses lifted up the
serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of man be lifted up: that
whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have eternal life. The
eighteenth verse repeats the same doctrine in the broadest terms:

He that believeth on him is not condemned: but he that believeth not is
condemned already, because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten
Son of God.

It is clear to every reader that these two statements must agree, since they
came from the same lips, and are recorded on the same inspired page. Why should
we make a difficulty where there can be none? If one statement assures us of the
necessity to salvation of a something, which only God can give, and if another
assures us that the Lord will save us upon our believing in Jesus, then we may
safely conclude that the Lord will give to those who believe all that is
declared to be necessary to salvation. The Lord does, in fact, produce the new
birth in all who believe in Jesus; and their believing is the surest evidence
that they are born again.

We trust in Jesus for what we cannot do ourselves: if it were in our own power,
what need of looking to Him? It is ours to believe, it is the Lord’s to create
us anew. He will not believe for us, neither are we to do regenerating work for
Him. It is enough for us to obey the gracious command; it is for the Lord to
work the new birth in us. He who could go so far as to die on the cross for us,
can and will give us all things that are needful for our eternal safety.

“But a saving change of heart is the work of the Holy Spirit.” This also is most
true, and let it be far from us to question it, or to forget it. But the work of
the Holy Spirit is secret and mysterious, and it can only be perceived by its
results. There are mysteries about our natural birth into which it would be an
unhallowed curiosity to pry: still more is this the case with the sacred
operations of the Spirit of God. “The wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou
hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, or whither it
goeth; so is every one that is born of the Spirit.” This much, however, we do
know—the mysterious work of the Holy Spirit cannot be a reason for refusing to
believe in Jesus to whom that same Spirit beareth witness.

If a man were bidden to sow a field, he could not excuse his neglect by saying
that it would be useless to sow unless God caused the seed to grow. He would not
be justified in neglecting tillage because the secret energy of God alone can
create a harvest. No one is hindered in the ordinary pursuits of life by the
fact that unless the Lord build the house they labor in vain that build it. It
is certain that no man who believes in Jesus will ever find that the Holy Spirit
refuses to work in him: in fact, his believing is the proof that the Spirit is
already at work in his heart.

God works in providence, but men do not therefore sit still. They could not move
without the divine power giving them life and strength, and yet they proceed
upon their way without question; the power being bestowed from day to day by Him
in whose hand their breath is, and whose are all their ways. So is it in grace.
We repent and believe, though we could do neither if the Lord did not enable us.
We forsake sin and trust in Jesus, and then we perceive that the Lord has
wrought in us to will and to do of His own good pleasure. It is idle to pretend
that there is any real difficulty in the matter.

Some truths which it is hard to explain in words are simple enough in actual
experience. There is no discrepancy between the truth that the sinner believes,
and that his faith is wrought in him by the Holy Spirit. Only folly can lead men
to puzzle themselves about plain matters while their souls are in danger. No man
would refuse to enter a lifeboat because he did not know the specific gravity of
bodies; neither would a starving man decline to eat till he understood the whole
process of mutrition. If you, my reader, will not believe till you can
understand all mysteries, you will never be saved at all; and if you allow
self-invented difficulties to keep you from accepting pardon through your Lord
and Saviour, you will perish in a condemnation which will be richly deserved. Do
not commit spiritual suicide through a passion for discussing metaphysical
subtleties.


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  CHAPTER 72: XIII. "MY REDEEMER LIVETH"
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XIII. “MY REDEEMER LIVETH”

CONTINUALLY have I spoken to the reader concerning Christ crucified, who is the
great hope of the guilty; but it is our wisdom to remember that our Lord has
risen from the dead and lives eternally.

You are not asked to trust in a dead Jesus, but in One who, though He died for
our sins, has risen again for our justification. You may go to Jesus at once as
to a living and present friend. He is not a mere memory, but a continually
existent Person who will hear your prayers and answer them. He lives on purpose
to carry on the work for which He once laid down His life. He is interceding for
sinners at the right hand of the Father, and for this reason He is able to save
them to the uttermost who come unto God by Him. Come and try this living
Saviour, if you have never done so before. This living Jesus is also raised to
an eminence of glory and power. He does not now sorrow as “a humble man before
his foes,” nor labor as “the carpenter’s son”; but He is exalted far above
principalities and power and every name that is named. The Father has given Him
all power in Heaven and in earth, and he exercises this high endowment in
carrying out His work of grace. Hear what Peter and the other apostles testified
concerning Him before the high priest and the council: The God of our fathers
raised up Jesus, whom ye slew and hanged on a tree. Him hath God exalted with
his right hand to be a Prince and a Saviour, for to give repentance to Israel,
and forgiveness of sins (Acts 5:30-31). The glory which surrounds the ascended
Lord should breathe hope into every believer’s breast. Jesus is no mean
person—He is “a Saviour and a great one.” He is the crowned and enthroned
Redeemer of men. The sovereign prerogative of life and death is vested in Him;
the Father has put all men under the mediatorial government of the Son, so that
He can quicken whom He will. He openeth, and no man shutteth. At His word the
soul which is bound by the cords of sin and condemnation can be unloosed in a
moment. He stretches out the silver scepter, and whosoever touches it lives.

It is well for us that as sin lives, and the flesh lives, and the devil lives,
so Jesus lives; and it is also well that whatever might these may have to ruin
us, Jesus has still greater power to save us.

All His exaltation and ability are on our account. “He is exalted to be,” and
exalted “to give.” He is exalted to be a Prince and a Saviour, that He may give
all that is needed to accomplish the salvation of all who come under His rule.
Jesus has nothing which He will not use for a sinner’s salvation, and He is
nothing which He will not display in the aboundings of His grace. He links His
princedom with His Saviour-ship, as if He would not have the one without the
other; and He sets forth His exaltation as designed to bring blessings to men,
as if this were the flower and crown of His glory. Could anything be more
calculated to raise the hopes of seeking sinners who are looking Christward?

Jesus endured great humiliation, and therefore there was room for Him to be
exalted. By that humiliation He accomplished and endured all the Father’s will,
and therefore He was rewarded by being raised to glory. He uses that exaltation
on behalf of His people. Let my reader raise his eyes to these hills of glory,
whence his help must come. Let him contemplate the high glories of the Prince
and Saviour. Is it not most hopeful for men that a Man is now on the throne of
the universe? Is it not glorious that the Lord of all is the Saviour of sinners?
We have a Friend at court; yea, a Friend on the throne. He will use all His
influence for those who entrust their affairs in His hands. Well does one of our
poets sing:

ever lives to intercede

His Father’s face;

Him, my soul, Thy cause to plead,

doubt the Father’s grace.

Come, friend, and commit your cause and your case to those once pierced hands,
which are now glorified with the signet rings of royal power and honor. No suit
ever failed which was left with this great Advocate.


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  CHAPTER 73: XIV. REPENTANCE MUST GO WITH FORGIVENESS
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XIV. REPENTANCE MUST GO WITH FORGIVENESS

IT IS CLEAR from the text which we have lately quoted that repentance is bound
up with the forgiveness of sins. In Acts 5:31 we read that Jesus is “exalted to
give repentance and forgiveness of sins.” These two blessings come from that
sacred hand which once was nailed to the tree, but is now raised to glory.
Repentance and forgiveness are riveted together by the eternal purpose of God.
What God hath joined together let no man put asunder.

Repentance must go with remission, and you will see that it is so if you think a
little upon the matter. It cannot be that pardon of sin should be given to an
impenitent sinner; this were to confirm him in his evil ways, and to teach him
to think little of evil. If the Lord were to say, “You love sin, and live in it,
and you are going on from bad to worse, but, all the same, I forgive you,” this
were to proclaim a horrible license for iniquity. The foundations of social
order would be removed, and moral anarchy would follow. I cannot tell what
innumerable mischiefs would certainly occur if you could divide repentance and
forgiveness, and pass by the sin while the sinner remained as fond of it as
ever. In the very nature of things, if we believe in the holiness of God, it
must be so, that if we continue in our sin, and will not repent of it, we cannot
be forgiven, but must reap the consequence of our obstinacy. According to the
infinite goodness of God, we are promised that if we will forsake our sins,
confessing them, and will, by faith, accept the grace which is provided in
Christ Jesus, God is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us
from all unrighteousness. But, so long as God lives, there can be no promise of
mercy to those who continue in their evil ways, and refuse to acknowledge their
wrongdoing. Surely no rebel can expect the King to pardon his treason while he
remains in open revolt. No one can be so foolish as to imagine that the Judge of
all the earth will put away our sins if we refuse to put them away ourselves.

Moreover, it must be so for the completeness of divine mercy. That mercy which
could forgive the sin and yet let the sinner live in it would be scant and
superficial mercy. It would be unequal and deformed mercy, lame upon one of its
feet, and withered as to one of its hands. Which, think you, is the greater
privilege, cleansing from the guilt of sin, or deliverance from the power of
sin? I will not attempt to weigh in the scales two mercies so surpassing.
Neither of them could have come to us apart from the precious blood of Jesus.
But it seems to me that to be delivered from the dominion of sin, to be made
holy, to be made like to God, must be reckoned the greater of the two, if a
comparison has to be drawn. To be forgiven is an immeasurable favor. We make
this one of the first notes of our psalm of praise: “Who forgiveth all thine
iniquities.” But if we could be forgiven, and then could be permitted to love
sin, to riot in iniquity, and to wallow in lust, what would be the use of such a
forgiveness? Might it not turn out to be a poisoned sweet, which would most
effectually destroy us? To be washed, and yet to lie in the mire; to be
pronounced clean, and yet to have the leprosy white on one’s brow, would be the
veriest mockery of mercy. What is it to bring the man out of his sepulcher if
you leave him dead? Why lead him into the light if he is still blind? We thank
God, that He who forgives our iniquities also heals our diseases. He who washes
us from the stains of the past also uplifts us from the foul ways of the
present, and keeps us from failing in the future. We must joyfully accept both
repentance and remission; they cannot be separated. The covenant heritage is one
and indivisible, and must not be parceled out. To divide the work of grace would
be to cut the living child in halves, and those who would permit this have no
interest in it.

I will ask you who are seeking the Lord, whether you would be satisfied with one
of these mercies alone? Would it content you, my reader, if God would forgive
you your sin and then allow you to be as worldly and wicked as before? Oh, no!
The quickened spirit is more afraid of sin itself than of the penal results of
it. The cry of your heart is not, “Who shall deliver me from punishment?” but,
“O wretched man that I am! Who shall deliver me from the body of this death? Who
shall enable me to live above temptation, and to become holy, even as God is
holy?” Since the unity of repentance with remission agrees with gracious desire,
and since it is necessary for the completeness of salvation, and for holiness’
sake, rest you sure that it abides.

Repentance and forgiveness are joined together in the experience of all
believers. There never was a person yet who did unfeignedly repent of sin with
believing repentance who was not forgiven; and on the other hand, there never
was a person forgiven who had not repented of his sin. I do not hesitate to say
that beneath the copes of Heaven there never was, there is not, and there never
will be, any case of sin being washed away, unless at the same time the heart
was led to repentance and faith in Christ. Hatred of sin and a sense of pardon
come together into the soul, and abide together while we live.

These two things act and react upon each other: the man who is forgiven,
therefore repents; and the man who repents is also most assuredly forgiven.
Remember first, that forgiveness leads to repentance. As we sing in Hart’s
words:

Law and terrors do but harden, All the while they work alone; But a sense of
blood-bought pardon Soon dissolves a heart of stone. When we are sure that we
are forgiven, then we abhor iniquity; and I suppose that when faith grows into
full assurance, so that we are certain beyond a doubt that the blood of Jesus
has washed us whiter than snow, it is then that repentance reaches to its
greatest height. Repentance grows as faith grows. Do not make any mistake about
it; repentance is not a thing of days and weeks, a temporary penance to be over
as fast as possible! No; it is the grace of a lifetime, like faith itself. God’s
little children repent, and so do the young men and the fathers. Repentance is
the inseparable companion of faith. All the while that we walk by faith and not
by sight, the tear of repentance glitters in the eye of faith. That is not true
repentance which does not come of faith in Jesus, and that is not true faith in
Jesus which is not tinctured with repentance. Faith and repentance, like Siamese
twins, are vitally joined together. In proportion as we believe in the forgiving
love of Christ, in that proportion we repent; and in proportion as we repent of
sin and hate evil, we rejoice in the fullness of the absolution which Jesus is
exalted to bestow. You will never value pardon unless you feel repentance; and
you will never taste the deepest draught of repentance until you know that you
are pardoned. It may seem a strange thing, but so it is—the bitterness of
repentance and the sweetness of pardon blend in the flavor of every gracious
life, and make up an incomparable happiness.

These two covenant gifts are the mutual assurance of each other. If I know that
I repent, I know that I am forgiven. How am I to know that I am forgiven except
I know also that I am turned from my former sinful course? To be a believer is
to be a penitent. Faith and repentance are but two spokes in the same wheel, two
handles of the same plough. Repentance has been well described as a heart broken
for sin, and from sin; and it may equally well be spoken of as turning and
returning. It is a change of mind of the most thorough and radical sort, and it
is attended with sorrow for the past, and a resolve of amendment in the future.

is to leave

sins we loved before;

show that we in earnest grieve,

doing so no more.

Now, when that is the case, we may be certain that we are forgiven; for the Lord
never made a heart to be broken for sin and broken from sin, without pardoning
it. If, on the other hand, we are enjoying pardon, through the blood of Jesus,
and are justified by faith, and have peace with God, through Jesus Christ our
Lord, we know that our repentance and faith are of the right sort. Do not regard
your repentance as the cause of your remission, but as the companion of it. Do
not expect to be able to repent until you see the grace of our Lord Jesus, and
His readiness to blot out your sin. Keep these blessed things in their places,
and view them in their relation to each other. They are the Jachin and Boaz of a
saving experience; I mean that they are comparable to Solomon’s two great
pillars which stood in the forefront of the house of the Lord, and formed a
majestic entrance to the holy place. No man comes to God aright except he passes
between the pillars of repentance and remission. Upon your heart the rainbow of
covenant grace has been displayed in all its beauty when the tear-drops of
repentance have been shone upon by the light of full forgiveness. Repentance of
sin and faith in divine pardon are the warp and woof of the fabric of real
conversion. By these tokens shall you know an Israelite indeed. To come back to
the Scripture upon which we are meditating: both forgiveness and repentance flow
from the same source, and are given by the same Saviour. The Lord Jesus in His
glory bestows both upon the same persons. You are neither to find the remission
nor the repentance elsewhere. Jesus has both ready, and He is prepared to bestow
them now, and to bestow them most freely on all who will accept them at His
hands. Let it never be forgotten that Jesus gives all that is needful for our
salvation. It is highly important that all seekers after mercy should remember
this. Faith is as much the gift of God as is the Saviour upon whom that faith
relies. Repentance of sin is as truly the work of grace as the making of an
atonement by which sin is blotted out. Salvation, from first to last, is of
grace alone. You will not misunderstand me. It is not the Holy Spirit who
repents. He has never done anything for which He should repent. If He could
repent, it would not meet the case; we must ourselves repent of our own sin, or
we are not saved from its power. It is not the Lord Jesus Christ who repents.
What should He repent of? We ourselves repent with the full consent of every
faculty of our mind. The will, the affections, the emotions, all work together
most heartily in the blessed act of repentance for sin; and yet at the back of
all that is our personal act, there is a secret holy influence which melts the
heart, gives contrition, and produces a complete change. The Spirit of God
enlightens us to see what sin is, and thus makes it loathsome in our eyes. The
Spirit of God also turns us toward holiness, makes us heartily to appreciate,
love, and desire it, and thus gives us the impetus by which we are led onward
from stage to stage of sanctification. The Spirit of God works in us to will and
to do according to God’s good pleasure. To that good Spirit let us submit
ourselves at once, that He may lead us to Jesus, who will freely give us the
double benediction of repentance and remission, according to the riches of His
grace.

“BY GRACE ARE YE SAVED.”


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  CHAPTER 74: XV. HOW REPENTANCE IS GIVEN
========================================================================

XV. HOW REPENTANCE IS GIVEN TO RETURN to the grand text: “Him hath God exalted
with his right hand to be a Prince and a Saviour, for to give repentance to
Israel, and forgiveness of sins.” Our Lord Jesus Christ has gone up that grace
may come down. His glory is employed to give greater currency to His grace. The
Lord has not taken a step upward except with the design of bearing believing
sinners upward with Him. He is exalted to give repentance; and this we shall see
if we remember a few great truths. The work which our Lord Jesus has done has
made repentance possible, available, and acceptable. The law makes no mention of
repentance, but says plainly, “The soul that sinneth, it shall die.” If the Lord
Jesus had not died and risen again and gone unto the Father, what would your
repenting or mine be worth? We might feel remorse with its horrors, but never
repentance with its hopes. Repentance, as a natural feeling, is a common duty
deserving no great praise: indeed, it is so generally mingled with a selfish
fear of punishment, that the kindliest estimate makes but little of it. Had not
Jesus interposed and wrought out a wealth of merit, our tears of repentance
would have been so much water spilled upon the ground. Jesus is exalted on high,
that through the virtue of His intercession repentance may have a place before
God. In this respect He gives us repentance, because He puts repentance into a
position of acceptance, which otherwise it could never have occupied. When Jesus
was exalted on high, the Spirit of God was poured out to work in us all needful
graces. The Holy Ghost creates repentance in us by supernaturally renewing our
nature, and taking away the heart of stone out of our flesh. Oh, sit not down
straining those eyes of yours to fetch out impossible tears! Repentance comes
not from unwilling nature, but from free and sovereign grace. Get not to your
chamber to smite your breast in order to fetch from a heart of stone feelings
which are not there. But go to Calvary and see how Jesus died. Look upward to
the hills whence comes your help. The Holy Ghost has come on purpose that He may
overshadow men’s spirits and breed repentance within them, even as once He
brooded over chaos and brought forth order. Breathe your prayer to Him, “Blessed
Spirit, dwell with me. Make me tender and lowly of heart, that I may hate sin
and unfeignedly repent of it.” He will hear your cry and answer you.

Remember, too, that when our Lord Jesus was exalted, He not only gave us
repentance by sending forth the Holy Spirit, but by consecrating all the works
of nature and of providence to the great ends of our salvation, so that any one
of them may call us to repentance, whether it crow like Peter’s cock, or shake
the prison like the jailer’s earthquake. From the right hand of God our Lord
Jesus rules all things here below, and makes them work together for the
salvation of His redeemed. He uses both bitters and sweets, trials and joys,
that He may produce in sinners a better mind toward their God. Be thankful for
the providence which has made you poor, or sick, or sad; for by all this Jesus
works the life of your spirit and turns you to Himself. The Lord’s mercy often
rides to the door of our hearts on the black horse of affliction. Jesus uses the
whole range of our experience to wean us from earth and woo us to Heaven. Christ
is exalted to the throne of Heaven and earth in order that, by all the processes
of His providence, He may subdue hard hearts unto the gracious softening of
repentance.

Besides, He is at work at this hour by all His whispers in the conscience, by
His inspired Book, by those of us who speak out of that Book, and by praying
friends and earnest hearts. He can send a word to you which shall strike your
rocky heart as with the rod of Moses, and cause streams of repentance to flow
forth. He can bring to your mind some heart-breaking text out of Holy Scripture
which shall conquer you right speedily. He can mysteriously soften you, and
cause a holy frame of mind to steal over you when you least look for it. Be sure
of this, that He who is gone into His glory, raised into all the splendor and
majesty of God, has abundant ways of working repentance in those to whom He
grants forgiveness. He is even now waiting to give repentance to you. Ask Him
for it at once.

Observe with much comfort that the Lord Jesus Christ gives this repentance to
the most unlikely people in the world. He is exalted to give repentance to
Israel. To Israel! In the days when the apostles thus spoke, Israel was the
nation which had most grossly sinned against light and love, by daring to say,
“His blood be on us and on our children.” Yet Jesus is exalted to give them
repentance! What a marvel of grace! If you have been brought up in the brightest
of Christian light, and yet have rejected it, there is still hope. If you have
sinned against conscience, and against the Holy Spirit, and against the love of
Jesus, there is yet space for repentance. Though you may be as hard as
unbelieving Israel of old, softening may yet come to you, since Jesus is
exalted, and clothed with boundless power. For those who went the furthest in
iniquity, and sinned with special aggravation, the Lord Jesus is exalted to give
to them repentance and forgiveness of sins. Happy am I to have so full a gospel
to proclaim! Happy are you to be allowed to read it! The hearts of the children
of Israel had grown hard as an adamant stone. Luther used to think it impossible
to convert a Jew. We are far from agreeing with him, and yet we must admit that
the seed of Israel have been exceedingly obstinate in their rejection of the
Saviour during these many centuries. Truly did the Lord say, “Israel would none
of me.” “He came to his own and his own received him not.” Yet on behalf of
Israel our Lord Jesus is exalted for the giving of repentance and remission.
Probably my reader is a Gentile; but yet he may have a very stubborn heart,
which has stood out against the Lord Jesus for many years; and yet in him our
Lord can work repentance. It may be that you will yet feel compelled to write as
William Hone did when he yielded to divine love. He was the author of those most
entertaining volumes called the “Everyday Book,” but he was once a stout-hearted
infidel. When subdued by sovereign grace, he wrote:

proudest heart that ever beat

been subdued in me;

wildest will that ever rose

scorn Thy cause and aid Thy foes

quell’d my Lord, by Thee.

will, and not my will be done,

heart be ever Thine;

Thee the mighty Word,

Saviour Christ, my God, my Lord,

cross shall be my sign.

The Lord can give repentance to the most unlikely, turning lions into lambs, and
ravens into doves. Let us look to Him that this great change may be wrought in
us. Assuredly the contemplation of the death of Christ is one of the surest and
speediest methods of gaining repentance. Do not sit down and try to pump up
repentance from the dry well of corrupt nature. It is contrary to the laws of
mind to suppose that you can force your soul into that gracious state. Take your
heart in prayer to Him who understands it, and say, “Lord, cleanse it. Lord,
renew it. Lord, work repentance in it.” The more you try to produce penitent
emotions in yourself, the more you will be disappointed; but if you believingly
think of Jesus dying for you, repentance will burst forth. Meditate on the
Lord’s shedding His heart’s blood out of love to you. Set before your mind’s eye
the agony and bloody sweat, the cross and passion; and, as you do this, He who
was the bearer of all this grief will look at you, and with that look He will do
for you what He did for Peter, so that you also will go out and weep bitterly.
He who died for you can, by His gracious Spirit, make you die to sin; and He who
has gone into glory on your behalf can draw your soul after Him, away from evil,
and toward holiness.

I shall be content if I leave this one thought with you; look not beneath the
ice to find fire, neither hope in your own natural heart to find repentance.
Look to the Living One for life. Look to Jesus for all you need between Hell
Gate and Heaven Gate. Never seek elsewhere for any part of that which Jesus
loves to bestow; but remember,

Christ is all.


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  CHAPTER 75: XVI. THE FEAR OF FINAL FALLING
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XVI. THE FEAR OF FINAL FALLING A DARK FEAR haunts the minds of many who are
coming to Christ; they are afraid that they shall not persevere to the end. I
have heard the seeker say: “If I were to cast my soul upon Jesus, yet
peradventure I should after all draw back into perdition. I have had good
feelings before now, and they have died away. My goodness has been as the
morning cloud, and as the early dew. It has come on a sudden, lasted for a
season, promised much, and then vanished away.”

I believe that this fear is often the father of the fact; and that some who have
been afraid to trust Christ for all time, and for all eternity, have failed
because they had a temporary faith, which never went far enough to save them.
They set out trusting to Jesus in a measure, but looking to themselves for
continuance and perseverance in the heavenward way; and so they set out
faultily, and, as a natural consequence, turned back before long. If we trust to
ourselves for our holding on we shall not hold on. Even though we rest in Jesus
for a part of our salvation, we shall fail if we trust to self for anything. No
chain is stronger than its weakest link: if Jesus be our hope for everything,
except one thing, we shall utterly fail, because in that one point we shall come
to nought. I have no doubt whatever that a mistake about the perseverance of the
saints has prevented the perseverance of many who did run well. What did hinder
them that they should not continue to run? They trusted to themselves for that
running, and so they stopped short. Beware of mixing even a little of self with
the mortar with which you build, or you will make it untempered mortar, and the
stones will not hold together. If you look to Christ for your beginnings, beware
of looking to yourself for your endings. He is Alpha. See to it that you make
Him Omega also. If you begin in the Spirit you must not hope to be made perfect
by the flesh. Begin as you mean to go on, and go on as you began, and let the
Lord be all in all to you. Oh, that God, the Holy Spirit, may give us a very
clear idea of where the strength must come from by which we shall be preserved
until the day of our Lord’s appearing!

Here is what Paul once said upon this subject when he was writing to the
Corinthians: Our Lord Jesus Christ, who shall also confirm you unto the end,
that ye may be blameless in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ. God is faithful,
by whom ye were called unto the fellowship of his Son Jesus Christ our Lord (1
Corinthians 1:8-9). This language silently admits a great need, by telling us
how it is provided for. Wherever the Lord makes a provision, we are quite sure
that there was a need for it, since no superfluities encumber the covenant of
grace. Golden shields hung in Solomon’s courts which were never used, but there
are none such in the armory of God. What God has provided we shall surely need.
Between this hour and the consummation of all things every promise of God and
every provision of the covenant of grace will be brought into requisition. The
urgent need of the believing soul is confirmation, continuance, final
perseverance, preservation to the end. This is the great necessity of the most
advanced believers, for Paul was writing to saints at Corinth, who were men of a
high order, of whom he could say, “I thank my God always on your behalf, for the
grace of God which is given you by Jesus Christ.” Such men are the very persons
who most assuredly feel that they have daily need of new grace if they are to
hold on, and hold out, and come off conquerors at the last. If you were not
saints you would have no grace, and you would feel no need of more grace; but
because you are men of God, therefore you feel the daily demands of the
spiritual life. The marble statue requires no food; but the living man hungers
and thirsts, and he rejoices that his bread and his water are made sure to him,
for else he would certainly faint by the way. The believer’s personal wants make
it inevitable that he should daily draw from the great source of all supplies;
for what could he do if he could not resort to his God? This is true of the most
gifted of the saints—of those men at Corinth who were enriched with all
utterance and with all knowledge. They needed to be confirmed to the end, or
else their gifts and attainments would prove their ruin. If we had the tongues
of men and of angels, if we did not receive fresh grace, where should we be? If
we had all experience till we were fathers in the church—if we had been taught
of God so as to understand all mysteries—yet we could not live a single day
without the divine life flowing into us from our Covenant Head. How could we
hope to hold on for a single hour, to say nothing of a lifetime, unless the Lord
should hold us on? He who began the good work in us must perform it unto the day
of Christ, or it will prove a painful failure. This great necessity arises very
much from our own selves. In some there is a painful fear that they shall not
persevere in grace because they know their own fickleness. Certain persons are
constitutionally unstable. Some men are by nature conservative, not to say
obstinate; but others are as naturally variable and volatile. Like butterflies
they flit from flower to flower, till they visit all the beauties of the garden,
and settle upon none of them. They are never long enough in one place to do any
good; not even in their business nor in their intellectual pursuits. Such
persons may well be afraid that ten, twenty, thirty, forty, perhaps fifty years
of continuous religious watchfulness will be a great deal too much for them. We
see men joining first one church and then another, till they box the compass.
They are everything by turns and nothing long. Such have double need to pray
that they may be divinely confirmed, and may be made not only steadfast but
unmoveable, or otherwise they will not be found “always abounding in the work of
the Lord.”

All of us, even if we have no constitutional temptation to fickleness, must feel
our own weakness if we are really quickened of God. Dear reader, do you not find
enough in any one single day to make you stumble? You that desire to walk in
perfect holiness, as I trust you do; you that have set before you a high
standard of what a Christian should be—do you not find that before the breakfast
things are cleared away from the table, you have displayed enough folly to make
you ashamed of yourselves? If we were to shut ourselves up in the lone cell of a
hermit, temptation would follow us; for as long as we cannot escape from
ourselves we cannot escape from incitements to sin. There is that within our
hearts which should make us watchful and humble before God. If he does not
confirm us, we are so weak that we shall stumble and fall; not overturned by an
enemy, but by our own carelessness. Lord, be thou our strength. We are weakness
itself.

Besides that, there is the weariness which comes of a long life. When we begin
our Christian profession we mount up with wings as eagles, further on we run
without weariness; but in our best and truest days we walk without fainting. Our
pace seems slower, but it is more serviceable and better sustained. I pray God
that the energy of our youth may continue with us so far as it is the energy of
the Spirit and not the mere fermentation of proud flesh. He that has long been
on the road to Heaven finds that there was good reason why it was promised that
his shoes should be iron and brass, for the road is rough. He has discovered
that there are Hills of Difficulty and Valleys of Humiliation; that there is a
Vale of Deathshade, and, worse still, a Vanity Fair—and all these are to be
traversed. If there be Delectable Mountains (and, thank God, there are,) there
are also Castles of Despair, the inside of which pilgrims have too often seen.
Considering all things, those who hold out to the end in the way of holiness
will be “men wondered at.”

“O world of wonders, I can say no less.” The days of a Christian’s life are like
so many Koh-i-noors of mercy threaded upon the golden string of divine
faithfulness. In Heaven we shall tell to angels, and principalities, and powers,
the unsearchable riches of Christ which were spent upon us, and enjoyed by us
while we were here below. We have been kept alive on the brink of death. Our
spiritual life has been a flame burning on in the midst of the sea, a stone that
has remained suspended in the air. It will amaze the universe to see us enter
the pearly gate, blameless in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ. We ought to be
full of grateful wonder if kept for an hour; and I trust we are.

If this were all, there would be enough cause for anxiety; but there is far
more. We have to think of what a place we live in. The world is a howling
wilderness to many of God’s people. Some of us are greatly indulged in the
providence of God, but others have a stern fight of it. We begin our day with
prayer, and we hear the voice of holy song full often in our houses; but many
good people have scarcely risen from their knees in the morning before they are
saluted with blasphemy. They go out to work, and all day long they are vexed
with filthy conversation like righteous Lot in Sodom. Can you even walk the open
streets without your ears being afflicted with foul language? The world is no
friend to grace. The best we can do with this world is to get through it as
quickly as we can, for we dwell in an enemy’s country. A robber lurks in every
bush. Everywhere we need to travel with a “drawn sword” in our hand, or at least
with that weapon which is called all-prayer ever at our side; for we have to
contend for every inch of our way. Make no mistake about this, or you will be
rudely shaken out of your fond delusion. O God, help us, and confirm us to the
end, or where shall we be?

True religion is supernatural at its beginning, supernatural in its continuance,
and supernatural in its close. It is the work of God from first to last. There
is great need that the hand of the Lord should be stretched out still: that need
my reader is feeling now, and I am glad that he should feel it; for now he will
look for his own preservation to the Lord who alone is able to keep us from
failing, and glorify us with His Son.


========================================================================
  CHAPTER 76: XVII. CONFIRMATION
========================================================================

XVII. CONFIRMATION

I WANT YOU TO NOTICE the security which Paul confidently expected for all the
saints. He says—“Who shall confirm you unto the end, that ye may be blameless in
the day of our Lord Jesus Christ.” This is the kind of confirmation which is
above all things to be desired. You see it supposes that the persons are right,
and it proposes to confirm them in the right. It would be an awful thing to
confirm a man in ways of sin and error. Think of a confirmed drunkard, or a
confirmed thief, or a confirmed liar. It would be a deplorable thing for a man
to be confirmed in unbelief and ungodliness. Divine confirmation can only be
enjoyed by those to whom the grace of God has been already manifested. It is the
work of the Holy Ghost. He who gives faith strengthens and establishes it: He
who kindles love in us preserves it and increases its flame. What He makes us to
know by His first teaching, the good Spirit causes us to know with greater
clearness and certainty by still further instruction. Holy acts are confirmed
till they become habits, and holy feelings are confirmed till they become
abiding conditions. Experience and practice confirm our beliefs and our
resolutions. Both our joys and our sorrows, our successes and our failures, are
sanctified to the selfsame end: even as the tree is helped to root itself both
by the soft showers and the rough winds. The mind is instructed, and in its
growing knowledge it gathers reasons for persevering in the good way: the heart
is comforted, and so it is made to cling more closely to the consoling truth.
The grip grows tighter, and the tread grows firmer, and the man himself becomes
more solid and substantial. This is not a merely natural growth, but is as
distinct a work of the Spirit as conversion. The Lord will surely give it to
those who are relying upon Him for eternal life. By His inward working He will
deliver us from being “unstable as water,” and cause us to be rooted and
grounded. It is a part of the method by which He saves us—this building us up
into Christ Jesus and causing us to abide in Him. Dear reader, you may daily
look for this; and you shall not be disappointed. He whom you trust will make
you to be as a tree planted by the rivers of waters, so preserved that even your
leaf shall not wither.

What a strength to a church is a confirmed Christian! He is a comfort to the
sorrowful, and a help to the weak. Would you not like to be such? Confirmed
believers are pillars in the house of our God. These are not carried away by
every wind of doctrine, nor overthrown by sudden temptation. They are a great
stay to others, and act as anchors in the time of church trouble. You who are
beginning the holy life hardly dare to hope that you will become like them. But
you need not fear; the good Lord will work in you as well as in them. One of
these days you who are now a “babe” in Christ shall be a “father” in the church.
Hope for this great thing; but hope for it as a gift of grace, and not as the
wages of work, or as the product of your own energy. The inspired apostle Paul
speaks of these people as to be confirmed unto the end. He expected the grace of
God to preserve them personally to the end of their lives, or till the Lord
Jesus should come. Indeed, he expected that the whole church of God in every
place and in all time would be kept to the end of the dispensation, till the
Lord Jesus as the Bridegroom should come to celebrate the wedding-feast with his
perfected Bride. All who are in Christ will be confirmed in Him till that
illustrious day. Has He not said, “Because I live ye shall live also”? He also
said, “I give unto my sheep eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither
shall any man pluck them out of my hand.” He that hath begun a good work in you
will confirm it unto the day of Christ. The work of grace in the soul is not a
superficial reformation; the life implanted as the new birth comes of a living
and incorruptible seed, which liveth and abideth for ever; and the promises of
God made to believers are not of a transient character, but involve for their
fulfilment the believer’s holding on his way till he comes to endless glory. We
are kept by the power of God, through faith unto salvation. “The righteous shall
hold on his way.” Not as the result of our own merit or strength, but as a gift
of free and undeserved favor those who believe are “preserved in Christ Jesus.”
Of the sheep of His fold Jesus will lose none; no member of His Body shall die;
no gem of His treasure shall be missing in the day when He makes up His jewels.
Dear reader, the salvation which is received by faith is not a thing of months
and years; for our Lord Jesus hath “obtained eternal salvation for us,” and that
which is eternal cannot come to an end.

Paul also declares his expectation that the Corinthian saints would be
“Confirmed to the end blameless.” This blamelessness is a precious part of our
keeping. To be kept holy is better than merely to be kept safe. It is a dreadful
thing when you see religious people blundering out of one dishonor into another;
they have not believed in the power of our Lord to make them blameless. The
lives of some professing Christians are a series of stumbles; they are never
quite down, and yet they are seldom on their feet. This is not a fit thing for a
believer; he is invited to walk with God, and by faith he can attain to steady
perseverance in holiness; and he ought to do so. The Lord is able, not only to
save us from hell, but to keep us from falling. We need not yield to temptation.
Is it not written, “Sin shall not have dominion over you?” The Lord is able to
keep the feet of His saints; and He will do it if we will trust Him to do so. We
need not defile our garments, we may by His grace keep them unspotted from the
world; we are bound to do this, “for without holiness no man shall see the
Lord.” The apostle prophesied for these believers, that which he would have us
seek after—that we may be preserved, blameless unto the day of our Lord Jesus
Christ.” The revised version has “unreproveable,” instead of “blameless.”
Possibly a better rendering would be “unimpeachable.” God grant that in that
last great day we may stand free from all charge, that none in the whole
universe may dare to challenge our claim to be the redeemed of the Lord. We have
sins and infirmities to mourn over, but these are not the kind of faults which
would prove us to be out of Christ; we shall be clear of hypocrisy, deceit,
hatred, and delight in sin; for these things would be fatal charges. Despite our
failings, the Holy Spirit can work in us a character spotless before men; so
that, like Daniel, we shall furnish no occasion for accusing tongues, except in
the matter of our religion. Multitudes of godly men and women have exhibited
lives so transparent, so consistent throughout, that none could gainsay them.
The Lord will be able to say of many a believer, as he did of Job, when Satan
stood before Him, “Hast thou considered my servant, a perfect and an upright
man, one that feareth God and escheweth evil?” This is what my reader must look
for at the Lord’s hands. This is the triumph of the saints—to continue to follow
the Lamb whithersoever He goeth, maintaining our integrity as before the living
God. May we never turn aside into crooked ways, and give cause to the adversary
to blaspheme. Of the true believer it is written, “He keepeth himself, and that
wicked one toucheth him not.” May it be so written concerning us!

Friend just beginning in the divine life, the Lord can give you an
irreproachable character. Even though in your past life you may have gone far
into sin, the Lord can altogether deliver you from the power of former habits,
and make you an example of virtue. He can not only make you moral, but He can
make you abhor every false way and follow after all that is saintly. Do not
doubt it. The chief of sinners need not be a whit behind the purest of the
saints. Believe for this, and according to your faith shall it be unto you.

Oh, what a joy it will be to be found blameless in the day of judgment! We sing
not amiss, when we join in that charming hymn:

Bold shall I stand in that great day, For who aught to my charge shall lay;

While through Thy blood absolved I am, From sin’s tremendous curse and shame?

What bliss it will be to enjoy that dauntless courage, when heaven and earth
shall flee away from the face of the Judge of all! This bliss shall be the
portion of everyone who looks alone to the grace of God in Christ Jesus, and in
that sacred might wages continual war with all sin.


========================================================================
  CHAPTER 77: XVIII. WHY SAINTS PERSEVERE
========================================================================

XVIII. WHY SAINTS PERSEVERE THE HOPE which filled the heart of Paul concerning
the Corinthian brethren we have already seen to be full of comfort to those who
trembled as to their future. But why was it that he believed that the brethren
would be confirmed unto the end?

I want you to notice that he gives his reasons. Here they are:

God is faithful, by whom ye were called unto the fellowship of his Son Jesus
Christ (1 Corinthians 1:9)

The apostle does not say, “You are faithful.” Alas! the faithfulness of man is a
very unreliable affair; it is mere vanity. He does not say, “You have faithful
ministers to lead and guide you, and therefore I trust you will be safe.” Oh,
no! if we are kept by men we shall be but ill kept. He puts it, “God is
faithful.” If we are found faithful, it will be because God is faithful. On the
faithfulness of our covenant God the whole burden of our salvation must rest. On
this glorious attribute of God the matter hinges. We are variable as the wind,
frail as a spider’s web, weak as water. No dependence can be placed upon our
natural qualities, or our spiritual attainments; but God abideth faithful. He is
faithful in His love; He knows no variableness, neither shadow of turning. He is
faithful to His purpose; He doth not begin a work and then leave it undone. He
is faithful to His relationships; as a Father He will not renounce His children,
as a friend He will not deny His people, as a Creator He will not forsake the
work of His own hands. He is faithful to His promises, and will never allow one
of them to fail to a single believer. He is faithful to His covenant, which He
has made with us in Christ Jesus, and ratified with the blood of His sacrifice.
He is faithful to His Son, and will not allow His precious blood to be spilled
in vain. He is faithful to His people to whom He has promised eternal life, and
from whom He will not turn away. This faithfulness of God is the foundation and
cornerstone of our hope of final perseverance. The saints shall persevere in
holiness, because God perseveres in grace. He perseveres to bless, and therefore
believers persevere in being blessed. He continues to keep His people, and
therefore they continue to keep His commandments. This is good solid ground to
rest upon, and it is delightfully consistent with the title of this little book,
“all of grace.” Thus it is free favor and infinite mercy which ring in the dawn
of salvation, and the same sweet bells sound melodiously through the whole day
of grace.

You see that the only reasons for hoping that we shall be confirmed to the end,
and be found blameless at the last, are found in our God; but in Him these
reasons are exceedingly abundant.

They lie first, in what God has done. He has gone so far in blessing us that it
is not possible for Him to run back. Paul reminds us that He has “called us into
the fellowship of his Son Jesus Christ.” Has he called us? Then the call cannot
be reversed; for, “the gifts and calling of God are without repentance.” From
the effectual call of His grace the Lord never turns. “Whom he called them he
also justified, and whom he justified them he also glorified:” this is the
invariable rule of the divine procedure. There is a common call, of which it is
said, “Many are called, but few are chosen,” but this of which we are now
thinking is another kind of call, which betokens special love, and necessitates
the possession of that to which we are called. In such a case it is with the
called one even as with Abraham’s seed, of whom the Lord said, “I have called
thee from the ends of the earth, and said unto thee, Thou art my servant; I have
chosen thee, and not cast thee away.” In what the Lord has done, we see strong
reasons for our preservation and future glory, because the Lord has called us
into the fellowship of His Son Jesus Christ. It means into partnership with
Jesus Christ, and I would have you carefully consider what this means. If you
are indeed called by divine grace, you have come into fellowship with the Lord
Jesus Christ, so as to be joint-owner with Him in all things. Henceforth you are
one with Him in the sight of the Most High. The Lord Jesus bare your sins in His
own body on the tree, being made a curse for you; and at the same time He has
become your righteousness, so that you are justified in Him. You are Christ’s
and Christ is yours. As Adam stood for his descendants, so does Jesus stand for
all who are in Him. As husband and wife are one, so is Jesus one with all those
who are united to Him by faith; one by a conjugal union which can never be
broken. More than this, believers are members of the Body of Christ, and so are
one with Him by a loving, living, lasting union. God has called us into this
union, this fellowship, this partnership, and by this very fact He has given us
the token and pledge of our being confirmed to the end. If we were considered
apart from Christ we should be poor perishable units, soon dissolved and borne
away to destruction; but as one with Jesus we are made partakers of His nature,
and are endowed with His immortal life. Our destiny is linked with that of our
Lord, and until He can be destroyed it is not possible that we should perish.

Dwell much upon this partnership with the Son of God, unto which you have been
called: for all your hope lies there. You can never be poor while Jesus is rich,
since you are in one firm with Him. Want can never assail you, since you are
joint-proprietor with Him who is Possessor of Heaven and earth. You can never
fail; for though one of the partners in the firm is as poor as a church mouse,
and in himself an utter bankrupt, who could not pay even a small amount of his
heavy debts, yet the other partner is inconceivably, inexhaustibly rich. In such
partnership you are raised above the depression of the times, the changes of the
future, and the shock of the end of all things. The Lord has called you into the
fellowship of His Son Jesus Christ, and by that act and deed He has put you into
the place of infallible safeguard.

If you are indeed a believer you are one with Jesus, and therefore you are
secure. Do you not see that it must be so? You must be confirmed to the end
until the day of His appearing, if you have indeed been made one with Jesus by
the irrevocable act of God. Christ and the believing sinner are in the same
boat: unless Jesus sinks, the believer will never drown. Jesus has taken His
redeemed into such connection with himself, that He must first be smitten,
overcome, and dishonored, ere the least of His purchased ones can be injured.
His name is at the head of the firm, and until it can be dishonored we are
secure against all dread of failure.

So, then, with the utmost confidence let us go forward into the unknown future,
linked eternally with Jesus. If the men of the world should cry, “Who is this
that cometh up from the wilderness, leaning upon her Beloved?” we will joyfully
confess that we do lean on Jesus, and that we mean to lean on Him more and more.
Our faithful God is an everflowing well of delight, and our fellowship with the
Son of God is a full river of joy. Knowing these glorious things we cannot be
discouraged: nay, rather we cry with the apostle, “Who shall separate us from
the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord?”


========================================================================
  CHAPTER 78: XIX. CLOSE
========================================================================

XIX. CLOSE

IF MY READER has not followed me step by step as he has read my pages, I am
truly sorry. Book-reading is of small value unless the truths which pass before
the mind are grasped, appropriated, and carried out to their practical issues.
It is as if one saw plenty of food in a shop and yet remained hungry, for want
of personally eating some. It is all in vain, dear reader, that you and I have
met, unless you have actually laid hold upon Christ Jesus, my Lord. On my part
there was a distinct desire to benefit you, and I have done my best to that end.
It pains me that I have not been able to do you good, for I have longed to win
that privilege. I was thinking of you when I wrote this page, and I laid down my
pen and solemnly bowed my knee in prayer for everyone who should read it. It is
my firm conviction that great numbers of readers will get a blessing, even
though you refuse to be of the number. But why should you refuse? If you do not
desire the choice blessing which I would have brought to you, at least do me the
justice to admit that the blame of your final doom will not lie at my door. When
we two meet before the great white throne you will not be able to charge me with
having idly used the attention which you were pleased to give me while you were
reading my little book. God knoweth I wrote each line for your eternal good. I
now in spirit take you by the hand. I give you a firm grip. Do you feel my
brotherly grasp? The tears are in my eyes as I look at you and say, Why will you
die? Will you not give your soul a thought? Will you perish through sheer
carelessness? Oh, do not so; but weigh these solemn matters, and make sure work
for eternity! Do not refuse Jesus, His love, His blood, His salvation. Why
should you do so? Can you do it?

I beseech you, Do not turn away from your Redeemer!

If, on the other hand, my prayers are heard, and you, my reader, have been led
to trust the Lord Jesus and receive from Him salvation by grace, then keep you
ever to this doctrine, and this way of living. Let Jesus be your all in all, and
let free grace be the one line in which you live and move. There is no life like
that of one who lives in the favor of God. To receive all as a free gift
preserves the mind from self-righteous pride, and from self-accusing despair. It
makes the heart grow warm with grateful love, and thus it creates a feeling in
the soul which is infinitely more acceptable to God than anything that can
possibly come of slavish fear. Those who hope to be saved by trying to do their
best know nothing of that glowing fervor, that hallowed warmth, that devout joy
in God, which come with salvation freely given according to the grace of God.
The slavish spirit of self-salvation is no match for the joyous spirit of
adoption. There is more real virtue in the least emotion of faith than in all
the tuggings of legal bond-slaves, or all the weary machinery of devotees who
would climb to Heaven by rounds of ceremonies. Faith is spiritual, and God who
is a spirit delights in it for that reason. Years of prayer-saying, and
church-going, or chapel-going, and ceremonies, and performances, may only be an
abomination in the sight of Jehovah; but a glance from the eye of true faith is
spiritual and it is therefore dear to Him. “The Father seeketh such to worship
him.” Look you first to the inner man, and to the spiritual, and the rest will
then follow in due course.

If you are saved yourself, be on the watch for the souls of others. Your own
heart will not prosper unless it is filled with intense concern to bless your
fellow men. The life of your soul lies in faith; its health lies in love. He who
does not pine to lead others to Jesus has never been under the spell of love
himself. Get to the work of the Lord—the work of love. Begin at home. Visit next
your neighbors. Enlighten the village or the street in which you live. Scatter
the word of the Lord wherever your hand can reach.

Reader, meet me in heaven! Do not go down to hell. There is no coming back again
from that abode of misery. Why do you wish to enter the way of death when
Heaven’s gate is open before you? Do not refuse the free pardon, the full
salvation which Jesus grants to all who trust Him. Do not hesitate and delay.
You have had enough of resolving, come to action. Believe in Jesus now, with
full and immediate decision. Take with you words and come unto your Lord this
day, even this day. Remember, O soul, it may be now or never with you. Let it be
now; it would be horrible that it should be never.

Again I charge you, meet me in heaven.


========================================================================
  CHAPTER 79: BOOK: AN ALL AROUND MINISTRY (12 SERMONS)
========================================================================

AN ALL-ROUND MINISTRY Addresses to Ministers and Students by

C. H. Spurgeon An All-Round Ministry: Addresses to Ministers and Students.

01. FAITH 02. “FORWARD!”

03. INDIVIDUALITY, AND ITS OPPOSITE 04. HOW TO MEET THE EVILS OF THE AGE 05. “A
NEW DEPARTURE”

06. LIGHT, FIRE, FAITH, LIFE, LOVE 07. STRENGTH IN WEAKNESS 08. WHAT WE WOULD BE

09. STEWARDS 10.THE EVILS OF THE PRESENT TIME, AND OUR OBJECT, NECESSITIES, AND
ENCOURAGEMENTS 11. THE PREACHER’S POWER, AND THE CONDITIONS OF OBTAINING IT 12.
THE MINISTER IN THESE TIMES


========================================================================
  CHAPTER 80: 01. FAITH
========================================================================

Chapter 1—Faith NOW that the time has come for me to address you, my beloved
brethren, may God Himself speak through me to you! The subject which I have
selected for this address is FAITH. As believers in Jesus, we are all of us of
the pedigree of faith. Two lines of descent claim the covenant heritage. There
is the line of nature, human efforts, and works, headed by Ishmael, the son of
Hagar. We own no kindred there. We know that the highest position to which the
child of the flesh can attain will only end in the command, "Cast out the
bondwoman and her son: for the son of the bondwoman shall not be heir with the
son of the freewoman." We, brethren, are children of the promise, born not after
the flesh, nor according to the energy of nature, but by the power of God. We
trace our new birth not to blood, nor to the will of the flesh, nor to the will
of man, but to God alone. We owe our conversion neither to the reasoning of the
logician nor to the eloquence of the orator, neither to our natural betterness
nor to our personal efforts; we are, as Isaac was, the children of God's power
according to the promise.

Now, to us the covenant belongs, for it has been decided–and the apostle has
declared the decision in the name of God,–that "to Abraham and his seed were the
promises made. He saith not, And to seeds, as of many; but as of one, And to thy
seed, which is Christ. . . . And if ye be Christ's, then are ye Abraham's seed,
and heirs according to the promise."–Galatians 3:16; Galatians 3:29. We are
altogether saved by faith. The brightest day that ever dawned upon us was the
day in which we first "looked unto Him, and were lightened." It was all dark
till faith beheld the Sun of Righteousness. The dawn of faith was to us the
morning of life; by faith only we began to live. We have since then walked by
faith. Whenever we have been tempted to step aside from the path of faith, we
have been like the foolish Galatians, and we have smarted for our folly. I trust
we have not "suffered so many things in vain."–Galatians 3:4. We began in the
Spirit, and if we have sought to be made perfect in the flesh, we have soon
discovered ourselves to be sailing upon the wrong tack, and nearing sunken
rocks. "The just shall live by faith," is a truth which has worked itself out in
our experience, for often and often have we felt that, in any other course,
death stares us in the face; and, therefore, "we through the Spirit wait for the
hope of righteousness by faith."–Galatians 5:5.

Now, brethren, as our pedigree is of faith, and our claim to the privileges of
the covenant is of faith, and our life in its beginning and continuance is all
of faith, so may I boldly say that our ministry is of faith, too. We are heralds
to the sons of men, not of the law of Sinai, but of the love of Calvary. We come
to them, not with the command, "This do, and thou shalt live," but with the
message, "Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved." Ours is
the ministry of gracious faith, and is not after man, nor according to the law
of a carnal commandment. We preach not man's merit, but Christ crucified. The
object of our preaching, as well as its doctrine, is faith; for we reckon that
we have done nothing for sinners until, by the power of the Holy Ghost, we bring
them to faith; and we only reckon that our preaching is useful to saints as we
see them increase in faith. As faith is in our hand the power with which we sow,
and as the seed we sow is received by us by faith, and steeped in faith, so the
harvest for which we look is to see faith springing up in the furrows of men's
hearts to the praise and glory of God.

Interwoven, therefore, with our entire spiritual life, and with all our
ministerial work, is the doctrine and grace of faith; and, therefore, we must be
very clear upon it,–that is a small business; we must be very strong in it,–that
is the great matter. On that topic I will speak to you, praying earnestly that
we may every one of us be, like Abraham, "strong in faith, giving glory to God,"
and, like Stephen, "full of faith and of the Holy Ghost." Our work especially
requires faith. If we fail in faith, we had better not have undertaken it; and
unless we obtain faith commensurate with the service, we shall soon grow weary
of it. It is proven by all observation that success in the Lord's service is
very generally in proportion to faith. It certainly is not in proportion to
ability, nor does it always run parallel with a display of zeal; but it is
invariably according to the measure of faith, for this is a law of the Kingdom
without exception, "According to your faith be it unto you." It is essential,
then, that we should have faith if we are to be useful, and that we should have
great faith if we are to be greatly useful. For many other reasons besides
usefulness,–namely, even for our being able to hold our own against the enemies
of the truth, and for ability to stand against the temptations which surround
our office,–it is imperative upon us that we should have abundant confidence in
the living God. We, above all men, need the mountain-moving faith, by which, in
the old time, men of God "subdued kingdoms, wrought righteousness, obtained
promises, stopped the mouths of lions, quenched the violence of fire, escaped
the edge of the sword, out of weakness were made strong, waxed valiant in fight,
turned to flight the armies of the aliens."

One of the brethren observed, at last night's meeting, that I confirmed you in
the habit of saying, firstly, secondly, and thirdly. I must plead guilty to the
charge, and follow the same method still; for I judge it to be no fault, but a
practice helpful to the speaker in the arrangement and recollection of his
thoughts, and profitable to the hearer in the remembrance of the sermon. We may
risk being formal when to be formal is to be useful. Though not to be slavishly
followed, the custom of announcing divisions in a discourse may be generally
maintained, and we will maintain it, at any rate, today.

I. I mean first to speak, concerning faith, under the head of this
question,–WHEREIN AND UPON WHAT MATTERS HAVE WE, AS MINISTERS, FAITH, OR GREAT
NEED OF IT?

First, we have faith in God. We believe "that He is, and that He is a rewarder
of them that diligently seek Him." We do not believe in the powers of nature
operating of themselves apart from constant emanations of power from the Great
and Mighty One, who is the Sustainer as well as the Creator of all things. Far
be it from us to banish God from His own universe. Neither do we believe in a
merely nominal deity, as those do who make all things to be God, for we conceive
pantheism to be only another form of atheism. We know the Lord as a distinct
personal existence, a real God, infinitely more real than the things which are
seen and handled, more real even than ourselves, for we are but shadows, He
alone is the I AM, abiding the same for ever and ever.

We believe in a God of purposes and plans, who has not left a blind fate to
tyrannize over the world, much less an aimless chance to rock it to and fro. We
are not fatalists, neither are we doubters of providence and predestination. We
are believers in a God "who worketh all things after the counsel of His own
will." We do not conceive of the Lord as having gone away from the world, and
left it and the inhabitants thereof to themselves; we believe in Him as
continually presiding in all the affairs of life. We, by faith, perceive the
hand of the Lord giving to every blade of grass its own drop of dew, and to
every young raven its meat. We see the present power of God in the flight of
every sparrow, and hear His goodness in the song of every lark. We believe that
"the earth is the Lord's, and the fulness thereof;" and we go forth into it, not
as into the domains of Satan where light comes not, nor into a chaos where rule
is unknown, nor into a boiling sea where fate's resistless billows shipwreck
mortals at their will; but we walk boldly on, having God within us and around
us, living and moving and having our being in Him, and so, by faith, we dwell in
a temple of providence and grace wherein everything doth speak of His glory. We
believe in a present God wherever we may be, and a working and operating God
accomplishing His own purposes steadfastly and surely in all matters, places,
and times; working out His designs as much in what seemeth evil as in that which
is manifestly good; in all things driving on in His eternal chariot towards the
goal which infinite wisdom has chosen, never slackening His pace nor drawing the
rein, but for ever, according to the eternal strength that is in Him, speeding
forward without pause. We believe in this God as being faithful to everything
that He has spoken, a God who can neither lie nor change. The God of Abraham is
the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, and He is our God this day. We do
not believe in the ever-shifting views of the Divine Being which differing
philosophies are adopting; the God of the Hebrews is our God,–Jehovah, Jah, the
Mighty One, the covenant-keeping God,–"this God is our God for ever and ever: He
will be our Guide even unto death."

Whether we be fools or not thus to believe in God, the world shall know one day;
and whether it be more reasonable to believe in nature, or in powers that
operate of themselves, or to believe in nothing, than it is to believe in a
self-existent Being, we shall leave eternity to decide. Meanwhile, to us, faith
in God is not only a necessity of reason, but the fruit of a child-like instinct
which tarries not to justify itself by arguments, being born in us with our
regenerate nature itself.

Next to this, our faith most earnestly and intensely fixes itself upon the
Christ of God. We trust in Jesus; we believe all that inspired history says
concerning Him; not making a myth of Him, or His life, but taking it as a matter
of fact that God dwelt in very deed among men in human flesh, and that an
atonement was really and truly offered by the Incarnate God upon the cross of
Calvary. Yet, to us, the Lord Jesus Christ is not alone a Savior of the past. We
believe that "He ascended up on high," and "led captivity captive," and that "He
ever liveth to make intercession for them that come unto God by Him." I saw, in
the cathedral at Turin, a very remarkable sight, namely, the pretended
graveclothes of the Lord Jesus Christ, which are devoutly worshipped by crowds
of Romanists. I could not help observing, as I gazed upon these relics, that the
ensigns of the death of Christ were all of Him that the Romish Church possessed.
They may well show the true cross, for they crucify Him afresh; they may well
pray in His sepulchre, for He is not there, or in their Church; and they may
well claim His graveclothes, for they know only a dead Christ. But, beloved
brethren, our Christ is not dead, neither has He fallen asleep; He still walks
among the golden candlesticks, and holds the stars in His right hand. Our faith
in Jesus is most real. We believe in those dear wounds of His as we believe in
nothing else; there is no fact so sure to us as that He was slain, and He has
redeemed us to God by His blood. We believe in the brightness of His glory; for
nothing seems to us so necessarily true as that He who was obedient unto death
should, as His due reward, be crowned with glory and honor. For this reason,
also, we believe in a real Christ yet to come, a second time, in like manner as
He went up into Heaven; and, though we may not enquire minutely into times and
seasons, yet we are" looking for and hasting unto the coming of the day of God,"
at which time we expect the manifestation of the sons of God, and the rising of
their bodies from the tomb. Christ Jesus is no fiction to us; and, with Dr.
Watts, we sing,–

"While Jews on their own law rely,

And Greeks of wisdom boast,

We love th' incarnate mystery,

And there we fix our trust."

We have an equal confidence, beloved brethren, in the Holy Spirit. We
unfeignedly believe in His Deity and personality. We speak of His influences,
because He has influences, but we do not forget that He is a Person from whom
those influences stream; we believe in His offices, for He has offices, but we
rejoice in the Person who fills them, and makes them effectual for our good.
Devoutly would each one of us say, "I believe in the Holy Ghost." Yet, my
brethren, do you believe in the Holy Ghost? "Yes," you say unanimously,
spontaneously, and emphatically. "Yes," say I also; but be not grieved if I ask
you yet again if you verily and indeed believe in Him; for there is a believing
and a believing. There is a believing which I have concerning a man, for which I
may have but slender grounds, and upon which I would not risk a single penny of
my substance; but it is another form of believing in a man when I feel that I
could trust my very life with him, being assured that he would be true to me,
and prove both an able and a willing helper. Have we such a reliance upon the
Holy Ghost? Do we believe that, at this moment, He can clothe us with power,
even as He did the apostles at Pentecost? Do we believe that, under our
preaching, by His energy a thousand might be born in a day? If we all so
believe, we are happy to be in such an assembly, for the majority of Christians,
if under one sermon even a dozen persons were to cry out, "What must we do to be
saved?" would exclaim exactly as the unbelieving Jews did, "These men are full
of new wine." They would condemn the whole transaction as the result of
dangerous excitement; they would never imagine it to be of the Lord. For this
reason, I mournfully conclude that there is not, in the Church, such a belief in
the Holy Ghost as there ought to be; and yet, as certainly as we hear the voice
which saith, "Power belongeth unto God;" as surely as we hear the Divine voice
of the Son, saying, "Ye believe in God, believe also in Me;" so truly does the
third Person of the blessed Trinity claim our loving confidence, and woe be unto
us if we vex Him by our unbelief! When we have a full faith in the Triune God,
then shall we be "strong in the Lord, and in the power of His might."

Beside this, dear brethren, you and I believe in the doctrines of the gospel. We
have received the certainties of revealed truth. These are things which are
verily believed among us. We do not bow down before men's theories of truth, nor
do we admit that theology consists in "views" and "opinions." We declare that
there are certain verities,–essential, abiding, eternal,–from which it is
ruinous to swerve. I am deeply grieved to hear so many ministers talk as if the
truth of God were a variable quantity, a matter of daily formation, a nose of
wax to be constantly reshaped, a cloud driven by the wind. So do not I believe!
I have been charged with being a mere echo of the Puritans, but I had rather be
the echo of truth, than the voice of falsehood. It may be want of intellect
which prevents our departing from the good old way; but even this is better than
want of grace, which lies at the bottom of men's perpetual chopping and changing
of their beliefs. Rest assured that there is nothing new in theology except that
which is false; and that the facts of theology are today what they were eighteen
hundred years ago.

But, in these days, the self-styled "men of progress", who commenced with
preaching the gospel, degenerate as they advance, and their divinity, like the
snail, melts as it proceeds. I hope it will never be so with any of us. I have
likened the career of certain divines to the journey of a Roman wine-cask from
the vineyard to the city. It starts from the winepress as the pure juice of the
grape; but, at the first halting-place, the drivers of the cart must needs
quench their thirst; and when they come to a fountain, they substitute water for
the wine which they have drunk. In the next village, there are numbers of lovers
of wine who beg or buy a little, and the discreet carrier dilutes it again. The
watering is again and again repeated, till, on its entrance into Rome, the fluid
is remarkably different from that which originally started from the vineyard.
There is a way of "doctoring" the gospel in much the same manner. A little truth
is given up, and then a little more, and men fill up the vacuum with opinions,
inferences, speculations, and dreams, till their wine is mixed with water, and
the water none of the best. Many preachers–and I speak it with sorrow,–have
built a tower of theological speculations, upon which they sit, like Nero,
fiddling the tune of their own philosophy while the world is burning with sin
and misery. They are playing with the toys of speculation while men's souls are
being lost.

Much of human wisdom is a mere coverlet for the absence of vital godliness. I
went into railway carriages, of the first class in Italy, which were lined with
very pretty crochet-work, and I thought the voyagers were highly honored, since
no doubt some delicate fingers had sumptuously furnished the cars for them; but
I soon discovered that the crochet-work was simply put on to cover the grease
and dirt of the cloth. A great deal of very pretty sentimentalism and
religiousness that is now preached is a mere crochet-work covering for
detestable heresies long since disproved, which dared not appear again without a
disguise for their hideousness. With words of human wisdom, and speculations of
their own invention, men disguise falsehood, and deceive many. Be it ours to
give to the people what God gives to us. Be ye each of you as Micaiah, who
declared, "As the Lord liveth, what the Lord saith unto me, that will I speak."
If it be folly to keep to what we find in Scripture, and if it be madness to
believe in verbal inspiration, we purpose to remain fools to the end of the
chapter, and hope to be among the foolish things of the world which God hath
chosen to confound the wise, "that no flesh should glory in His presence."

Brethren, our faith also, resting upon the doctrines of the gospel and upon the
God of the gospel, embraces the power of prayer. We believe in the prevalence of
supplication. I am afraid that this belief is going out of fashion in the
so-called Christian world. The theory of some is, that prayer is useful to
ourselves, but that it cannot be operative upon God; and much is said about the
impossibility of the Divine purposes being changed, and the utter unlikelihood
of a finite being affecting God by his cries. We also hold that the purposes of
God are not changed; but what if prayer be a part of His purpose, and what if He
ordains that His people should pray when He intends to give them blessings?
Prayer is one of the necessary wheels of the machinery of providence. The
offering of prayer is as operative in the affairs of the world, and the
production of events, as the rise of dynasties or the fall of nations. We
believe that God in very truth hearkens to the voices of men. For my own part,
if anyone should say to me now, "God does not hear prayer; such a notion is a
piece of superstition;" I should reply to him, "Nay, sir, but with you I have no
argument at all. The whole question is a personal one which concerns my own
character,–am I an honest man or no? If I am a truth-speaking person, my
testimony is worth receiving; and I solemnly declare that the Lord has heard and
answered my prayers scores and hundreds of times, and that the answers have come
so often and so singularly that they could not have been mere coincidences." I
should not argue beyond this point, "Unless you are prepared to make me out to
be a liar, you are as much bound to believe facts which I affirm that I have
witnessed as I am to believe anything which you solemnly assert to be true."

Brethren, we ought not always to profess our ability to prove Scriptural truths
to ungodly men, for many of those truths lie outside the region of their
understanding. I should not try to prove to a blind man that the grass is green
and the sky is blue, because he can have no idea of the proposition which I am
proving. Argument in such a case is folly on both sides. To us, at any rate,
prayer is no vain thing. We go to our chambers alone, believing that we are
transacting high and real business when we pray. We do not bow the knee merely
because it is a duty, and a commendable spiritual exercise; but because we
believe that, into the ear of the eternal God, we speak our wants, and that His
ear is linked with a heart feeling for us, and a hand working on our behalf. To
us, true prayer is true power.

One other point, which I believe is essential to a minister's faith, is that we
believe in our own commission to preach the gospel. If any brother here is not
assured of his call to the ministry, let him wait till he is sure of it. He who
doubts as to whether he is sent of God, goes hesitatingly; but he who is certain
of his call from above demands and commands an audience; he does not apologize
for his existence, or for his utterances; but he quits himself like a man, and
boldly speaks God's truth in the Name of the Lord. He has a message to deliver
which he must deliver, for woe is unto him unless he preaches the gospel! In the
face of the Ritualists, who boast that they alone have the apostolical
succession, we declare that ours is the true commission, and that their claim is
false. We are not afraid to submit our claims to the test which the Lord Himself
has appointed, "By their fruits ye shall know them." We believe that God has
anointed us to preach the gospel, and we do preach it; but who will testify that
these "priests" even so much as know the gospel? Under our word, the Spirit of
God regenerates men, but He does not so work through these pretenders. They do
not even comprehend what regeneration is, but confound it with a ceremonial
aspersion. Our gospel satisfies the heart, renews the nature, comforts the soul;
but can these pretenders do so with their enchantments? If they be apostles, let
them show us their signs. We claim to be the Lord's ministers, and our epistles
of commendation are written upon many hearts.

Now, having detailed the great points of our faith, let me say, brethren, we
believe, hence, on account of all this, that, notwithstanding the slenderness of
our stores, the Great Shepherd of the sheep will grant us an all-sufficiency
with which to feed His people. Believing in God All-sufficient, we expect to see
our loaves and fishes multiplied; consequently, we do not lay by in store, but
deal out at this present all that we have. I saw in Rome a fountain, which
represented a man holding a barrel, out of which a copious stream of water was
perpetually running. There never was much at any one time in that marble barrel,
and yet it has continued to yield a stream for four or five hundred years. So
let us pour forth from our very soul all that the Lord imparts to us. For twenty
years and more, I have told out all I know, and have run dry every time, and yet
my heart still bubbles up with a good matter. I know some brethren in the
ministry who are comparable to the great tun of Heidelberg for capacity, and yet
the people do not receive so much gospel truth from them as from preachers of
very inferior capacity who have formed the habit of giving out all they have. We
believe that the Spirit of God will be in us a well of water springing up unto
everlasting life, and we act according to that conviction. We do not expect to
have much goods laid up for many years; but, as we live by daily bread, so upon
continually new supplies do we feed our people. Away with the musty,
worm-breeding stores of old manna, and let us look up day by day for a fresh
supply!

Brethren, our faith discerns upon our side unseen agency. While we are at work,
God also is at work. We do not reckon that the forces engaged upon our side are
confined to the pulpit; we know that, all the week long, God is, by care, and
affliction, and trouble, and sometimes by joy and consolation, making the people
ready to receive what He has charged us to teach them. We look upon our
congregations, and perhaps are ready to cry in our unbelief, "Master, what shall
we do?" but our eyes are opened, and we see horses of fire and chariots of fire
round about the prophet of the Lord; mysterious agencies are cooperating with
the ministry of grace. When the Mont Cenis Tunnel was being made, a party of
engineers worked from the Italian side for six years, and expected at the end of
that period to see an open roadway through the mountain. They knew that the work
would take, at the rate they were going, twelve years at least, and yet they
knew it would be completed in six years, because there was another party, on the
French side, working to meet them; and, accordingly, in due time they met to an
inch. I cannot understand these miracles of engineering, and do not know how two
tunnelling parties manage to meet each other in the heart of an Alp; neither do
I know how the Lord's work in men's consciences will fit in with mine, but I am
quite sure it will, and, therefore, in faith, I go on working with all my might.

Faith leads us to believe in difficulties being overruled to promote success.
Because we believe in God, and in His Holy Spirit, we believe that difficulties
will be greatly sanctified to us, and that they are only placed before us as
stepping-stones to grander results. We believe in defeats, my brethren; we
believe in going back with the banner trailed in the mire, persuaded that this
may be the surest way to lasting triumph. We believe in waiting, weeping, and
agonizing; we believe in a non-success which prepares us for doing greater and
higher work, for which we should not have been fitted unless anguish had
sharpened our soul. We believe in our infirmities, and even glory in them; we
thank God that we are not so eloquent as we could wish to be, and have not all
the abilities we might desire, because now we know that "the excellency of the
power" shall "be of God, and not of us." Faith enables us so to rejoice in the
Lord that our infirmities become platforms for the display of His grace.
Brethren, we believe that even our enemies shall, in God's hands, subserve our
highest interests; they are yoked to the car of God. Perhaps, of all the powers
which effect the Divine purposes in the world, no one does more than the devil
himself. He is but a scullion in the Eternal's kitchen; he unwillingly performs
much work to which the Lord would not put His own children, work which is just
as needful as that which seraphim perform. Believe not that evil is a rival
power of equal potency with the good God. No, sin and death are, like the
Gibeonites, hewers of wood and drawers of water for the Divine purposes; and,
though they know it not, when the Lord's enemies rave and rage most, they fulfil
His eternal purposes to the praise of the glory of His wisdom and grace.

Further, brethren, we believe in the gospel as God's power to save. We know
that, for every case of spiritual sickness, we have an infallible cure; we need
not say to any man, "We have no good news from God for you." We believe that
there is a way of getting at all hearts. There is a joint in every sinner's
harness, though he be an Ahab, and we may draw the bow hopefully, praying the
Lord to direct the arrow through it. If we believe in God, nothing can be too
hard or too heavy for us. If I believe only in myself, I feel that a hardened
sinner may refuse to listen to my reasoning, and may not be moved by my
affectionate address; but if I believe in the Holy Ghost, I feel that He can win
a hearing, and carry conviction to the conscience. We believe, brethren, in the
power of truth. We do not expect truth to be loved by all mankind; we do not
expect the gospel to become popular amongst the great and the learned, for we
remember that word of the apostle, "Not many wise men after the flesh, not many
mighty, not many noble, are called;" but we do not believe that the gospel has
become decrepit through old age. When the foolish wise men of this age sneer at
the old gospel, they render an unconscious homage to its power. We do not
believe that our grand castle and defence has tottered and fallen to the ground,
because men say it is so. We recollect Rab-shakeh, and how he reviled the Lord,
and how, nevertheless, it happened to the king of Assyria even as the Lord said,
"He shall not come into this city, nor shoot an arrow there, nor come before it
with shield, nor cast a bank against it. By the way that he came, by the same
shall he return." We have seen enough philosophies go back "to the vile dust
from whence they sprang," to know that the whole species of them is of the order
of Jonah's gourd. We, therefore, in confidence wait, and in patience bide our
time. We are sure of victory ere long.

If our gospel be true, it will yet come to the front, and God will work for us;
therefore are we "steadfast, unmovable, always abounding in the work of the
Lord." If we do not see souls saved today or tomorrow, we will still work on.
Ours is not the unrequited toil of Sisyphus rolling uphill a stone which will
rebound upon us, nor that of the daughters of Danaus who sought to fill a
bottomless vessel. Our work may no more quickly appear than the islands which
the coral insects are building below the blue waves of the Southern sea; but the
reef is rising, far down the foundation of the massive structure is laid, and
its walls are climbing to the surface. We are laboring for eternity, and we
count not our work by each day's advance, as men measure theirs; it is God's
work, and must be measured by His standard. Be ye well assured that, when time,
and things created, and all that oppose themselves to the Lord's truth, shall be
gone, every earnest sermon preached, and every importunate prayer offered, and
every form of Christian service honestly rendered, shall remain embedded in the
mighty structure which God from all eternity has resolved to raise to His own
honor.

II. Now, brethren, our second question will be, WHAT DOES OUR FAITH WORK IN US?

It works in us, first, a glorious independence of man. We are glad of earnest
helpers, but we can do without them. We are grateful for our good deacons, but
we dare not make flesh our arm. We are very glad if God raises up brethren in
other churches who will fraternize with us, but we do not lean upon them. The
man who believes in God, and believes in Christ, and believes in the Holy Ghost,
will stay himself upon the Lord alone. He does not wish to be solitary, or to be
singular, yet can he by himself contend for his Master; and when he has most
human helps, he sedulously endeavors still to wait only upon God. If you lean
upon your helpers when you have them, it may be that you will realize the
terrible meaning of that ancient word, "Cursed be the man that trusteth in man,
and maketh flesh his arm." As the apostle saith, "It remaineth, that both they
that have wives be as though they had none;" so may we say that it remaineth,
that we who have zealous helpers be as though we had none, and to let our
confidence in God be as simple, and our own selves be as free of all carnal
confidence, as if we stood like Athanasius against the world, and had no one to
speak a good word for us, or to bear a portion of our burden. God alone suffices
to bear up yon unpillared firmament. He alone balances the clouds, and upbears
them in the heavens. He kindles the lamps of night, and gives the sun his flames
of fire. God alone is sufficient for us, and in His might we shall achieve the
purpose of our being.

Further, true faith gives us courage under all circumstances. When young Nelson
came home from a birds'-nesting expedition, his aunt chided him for being out so
far into the night, and remarked, "I wonder fear did not make you come home."
"Fear?" said Nelson, "I don't know him." That is a fitting speech for a believer
when working for God. "Fear? I do not know it; what does it mean?" The Lord is
on our side; whom shall we fear? "If God be for us, who can be against us?" A
minister stands trembling in the presence of a learned schoolmaster, who, with
his twenty scholars, makes an important item in a village congregation; but is
that a consistent condition of heart for a prophet of the Lord? A preacher is
all on a quiver because a person with a white cravat, under the gallery, looks
like a minister, and probably is a London divine who is staying in the
neighborhood for his health; is that trembling preacher a man? I say, a man! I
will not ask, is he a man of God? If you have something of your own to say, my
dear friend, do not try to say it when those learned people are present who can
speak so much better than you can; but if God has something to say through you,
He knows which trumpet is most fit for Him to use; and what matters it to you
who may or may not be listening? Dare you play the coward in the presence of
God? No. The conviction that you have a commission from God, and that the Spirit
of the Lord is upon you, will make you very bold. Faith in God will cause us to
honor our calling so much that we shall not dare to disgrace it by cowardice.

True faith in God will also make us abundant in good works. The eleventh of
Hebrews is a chapter dedicated to the glorification of faith; but if I assert
that it records the good works of the saints, can anybody contradict me? Is it
not as much a record of works as of faith? Ay, verily, because where there is
much faith, there shall surely ere long be abundant good works. I have no notion
of that faith which does not produce good works, especially in the preacher. I
question whether, as channels for damnation, Satan has upon earth more apt
instruments for breeding infidelity, and for causing men to regard the gospel
with contempt, than those who profess to believe it, and then act as though the
belief were a matter of no consequence whatsoever.

Those philanthropists who are always telling us what ought to be done, and yet
who do nothing,–what is their faith, and what is their philanthropy? To what
shall I liken it? It reminds me of a shipwreck, off the Tuscan coast, some years
ago. The Tuscan coastguard reported to his government that there had been a
lamentable shipwreck on the coast, and he said, "Notwithstanding that I lent to
the crew on board the ship every assistance possible by means of my
speaking-trumpet, I regret to say that a number of bodies were washed upon the
shore next morning, dead." Very wonderful, was it not? And yet this is the kind
of assistance which many, who profess to have faith, have lent to the people.
They have yielded them the assistance of rhetoric, flowers of speech, and
poetical quotations, and yet men have persisted in impenitence. There has been
no real care for souls. The sermon was preached, but the people were not prayed
for in secret, they were not hunted for as men search for precious things. They
were not wept over; they were not in very deed cared about. After all, it was
the speaking-trumpet's help, and nothing else. But our faith makes us abundant
in good works. May I say to you, if you are doing all you possibly can for
Christ, endeavor to do yet more? I believe a Christian man is generally right
when he is doing more than he can; and when he goes still further beyond that
point, he will be even more nearly right. There are scarcely any bounds to the
possibilities of our service. Many a man, who now is doing little, might, with
the same exertion, do twice as much by wise arrangement and courageous
enterprise. For instance, in our country towns, a sermon delivered on the
village green would, in all probability, be worth twenty sermons preached in the
chapel; and, in London, a sermon delivered to a crowd in a public hall or
theatre may accomplish ten times as much good as if it had fallen on the
accustomed ears of our regular auditors. We need, like the apostles, to launch
out into the deep, or our nets will never enclose a great multitude of fishes.
If we had but the pluck to come out of our hiding-places, and face the foe, we
should soon achieve immense success. We need far more faith in the Holy Ghost.
He will bless us if we cast ourselves entirely upon Him.

Faith in God enables many of you, I know right well, to bear much hardship, and
exercise much self-denial, and yet to persevere in your ministry. My heart
rejoices over the many brethren here whom God has made to be winners of souls;
and I may add that I am firmly persuaded, concerning many here present, that the
privations they have undergone, and the zeal they have shown in the service of
their Lord, though unrewarded by any outward success, are a sweet savor unto
God. True faith makes a man feel that it is sweet to be a living sacrifice unto
God. Only faith could keep us in the ministry, for ours is not a vocation which
brings with it golden pay; it is not a calling which men would follow who desire
honor and rank. We have all kinds of evils to endure, evils as numerous as those
which Paul included in his famous catalogue of trials; and, I may add, we have
one peril which he does not mention, namely, the perils of church-meetings,
which are probably worse than perils of robbers. Underpaid and undervalued,
without books and without congenial associates, many a rural preacher of the
gospel would die of a broken heart, did not his faith gird him with strength
from on high.

Well, brethren, to sum up a great many things in one, faith is to us a great
enlargement of our souls. Men who are morbidly anxious to possess a
self-consistent creed,–a creed which they can put together, and form into a
square, like a Chinese puzzle,–are very apt to narrow their souls. Fancying that
all truth can be comprehended in half-a-dozen formulae, they reject as worthless
every doctrinal statement which cannot be so comprehended. Those who will only
believe what they can reconcile will necessarily disbelieve much of Divine
revelation; they are, without knowing it, following the lead of the
Rationalists. Those who receive by faith anything which they find in the Bible
will receive two things, twenty things, ay, or twenty thousand things, though
they cannot construct a theory which harmonizes them all. That process of
theory-making is an expensive folly, the invention of middle terms is a waste of
ingenuity; it were far better to believe the truths, and leave the Lord to show
their consistency.

Those who believe firmly are, moreover, the men who are strong for service. Have
you ever seen the famous statue of the boy sitting down and picking a thorn out
of his foot? I saw him twenty years ago, and I saw him again only the other day,
and he was still extracting the little tormentor. I have known brethren of the
same order in the ministry, they are always picking thorns out of their feet;
they have a doubt about this, and a scruple about that; but the man who says, "I
know whom I have believed, I know what I have experienced," he is the man who
can run upon the Lord's errands.

Faith is also our refreshment. Our faith in God relieves us of our weariness.
Even natural fatigue is sometimes overcome by faith. Certainly, faintness of
spirit needs no better restorative than reliance upon God. Close to the
Colosseum there stands the ruin of an ancient fountain and bath called the Meta
Sudans. Here came the. gladiators who escaped with life from the struggles of
the amphitheatre; covered with blood, and begrimed with sweat and dust from the
arena, they plunged into the bath, and felt delicious refreshment. Faith in God
is just such a laver to our hearts.

III. My concluding question shall be, WHAT DOES OUR FAITH SAY TO US THIS
MORNING?

First, it claims to be well-founded. I put it to you, brethren, in very simple
words. Is the living God worth trusting? Does Omnipotence deserve that you
should lean upon it? Does Omniscience warrant you in believing it? Does
Immutability justify you in depending upon it? Why, if I were to bring here the
best man of woman born whose name should be to you the synonym for virtue, and
if I were to advise that you should trust him with your lives, I must speak with
bated breath, for who shall trust in man? Ay, and if there stood here Gabriel,
the angelic messenger of God, and he should tell us that he would zealously
defend us, I might hesitate ere I said to you, "O sons of men, rest in angelic
strength, and rely on seraphic zeal!" But when I speak of the Father, the
Incarnate Son, the ever-blessed Spirit, who shall venture to hint a limit to our
trust in God? What logician shall accuse us of folly in confiding in the Divine
Trinity? The older I grow, (and Mr. Rogers, who is much older, will agree with
me, I am sure,) I feel more and more sure of the things which I believe, not
merely (as some would insinuate) because I get into the habit of saying them,
and therefore think I believe them, but because they tally with my soul's best
experience. I read, occasionally, some of those productions of genius which are
associated with the frothy religion of modern thought; but when my body is sick,
or I am depressed in spirit, nothing suits my case but the gospel of our Lord
and Savior Jesus Christ, which was to our fathers the very truth of God; and I
believe that the doctrine which a man's innermost experience confirms to him in
the day of trial, and in the day when he is nearest to God, is to him, at any
rate, the very truth itself, and worthy of his credence.

I never feel, when I meet with intellectual men, who look down upon me as a mere
preacher of platitudes, that they have any right to do so. To them I give place
by subjection, no, not for an hour. I have rather to check a propensity to look
down on them than to subdue any feeling of inferiority. To us, the truths of the
gospel are absolute certainties for which we do not crave tolerance, but to
which we demand submission. If any shall brand us with epithets, such as
"bigot", "vulgar dogmatist", or "mere echo of departed Puritanism," (and all
these have been used,) we will only reply, "You may apply to us what opprobrious
titles you please, but we know that, if we were to express the truth about you,
there is no adjective of contempt which you do not deserve; and, therefore,
because we know of no language sufficiently strong to set forth our abhorrence
of your false doctrine, we will let you pass in silence." My brethren, when you
hear that a learned man has made a new discovery which contradicts the
Scriptures, do not: feel alarmed. Do not imagine that he is really a great man,
but believe that he is just an educated idiot, or a self-conceited fool. If you
find time to read the works of learned sceptics, you will soon see that their
statements of fact are not reliable, their deductions are not logical, their
inferences are monstrous, and their speculations are insane. I remember reading
some statements of the great German, Oken, which to me sounded singularly like
the babblings of Bethlehem Hospital. They reminded me of an incident which
occurred when a prize was offered for verses of poetry, which were to be quite
free from meaning. Two of the competitors were nearly equal, but in the poem of
one of them there was the faintest glimmering of an idea, while the other had
not even a trace of sense, and therefore gained the prize. I vote for the
supremacy of the Neologians in that department, in sonorous nonsense, they
excel. If I am thought to express myself too strongly, it must be so, for I
believe I speak what God Himself would endorse; He applies no soft terms to
boastful unbelievers. When He takes any notice of them at all, He calls them
fools. You shall find that to be the expression which the Lord constantly uses
concerning unbelievers in the Old Testament, and in the New, too: "Professing
themselves to be wise, they became fools." And, brethren, when I hear my
Heavenly Father say that a man is a fool, I dare not think him wise. Do not let
us think otherwise than God does.

Though we may be confounded in argument, we cannot be confounded in experience,
or driven from that which we have tasted and handled of the good Word of God.
Neither are we confounded in our faith. We know that our faith is well-founded,
and, therefore, we hear it say, "Do not treat me as if I were a dream. Do not
deliver your message with bated breath. Tell it out boldly, for he who
contradicts it is a liar!" If it be of God, it must be true. We are not
adherents of an infallible church which founds its faith on its own authority,
or of an infallible Pope who fancies himself to be the image of truth; if such
were our boast, the world might well laugh us down; but, having learned God's
truth by Divine revelation, we defy the 'world's sneer, and we do not even say,
"By your leave, gentlemen." No, but with or without your leave, we will speak
what God has revealed to us.

Next, our faith asks us this question, "Have I ever deceived any one of you?" I
shall pass that enquiry round. God put to His ancient people this question,
"Have I been a wilderness unto Israel?" And I may ask you, Has the Lord ever
failed you? Has He turned His back upon you in the day of trouble; and, when you
have leaned upon His arm, has it proved insufficient? If God has failed you, if
His truth has been a lie to any one of you, speak out now, and say so; but if
you could not, would not, must not, accuse the Lord of unfaithfulness, but would
loathe such a thought because your experience would deny it, then, brethren, go
on to believe, and to believe more steadfastly; rest more implicitly on your
ever-faithful God. And so faith says, in the third place, "Give me a wider
range. Trust your God far more." We have only waded ankle-deep in faith as yet.
We thought the water very cold and chill when we timorously ventured in; but
having tried it up to the ankles, we have found it good and pleasant. Let us
advance until we are breast-deep, yea, and deeper. Blessed is that man who gets
his feet off the bottom, and swims in the stream where he has no hope but his
God, and no confidence and no helper but the Invisible One who sustaineth all
things. Faith cries, "Trust me, my son, to make you preach better. Have more
enterprise. Be more daring. Do not fight your own battle in the church-meeting,
leave it to your God; trust all with Him. Do not be afraid to go and speak to
that foul-mouthed man; I will give you the right word to say to him. Trust me,
and go with prudence but with zeal into the darkest haunts of vice. Find out the
worst of men, and seek their salvation. There is nothing you cannot do if you
will but trust in God." Brother, your failure, if you fail, will begin in your
faith. The air says to the eagle, "Trust me; spread thy broad wings; I will bear
thee up to the sun. Only trust me. Take thy foot from off yon rock which thou
canst feel beneath thee. Get away from it, and be buoyed up by the unseen
element." My brethren, eaglets of Heaven, mount aloft, for God invites you.
Mount! You have but to trust Him. An unknown glory rests upon Him, and the
radiance thereof shall come upon you if you only know how to trust Him. And then
faith says, (and with that I shall close,) "Feed me! Feed me!" Faith has been
everything to you; feed her upon the Bread of Heaven. Faith feeds on Christ. The
other day, I saw a group of lovely ferns in a grotto from the roof of which
continually distilled a cool, clear, crystal rain; those ferns were perpetually
fresh and beautiful, because their leaves were constantly bathed in the
refreshing drops. Although it was at a season when verdure was scant, those
ferns were as verdant as possible. I observed to the friend who was with me that
I would wish to live in the everlasting drip of grace, perpetually laved, and
bathed, and baptized in the overflowing of Divine fellowship. This makes a man
full of faith. You do not wonder if Moses had faith, for he had been forty days
upon the mount with God; and if we have communed with God, it shall be a marvel
if we doubt, and not that we believe. Feed faith with the truth of God, but
especially with Him who is the Truth.

I pray the Lord to endow this College with faith. May we be both established and
endowed,–established on a rock, and endowed with the blessings of the covenant
of grace! Remember, brethren, that you and I are committed to faith now; it is
too late for us to retire. We are in the condition of Bunyan's pilgrim; we must
go forward. There are many perils before us, the Valley of the Shadow of Death
lies on ahead; arrows will fly very thickly around us as we traverse its,
shades. 'Tis hard going on, but we cannot retrace our steps, for we have no
armor for our backs. Suppose we should take to reasoning, suppose we should give
up the fundamentals of our faith, what would remain to us? For my part, I should
have nothing beneath the sun to do but to take the rope of Judas, and to end a
miserable life, for only my faith makes it worth my while to live. If faith were
gone, I would entreat permission to expire; to be extinct, were better than to
live if these things be but a delusion after all. It must be onward with us, for
in the case of brethren of this College, the most unsafe thing for us is to
think of turning back. One or two of our former comrades have gone aside from
us; I cannot judge their hearts, but I fear they have also gone aside from God.
I will not say more of them than this,–they are the last men you would envy if
you knew their whole history. If any men bear upon them, even in this life, the
evident mark of God's disapprobation, it must be those who have known the truth,
and defended it, and yet, for lucre's sake, or ambition's sake, have turned
aside from it. If it were fitting, I could write narratives of apostate
experiences which would harrow up your feelings, and they would relate to men
into whose faces I have looked as I now look into yours, and who were familiar
with me, but with whose names, once well-beloved, I am ashamed now to be
associated. God have mercy upon them! It is all that I could say if I had to
write their epitaphs, "God have mercy upon them!"

Well, brethren, you and I are committed to the onward course, we cannot go back;
neither can we turn to the right hand or to the left. What shall we do, then?
Shall we lie down, and fret? Shall we stand still, and be dismayed? No! In the
Name of the Lord, let us again set up our banner, the royal standard of Jesus
the Crucified. Let us sound the trumpets joyously, and let us march on, not with
the trembling footsteps of those who know that they are bent upon an enterprise
of evil, but with the gallant bearing of men whose cause is Divine, whose
warfare is a crusade. Courage, my brethren; behold, the angels of God fly in our
front, and, lo, the eternal God Himself leads our van. "The Lord of hosts is
with us; the God of Jacob is our refuge." "Therefore will not we fear, though
the earth be removed, and though the mountains be carried into the midst of the
sea." Blessed faith! God grant us more of it, for Christ's sake! Amen.


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  CHAPTER 81: 02. “FORWARD!”
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Chapter 2—"Forward!"

BRETHREN, the substance of my address, this morning, will be found in the words
of God to His servant Moses, "Speak unto the children of Israel, that they go
forward." "Forward" is the watchword of our Conference, let it ring through your
ranks. Onward, ye elect of God! Victory is before you; your very safety lies in
that direction. To retreat is to perish. You have most of you read the story of
the boy, in an American village, who climbed the wall of the famous Natural
Bridge, and cut his name in the rock above the initials of his fellows, and then
became suddenly aware of the impossibility of descending. Voices shouted, "Do
not look down, try and reach the top." His only hope was to go right up, up, up,
till he landed on the top. Upward was terrible, but downward was destruction.
Now, we, dear brethren, are all of us in a like condition. By the help of God,
we have cut our way to positions of usefulness; and to descend is death. To us,
forward means upward; and therefore forward and upward let us go. While we
prayed, this morning, we committed ourselves beyond all recall. We did that most
heartily when we first preached the gospel, and publicly declared, "I am my
Lord's, and He is mine." We put our hand to the plough then; thank God, we have
not looked back yet, and we must never do so. The only course open to us is to
plough right on to the end of the furrow, and never think of leaving the field
till the Master shall call us home. But this morning you committed yourselves
again to the Lord's work; you did not deliberate, or consult with flesh and
blood; but you plunged right in, renouncing all for Jesus; and except ye be
reprobates, ye have enlisted for life in His service. You are the branded
servants of Christ, bearing in your bodies His mark. You have now no liberty to
serve another, you are the sworn soldiers of the Crucified. Forward is your only
way; you are shut up to it. You have no armor for your backs; and whatever
dangers lie in front, there are ten thousand times as many behind. It is onward
or nothing; nay, onward or dishonor; onward or death.

We were compared, last night, in the eloquent address of our friend Mr. Gange,
to the little army of Sir Garnet Wolseley marching to Coomassie; and the
parallel was very beautifully worked out in all respects. Fellow-soldiers, we
are few, and we have a desperate fight in the bush before us, therefore it is
needful that every man should be made the most of, and nerved to his highest
point of strength. It is desirable that you should be the picked men of the
Church, yea, of the entire universe, for such the age demands, therefore it is
as to yourselves that I am most concerned that you should go forward. You must
go forward in personal attainments, growing in gifts and in grace, in fitness
for the work of God, and conformity to the image of Jesus. The points I shall
speak upon begin at the bottom, and ascend.

I. First, dear brethren, I think it necessary to say to myself and to you that
we must GO FORWARD IN OUR MENTAL ACQUIREMENTS.

It will never do for us to continually present ourselves to God at our worst. We
are not worth His having at our best; but, at any rate, let not the offering be
maimed and blemished by our idleness. "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all
thy heart" is, perhaps, more easy to comply with than to love Him with all our
mind; yet we must give Him our mind as well as our affections, and that mind
should be well furnished, that we may not offer Him an empty casket. Our
ministry demands mind. I shall not insist upon that phrase which is so
frequently heard nowadays, "the enlightenment of the age;" still, it is quite
certain that there is a great educational advance among all classes, and that
there will be much more of it. The time is past when ungrammatical speech
sufficed for a preacher. Even in a country village, where, according to
tradition, "nobody knows nothing," the schoolmaster is now abroad, and want of
education will hinder usefulness more than it once did; for, when the speaker
wishes his audience to remember the gospel, they, on the other hand, will
remember his ungrammatical expressions, and will repeat them as a theme of jest,
when we could have wished they had rehearsed the gospel of Jesus Christ one to
another in solemn earnest.

Dear brethren, we must cultivate ourselves to the highest possible point, and do
this, first, by gathering in knowledge that we may fill the barn; then, by
acquiring discrimination that we may winnow the heap; and, lastly, by a firm
retentiveness of mind, which lays up the winnowed grain in the storehouse. The
three points may not be equally important, but they are necessary to a complete
man.

We must, I say, first, make great efforts to acquire information, especially of
a Biblical kind. We must not confine ourselves to one topic of study, or we
shall not exercise our whole mental manhood. God made the world for man, and
made man with a mind intended to occupy and use all the world; he is the tenant,
and nature is for a while his house; why should he shut himself out of any of
its rooms? Why refuse to taste any of the cleansed meats the great Father has
put upon the table? Still, our main business is to study the Scriptures. The
smith's main business is to shoe horses; let him see that he knows how to do it,
for should he be able to belt an angel with a girdle of gold, he will fail as a
smith if he cannot make and fix a horseshoe. It is a small matter that you
should be able to write the most brilliant poetry,–as possibly you could,–unless
you can preach a good and telling sermon, which will have the effect of
comforting saints and convincing sinners. Study the Bible, dear brethren,
through and through, with all helps that you can possibly obtain. Remember that
the appliances now within the reach of ordinary Christians are much more
extensive than they were in our father's days, and therefore you must be greater
Biblical scholars if you would keep in front of your hearers. Intermeddle with
all knowledge; but, above all things, meditate day and night in the law of the
Lord. Be well instructed in theology, and do not regard the sneers of those who
rail at it because they are ignorant of it. Many preachers are not theologians,
and hence the mistakes which they make. It cannot do any hurt to the most lively
evangelist to be also a sound theologian, and it may often be the means of
saving him from gross blunders. Nowadays, we hear men tear a single sentence of
Scripture from its connection, and cry, "Eureka! Eureka!" as if they had found a
new truth; and yet they have not discovered a diamond, but only a piece of
broken glass. Had they been able to compare spiritual things with spiritual, had
they understood the analogy of the faith, and had they been acquainted with the
holy learning of the great Bible students of past ages, they would not have been
quite so fast in vaunting their marvelous knowledge. Let us be thoroughly well
acquainted with the great doctrines of the Word of God, and let us be mighty in
expounding the Scriptures. I am sure that no preaching will last so long, or
build up a church so well, as the expository. To renounce altogether the
hortatory discourse for the expository, would be running to a preposterous
extreme; but I cannot too earnestly assure you that, if your ministries are to
be lastingly useful, you must be expositors. For this purpose, you must
understand the Word yourselves, and be able so to comment upon it that the
people may be built up by the Word. Be masters of your Bibles, brethren;
whatever other works you have not searched, be at home with the writings of the
prophets and apostles. "Let the Word of God dwell in you richly."

Having given that the precedence, neglect no field of knowledge. The presence of
Jesus on the earth has sanctified the whole realm of nature; and what He has
cleansed, call not you common. All that your Father has made is yours, and you
should learn from it. You may read a naturalist's journal, or a traveler's
narrative of his voyages, and find profit in it. Yes, and even an old herbal, or
a manual of alchemy may, like Samson's dead lion, yield you honey. There are
pearls in oyster shells, and sweet fruits on thorny boughs. The paths of true
science, especially natural history and botany, drop fatness. Geology, so far as
it is fact, and not fiction, is full of treasures. History–wonderful are the
visions which it makes to pass before you,–is eminently instructive; indeed,
every portion of God's dominion in nature teems with precious teachings.
Intermeddle with all knowledge, according as you have the time, the opportunity,
and the peculiar faculty; and do not hesitate to do so because of any
apprehension that you will educate yourselves up to too high a point. When grace
abounds, learning will not puff you up, or injure your simplicity in the gospel.
Serve God with such education as you have, and thank Him for blowing through you
if you are a ram's horn, but if there be a possibility of your becoming a silver
trumpet, choose it rather.

I said that, next, we must learn always to discriminate between things that
differ; and at this particular time, this point needs insisting on very
emphatically. Many run after novelties, charmed with every new thing; learn to
judge between truth and its counterfeits, and you will not be led astray. Others
adhere to old teachings, like limpets stick to the rock; and yet these may only
be ancient errors: wherefore, "prove all things," and "hold fast that which is
good." The use of the sieve and the winnowing fan, is much to be commended. A
man who has asked the Lord to give him clear eyes, by which he shall see the
truth, and discern its bearings, and who, by reason of the constant exercise of
his faculties, has obtained an accurate judgment, is one fit to be a leader of
the Lord's host; but all ministers are not thus qualified. It is painful to
observe how many embrace anything it if be but earnestly brought before them.
They swallow the medicine of every spiritual quack who has enough of brazen
assurance to appear to be sincere. I say to you, as Paul wrote to the
Corinthians, "Brethren, be not children in understanding;" test everything that
claims your faith. Ask the Holy Spirit to give you the faculty of discerning
between good and evil, so shall you conduct your flocks far from poisonous
meadows, and lead them into safe pasturage. But then, if you have the power to
acquire knowledge, and also to discriminate, seek next for ability to retain and
hold firmly what you have learned. Alas! in these times, certain men glory in
being weathercocks; they hold fast nothing; they have, in fact, nothing worth
the holding. They believed yesterday, but not that which they believe today, nor
that which they will believe tomorrow; and he would be a greater prophet than
Isaiah who should be able to tell what they will believe when next the moon doth
fill her horns, for they are constantly changing, and seem to have been born
under that said moon, and to partake of her changing moods. These men may be as
honest as they claim to be, but of what use are they? Like good trees oftentimes
transplanted, they may be of a noble nature, but they bring forth nothing; their
strength goes out in rooting and re-rooting, they have no sap to spare for
fruit. Be sure you have the truth, and then be sure you hold it. Be ready for
fresh truth, if it be truth; but be very chary how you subscribe to the belief
that a better light has been found than that of the sun. Those who hawk new
truth about the street, as the boys do a new edition of the evening paper, are
usually no better than they should be. The fair maid of truth does not paint her
cheeks and tire her head, like Jezebel, following every new philosophic fashion;
she is content with her own native beauty, and in her aspect she is the same
yesterday, and today, and for ever. When men change often, they generally need
to be changed in the most emphatic sense. Our "modern thought" gentry are doing
incalculable mischief to the souls of men. Immortal souls are being damned, yet
these men are spinning theories. Hell gapes wide, and with her open mouth
swallows up myriads, yet those who should spread the tidings of salvation are
"pursuing fresh lines of thought." Highly-cultured soul-murderers will find
their boasted "culture" to be no excuse in the day of judgment. For God's sake,
let us know how men are to be saved, and get to the work; to be for ever
deliberating as to the proper mode of making bread while a nation dies of
famine, is detestable trifling. It is time we knew what to teach, or else
renounced our office. "Ever learning, and never able to come to the knowledge of
the truth," is the motto of the worst rather than of the best of men. Are they
to be our model? "I shape my creed every week," was the confession of one of
these divines to me. Whereunto shall I liken such unsettled ones? Are they not
like those birds which frequent the Golden Horn, and are to be seen from
Constantinople, of which it is said that they are always on the wing, and never
rest? No one ever saw them alight on the water or on the land, they are for ever
poised in mid-air. The natives call them "lost souls"–seeking rest and finding
none; and, methinks, men who have no personal rest in the truth, if they are not
themselves unsaved, are, at least, very unlikely to be the means of saving
others. He who has no assured truth to tell must not wonder if his hearers set
small store by what he says. We must know the truth, understand it, and hold it
with firm grip, or we cannot be of service to the sons of men. Brethren, I
charge you, seek to know, and, knowing, to discriminate; having discriminated, I
charge you to "hold fast that which is good." Keep in constant operation the
three processes of filling the barn, winnowing the grain, and storing it in
granaries, so shall you mentally "go forward."

II. We also need to GO FORWARD IN ORATORICAL QUALIFICATIONS.

I am beginning at the bottom, but all these matters are important, for it is a
pity that even the feet of this image should be of clay. Nothing is trifling
which can be of any service to our grand design. Only for want of a nail the
horse lost its shoe, and so became unfit for the battle; that shoe was only a
trifling rim of iron which smote the ground, and yet the neck clothed with
thunder was of no avail when the shoe was gone. A man may be irretrievably
ruined for spiritual usefulness, not because he fails either in character or
spirit, but because he breaks down mentally or oratorically; and, therefore, I
again remark that we must improve in utterance.

It is not every one of us who can speak as some can do, and even these men
cannot speak up to their own ideal. If there be any brother here who thinks he
can preach as well as he should, I would advise him to leave off altogether. If
he did so, he would be acting as wisely as the great painter who broke his
palette, and, turning to his wife, said, "My painting days are over, for I have
satisfied myself, and therefore I am sure my power is gone." Whatever other
perfection may be attainable, I am certain that he who thinks he has gained
perfection in oratory mistakes volubility for eloquence, and verbiage for
argument. Whatever you may know, you cannot be truly efficient ministers if you
are not "apt to teach." You are probably all acquainted with ministers who have
mistaken their calling, and evidently have no gifts for preaching; make sure
that none think the same of you. There are brethren in the ministry whose speech
is intolerable; either they dun you to death, or else they send you to sleep. No
chloral can ever equal their discourse in sleep-giving properties. No human
being, unless gifted with infinite patience, could long endure to listen to
them, and nature does well to give the victim deliverance through sleep. I heard
one say, the other day, that a certain preacher had no more gifts for the
ministry than an oyster, and in my own judgment this was a slander on the
oyster, for that worthy bivalve shows great discretion in his openings, and he
also knows when to close. If some men were sentenced to hear their own sermons,
it would be a righteous judgment upon them; but they would soon cry out with
Cain, "My punishment is greater than I can bear." Let us not fall under the same
condemnation through any faults in our preaching which we can remedy.

Brethren, we should cultivate a clear style. When a man does not make me
understand what he means, it is because he does not himself know what he means.
An average hearer, who is unable to follow the course of thought of the
preacher, ought not to worry himself, but to blame the preacher, whose business
it is to make the matter clear. If you look down into a well, if it be empty, it
will appear to be very deep; but. if there be water in it, you will see its
brightness. I believe that many "deep" preachers are simply so because they are
like dry wells with nothing whatever in them, except decaying leaves, a few
stones, and perhaps a dead cat or two. If there be living water in your
preaching, it may be very deep, but the light of the truth will give clearness
to it. At any rate, labor to be plain, so that the truths you teach may be
easily received by your hearers.

We must cultivate a cogent as well as a clear style; we must be forceful. Some
imagine that this consists in speaking loudly, but I can assure them they are in
error. Nonsense does not improve by being bellowed. God does not require us to
shout as if we were speaking to three millions when we are only addressing three
hundred. Let us be forcible by reason of the excellence of our matter, and the
energy of spirit which we throw into the delivery of it. In a word, let our
speaking be natural and living. I hope we have forsworn the tricks of
professional orators, the strain after effect, the studied climax, the
prearranged pause, the theatrical strut, the mouthing of words, and I know not
what besides, which you may see in certain pompous divines who still survive
upon the face of the earth. May such preachers become extinct animals ere long,
and may a living, natural, simple way of talking out the gospel be learned by us
all; for I am persuaded that such a style is one which God is likely to bless.

Among many other things, we must cultivate persuasiveness. Some of our brethren
have great influence over men, and yet others with greater gifts are devoid of
it; these last do not appear to get near to the people, they cannot grip them,
and make them feel. There are preachers who, in their sermons, seem to take
their hearers one by one by the buttonhole, and drive the truth right into their
souls, while others generalize so much, and are withal so cold, that one would
think they were speaking to dwellers in some remote planet, whose affairs did
not much concern them. Learn the art of pleading with men. You will do this well
if you often see the Lord. If I remember rightly, the old classic story tells us
that, when a soldier was about to kill Darius, his son, who had been dumb from
his childhood, suddenly cried out in surprise, "Know you not that he is the
king" His silent tongue was unloosed by love to his father, and well may ours
also find earnest speech when the Lord is seen by us crucified for sin. If there
be any speech in us, this will arouse it. The knowledge of "the terror of the
Lord" should also bestir us to persuade men. We cannot do other than plead with
them to be reconciled to God. Brethren, mark those who woo sinners to Jesus,
find out their secret, and never rest till you obtain the same power. If you
find them very simple and homely, yet if you see them really useful, say to
yourself, "That method will do for me;" but if, on the other hand, you listen to
a preacher who is much admired, and on enquiry you find that no souls are
savingly converted under his ministry, say to yourself, "This style is not the
thing for me, for I am not seeking to be great, but to be really useful."

Let your oratory, therefore, constantly improve in clearness, cogency,
naturalness, and persuasiveness. Try, dear brethren, to get such a style of
speaking that you suit yourselves to your audiences. Much lies in that. The
preacher, who should address an educated congregation in the language which he
would use in speaking to a company of costermongers, would prove himself a fool;
and, on the other hand, he who goes down amongst miners and colliers, with
technical theological terms and drawing-room phrases, acts like an idiot. The
confusion of tongues at Babel was more thorough than we imagine. It did not
merely give different languages to great nations, but it made the speech of each
class to vary from that of others. A fellow of Billingsgate cannot understand a
fellow of Brasenose. Now, as the costermonger cannot learn the language of the
College, let the collegian learn the language of the costermonger. "We use the
language of the market," said Whitefield, and this was much to his honor; yet,
when he stood in the drawing-room of the Countess of Huntingdon, and his speech
entranced the infidel noblemen whom she brought to hear him, he adopted another
style. His language was equally plain in each case, because it was equally
familiar to his audience; but he did not use the ipsissima verba, else his
speech would have lost its plainness in the one case or the other, and would
either have been slang to the nobility or Greek to the crowd. In our modes of
speech, we should aim at being "all things to all men." He is the greatest
master of oratory who is able to address any class of people in a manner
suitable to their condition, and likely to touch their hearts.

Brethren, let none excel us in power of speech; let none surpass us in the
mastery of our mother-tongue. Beloved fellow-soldiers, our tongues are the
swords which God has given us to use for Him, even as, it is said of our Lord,
"Out of His mouth went a sharp two-edged sword." Let these swords be sharp.
Cultivate your powers of speech, and be amongst the foremost in the land for
utterance. I do not exhort you to this because you are remarkably deficient; far
from it, for everybody says to me, "We know your College men by their plain,
bold speech." This leads me to believe that you have the gift largely in you,
and I beseech you to take pains to perfect it.

III. Brethren, we must be even more earnest to GO FORWARD IN MORAL QUALITIES.

Let the points I shall mention here come home to those who shall require them,
but I assure you I have no special persons among you in my mind's eye. We desire
to rise to the highest style of ministry; but even if we obtain the mental and
oratorical qualifications I have mentioned, we shall fail, unless we also
possess high moral qualities. There are evils which we must shake off, as Paul
shook the viper from his hand, and there are virtues which we must gain at any
cost. Self-indulgence has slain its thousands. Let us tremble lest we perish by
the hands of this Delilah. Let us have every passion and habit under due
restraint; if we are not masters of ourselves, we are not fit to be leaders in
the Church of Christ.

We must also put away all notion of self-importance. God will not bless the man
who thinks himself great. To glory even in the work of God the Holy Spirit in
yourself, is to tread dangerously near to self-adulation. "Let another man
praise thee, and not thine own mouth," and be very glad when that other has
sense enough to hold his tongue.

We must also have our tempers well under restraint. A vigorous temper is not
altogether an evil. Men who are as easy as an old shoe are generally of as
little worth. I would not say to you, "Dear brethren, have a temper;" but I do
say," If you have one, control it carefully." I thank God when I see a minister
have temper enough to be indignant at wrong, and to be firm for the right;
still, temper is an edged tool, and often cuts the man who handles it. "Gentle,
and easy to be entreated," preferring to bear evil rather than inflict it, this
is to be our spirit. If any brother here naturally boils over too soon, let him
mind that, when he does do so, he scalds nobody but the devil, and then let him
boil away as fast as he likes.

We must–some of us especially must–conquer our tendency to levity. A great
distinction exists between holy cheerfulness, which is a virtue, and that
general levity, which is a vice. There is a levity which has not enough heart to
laugh, but trifles with everything; it is flippant, hollow, unreal. A hearty
laugh is no more levity than a hearty cry. I speak of that religious veneering
which is pretentious, but thin, superficial, insincere about the weightiest
matters. Godliness is no jest, nor is it a mere form. Beware of being actors.
Never give earnest men the impression that you do not mean what you say, and are
mere professionals. To be burning at the lip, and freezing at the soul, is a
mark of reprobation. God deliver us from being either superfine or superficial;
may we never be the butterflies of the garden of God! At the same time, we
should avoid everything like the ferocity of bigotry. There are religious people
about, who, I have no doubt, were born of a woman, but they appear to have been
suckled by a wolf. I have done them no dishonor by that comparison, for were not
Romulus and Remus, the founders of the city of Rome, nourished in that fashion?
Some warlike men of this order have had power to found dynasties of thought; but
human kindness and brotherly love consort better with the Kingdom of Christ. We
are not to be always going about the world searching out heresies, like terrier
dogs sniffing for rats, and to be always so confident of our own infallibility
that we erect ecclesiastical stakes at which to roast all who differ from us,
not, 'tis true, with faggots of wood, but with those coals of juniper, which
consist of strong prejudice and cruel suspicion. In addition to all this, there
are mannerisms, and moods, and ways, which I cannot now describe, against which
we must struggle, for little faults may often be the source of failure, and to
get rid of them may be the secret of success. Count nothing little which makes
you even a little more useful; cleanse out from the temple of your soul the
seats of them that sell doves as well as the traffickers in sheep and oxen.

And, dear brethren, we must acquire certain moral faculties and habits, as, well
as put aside their opposites. He will never do much for God who has not
integrity of spirit. If we be guided by policy, if there be any mode of action
for us but that which is straightforward, we shall make shipwreck before long.
Resolve, dear brethren, that you can be poor, that you can be despised, that you
can lose life itself, but that you cannot do a crooked thing. For you, let the
only policy be honesty. May you also possess the grand moral characteristic of
courage! By this, I do not mean impertinence, impudence, or self-conceit; but
real courage to do and say calmly the right thing, and to go straight on at all
hazards, though there should be none to give you a good word. I am astonished at
the number of' Christians who are afraid to speak the truth to their brethren. I
thank God that I can say this,–there is no member of my church, no officer of
the church, and no man in the world, to whom I am afraid to say before his face
what I would say behind his back. Under God, I owe my position in my own church
to the absence of all policy, and the habit of always saying what I mean. The
plan of making things pleasant all round is a perilous as well as a wicked one.
If you say one thing to one man, and another to another, they will one day
compare notes, and find you out, and then you will be despised. The man of two
faces will sooner or later be the object of contempt, and justly so. Now, above
all things, avoid that. If you have anything that you feel you ought to say
about a man, let the measure of what you say be this, "How much dare I say to
his face?" We must not allow ourselves a word more than that in censure of any
man living. If that be your rule, your courage will save you from a thousand
difficulties, and win you lasting respect.

Having the integrity and the courage, dear brethren, may you be gifted with an
unconquerable zeal! Zeal,–what is it? How shall I describe it? Possess it, and
you will know what it is. Be consumed with love for Christ, and let the flame
burn continuously; not flaming up at public meetings, and dying out in the
routine work of every day. We need indomitable perseverance, dogged zeal, and a
combination of sacred obstinacy, self-denial, holy gentleness, and invincible
courage.

Excel also in one power, which is both mental and moral, namely, the power of
concentrating all your forces upon the work to which you are called. Collect
your thoughts, rally all your faculties, mass your energies, focus your
capacities. Turn all the springs of your soul into one channel, causing it to
flow onward in an undivided stream. Some men lack this quality. They scatter
themselves, and therefore fail. Mass your battalions, and hurl them upon the
enemy. Do not try to be great at this, and great at that,–to be "everything by
starts, and nothing long;" but suffer your entire nature to be led in captivity
by Jesus Christ, and lay everything at His dear feet who bled and died for you.

IV. Above all these things, we need TO GO FORWARD IN SPIRITUAL QUALIFICATIONS,
the graces which must be wrought in us by the Holy Spirit Himself. This is the
main matter, I am sure. Other things are precious, but this is priceless.

We need, first, to know ourselves. The preacher should be well acquainted with
the science of the heart, the philosophy of inward experience. There are two
schools of experience, and neither is content to learn from the other; let us be
willing, however, to learn from both. The one school speaks of the child of God
as one who knows the deep depravity of his heart, who understands the
loathsomeness of his nature, and daily feels that in his flesh there dwelleth no
good thing. "That man has not the life of God in his soul," say the men of this
school, "who does not know and feel this, and feel it by bitter and painful
experience from day to day." It is in vain to talk to them about liberty, and
joy in the Holy Ghost; they will not have it. Yet let us learn from these
one-sided brethren. They know much that should be known, and woe to that
minister who ignores their set of truths! Martin Luther used to say that
temptation is the best teacher for a minister. There is truth on that side of
the question.

Believers of another school dwell much–and rightly and blessedly so–upon the
glorious work of the Spirit of God. They believe in the Spirit of God as a
cleansing power, sweeping the Augean stable of the soul, and making it into a
temple for God. But frequently they talk as if they had ceased to sin, or to be
annoyed by temptation; they glory as if the battle were already fought, and the
victory won. Yet let us also learn what we can from these brethren. All the
truth they can teach us, let us know. Let us become familiar with the hilltops
of salvation, and the glory that shines thereon,–the Hermons and the Tabors,
where we may be transfigured with our Lord. Do not be afraid of ever growing too
holy, or of being too full of the Holy Spirit.

I would have you wise on all sides, and able to deal with man both in his
conflicts and in his joys, as one who is familiar with both experiences. Know
where Adam left you; know where the Spirit of God has placed you. Do not know
either of these things so exclusively as to forget the other. I believe that, if
any men are likely to cry, "O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from
the body of this death?" it will always be the ministers of the gospel, because
we need to be tempted in all points, so that we may be able to comfort others.
In a railway carriage, last week, I saw a poor man with his leg placed upon the
seat. An official happening to see him in that posture, remarked, "Those
cushions were not made for you to put your dirty boots on." As soon as the guard
was gone, the man put up his leg again, and said to me, "He never broke his leg
in two places, I am sure, or he would not be so sharp with me." When I have
heard brethren, who have lived at ease, enjoying good incomes, condemning others
who are much tried, because they could not rejoice in their fashion, I have felt
that they knew nothing of the broken bones which others have to carry throughout
the whole of their pilgrimage.

Brethren, know man, in Christ, and out of Christ. Study him at his best, and
study him at his worst; know his anatomy, his secrets, and his passions. You
cannot gain this knowledge from books; you must have personal acquaintance with
men if you are to help them in their varied spiritual experience. God alone can
give you that wisdom which you will need in dealing wisely with them, but He
will give it to you in answer to believing prayer.

Among spiritual acquirements, it is beyond all other things needful to know Him
who is the sure remedy for all human diseases. Know Jesus. Sit at His feet.
Consider His nature, His work, His sufferings, His glory. Rejoice in His
presence; commune with Him from day to day. To know Christ, is to understand the
most excellent of all sciences. You cannot fail to be wise if you commune with
Incarnate Wisdom; you cannot lack strength if you have constant fellowship with
God. Let this be your desire,–

"I would commune with Thee, my God;

E'en to Thy seat I come;

I leave my joys, I leave my sins, And seek in Thee my home."

Dwell in God, brethren; not sometimes go to Him, but abide in Him. They say in
Italy that, where the sun does not enter, the physician must. Where Jesus does
not shine, the soul is sick. Bask in His beams, and you shall be vigorous in the
service of your Lord.

Last Sunday night, I had a text which mastered me: "No man knoweth the Son, but
the Father." I told the people that poor sinners, who had gone to Jesus, and
trusted Him, thought they knew Him, but that they knew only a little of Him.
Saints of sixty years' experience, who have walked with Him every day, think
they know Him; but they are only beginning to know Him yet. The perfect spirits
before the throne, who have been for five thousand years perpetually adoring
Him, perhaps think they know Him, but they do not to the full. "No man knoweth
the Son, but the Father." He is so glorious, that only the infinite God has full
knowledge of Him, therefore there will be no limit to our study, or narrowness
in our line of thought, if we make our Lord the great object of all our thoughts
and researches.

So, brethren, as the outcome of this knowledge, if we are to be strong men, we
must be conformed to our Lord. Oh, to be like Him! Blessed be that cross on
which we shall suffer, if we suffer for being made like unto the Lord Jesus. If
we obtain conformity to Christ, we shall have a wondrous unction upon our
ministry; and without that, what is a ministry worth? In a word, we must labor
for holiness of character. What is holiness? Is it not wholeness of character? A
balanced condition in which there is neither lack nor redundance. It is not
morality, that is a cold, lifeless statue; holiness is life. You must have
holiness; and, dear brethren, if you should fail in mental qualifications
(though I hope you will not), and if you should have a slender measure of the
oratorical faculty (though I trust you will not), yet, depend upon it, a holy
life is, in itself, a wonderful power, and will make up for many deficiencies;
it is, in fact, the best sermon the best man can ever deliver. Let us resolve
that all the purity which can be had we will have, that all the sanctity which
can be reached we will obtain, and that all the likeness to Christ that is
possible in this world of sin shall certainly be in us through the effectual
working of the Spirit of God. The Lord lift us all, as a College, right up to a
higher platform, and He shall have the glory!

V. I have not finished my message, for I have further to say, GO FORWARD IN
ACTUAL WORK.

After all, we shall be known by what we have done, more than by what we have
said. Like the apostles, I hope our memorial will be our acts. There are good
brethren in the world who are impractical. The grand doctrine of the Second
Advent makes them stand with open mouths, peering into the skies, so that I am
ready to say, "Ye men of Plymouth, why stand ye here gazing up into Heaven?" The
fact that Jesus Christ is to come again, is not a reason for star-gazing, but
for working in the power of the Holy Ghost. Be not so taken up with speculations
as to prefer a Bible-reading over an obscure passage in the Revelation to
teaching in a Ragged-school or discoursing to the poor concerning Jesus. We must
have done with daydreams, and get to work. I believe in eggs, but we must get
chickens out of them. I do not mind how big your egg is, it may be an ostrich's
egg if you like; but if there is nothing in it, pray clear away the shell. If
something comes of your speculations, God bless them; and even if you should go
a little further than I think it wise to venture in that direction, still, if
you are thereby made more useful, God be praised for it!

We want facts,–deeds done, souls saved. It is all very well to write essays, but
what souls have you been the means of saving from going down to hell? Your
excellent management of your school interests me, but how many children have
been brought into the church by it? We are glad to hear of those special
meetings, but how many have really been born to God in them? Are saints edified?
Are sinners converted? To swing to and fro on a five-barred gate, is not
progress; yet some seem to think that it is. I see them in a kind of perpetual
Elysium, humming over to themselves and their friends, "We are very
comfortable." God save us from living in comfort while sinners are sinking into
hell! In traveling along the mountain roads in Switzerland, you will continually
see marks of the boring-rod; and in every minister's life there should be traces
of stern labor. Brethren, do something; do something; DO SOMETHING. While
Committees waste their time over resolutions, do something. While Societies and
Unions are making constitutions, let us win souls. Too often we discuss, and
discuss, and discuss, while Satan only laughs in his sleeve. It is time we had
done planning, and sought something to plan. I pray you, be men of action all of
you. Get to work, and quit yourselves like men. Old Suwarrow's idea of war is
mine: "Forward and strike! No theory! Attack! Form column! Fix bayonets, and
charge right into the very centre of the enemy." Our one aim is to save sinners,
and this we are not merely to talk about, but to effect in the power of God.

VI. Lastly, and here I am going to deliver a message which weighs upon me, GO
FORWARD IN THE MATTER OF THE CHOICE OF YOUR SPHERE OF ACTION.

I plead this day for those who cannot plead for themselves, namely, the great
outlying masses of the heathen world. Our existing pulpits are tolerably well
supplied, but we need men who will build on new foundations. Who will do this?
Are we, as a company of faithful men, clear in our consciences about the
heathen? Millions have never heard the Name of Jesus. Hundreds of millions have
seen a missionary only once in their lives, and know nothing of our King. Shall
we let them perish? Can we go to our beds and sleep, while China, India, Japan,
and other nations are being damned? Are we clear of their blood? Have they no
claim upon us? We ought to put it on this footing,–not, "Can I prove that I
ought to go?" but, "Can I prove that I ought not to go?" When a man can honestly
prove that he ought not to go, then he is clear, but not else. What answer do
you give, my brethren? I put it to you man by man. I am not raising a question
among you which I have not honestly put to myself. I have felt that, if some of
our leading ministers would go forth, it would have a grand effect in
stimulating the churches, and I have honestly asked myself whether I ought to
go. After balancing the whole thing, I feel bound to keep my place, and I think
the judgment of most Christians would confirm my decision; but I hope I would
readily, and willingly, and cheerfully, go abroad if I did not feel that I ought
to remain at home. Brethren, put yourselves through the same process. We must
have the heathen converted; God has myriads of His elect among them, we must go
and search for them somehow or other. Many difficulties are now removed, all
lands are open to us, and distance is almost annihilated. True, we have not the
Pentecostal gift of tongues; but languages are now readily acquired, while the
art of printing is a full equivalent for the lost gift. The dangers incident to
missions ought not to keep any true man back, even if they were very great, but
they are now reduced to a minimum. There are hundreds of places where the cross
of Christ is unknown, to which we can go without risk. Who will go? The men who
ought to go are young brethren of good abilities who have not yet taken upon
themselves family cares. Each student entering the College should consider this
matter, and surrender himself to the work unless there are conclusive reasons
for his not doing so. It is a fact that, even for the Colonies, it is very
difficult to find men, for I have had openings in Australia which I have been
obliged to decline. It ought not to be so. Surely there is some self-sacrifice
among us yet, and some among us who are willing to be exiled for Jesus. The
Mission languishes for want of men. If the men were forthcoming, the liberality
of the Church would supply their needs; and, in fact, the liberality of the
Church has provided the supply, and yet there are not the men to go. I shall
never feel, brethren, that we, as a band of men, have done our duty until we see
our comrades fighting for Jesus in every land in the van of the conflict. I
believe that, if God moves you to go, you will be among the best of
missionaries, because you will make the preaching of the gospel the great
feature of your work, and that is God's sure way of power.

I wish that our churches would imitate that of Pastor Harms, in Germany, where
every member was consecrated to God in deed and of a truth. The farmers gave the
produce of their lands, the working-men their labor; one gave a large house to
be used as a missionary college, and Pastor Harms obtained money for a ship
which he fitted out, to make voyages the to Africa, and then he sent
missionaries, and little companies of his people with them, to form Christian
communities among the Bushmen. When will our churches be equally self-denying
and energetic? Look at the Moravians, how every man or woman becomes a
missionary, and how much they do for the Lord in consequence. Let us catch their
spirit. Is it a right spirit? Then it is right for us to have it. It is not
enough for us to say, "Those Moravians are very wonderful people." We ought to
be wonderful people, too. Christ did not purchase the Moravians any more
completely than He purchased us; they are under no more obligation to make
sacrifices than we are. Why then this backwardness? When we read of heroic men
who gave up all for Jesus, we are not merely to admire, but to imitate them. Who
will imitate them now? Come to the point? Are there not some among you willing
to consecrate yourselves to the Lord? "Forward" is the watchword today! Are
there no bold spirits to lead the van? Pray all of you that, during this
Pentecost, the Spirit may say, "Separate Me Barnabas and Saul for the work
whereunto I have called them."

Brethren, on wings of love mount upward, and fly forward. Amen.


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  CHAPTER 82: 03.  INDIVIDUALITY, AND ITS OPPOSITE
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Chapter 3—Individuality, and Its Opposite

THEN the late excellent Field-Marshal, Sir John Burgoyne, took the chair at the
Tabernacle, at a lecture by Mr. Henry Vincent, he discharged his duty as
chairman briefly, but admirably, by saying that, as chairman, he looked upon
himself as merely called upon to ring the bell to announce the starting of the
train. That is somewhat my position with regard to this Conference, only it
rises to a higher degree of responsibility, because your President has not only
to start the train of good thoughts and words for this week, but to a large
measure he will give a tone for better or worse to all that shall follow. I am,
therefore, more like the pitch-pipe of the olden times, which gave the key-note
to the singers in the gallery, and through them to the whole congregation, and I
feel inexpressibly anxious that the key-note should be a right one. Brethren, a
measure of the sense of responsibility is helpful, and in many ways qualifies a
man for saying the right thing; but it may be pushed too far, it may go beyond
humbling the mind, and reach to the crushing of the spirit; it may so overwhelm
you with the feeling of what is to be done as utterly to disqualify you for the
doing of it. I am somewhat in that condition as to my part in this Conference
to-day. I pine to inspire and not to repress your zeal, I long to lead you into
the highest spiritual condition, and not to divert your attention to lower
matters, and these strong desires master me; my heart conquers my head, and
disturbs the equanimity so needful for the creation and utterance of thought.
However, I shall do my best, and leave myself in the hands of our great
Illuminator, the Holy Spirit, that He may speak through me as He wills. Our
subject is a duplicate, and involves the advocacy of personality, or say,–

INDIVIDUALITY, AND ITS OPPOSITE for which I cannot find the exact word,–either
in the English or Latin tongue. I want to show that each one of us is a man by
himself, and then that no one is alone by himself. Our individuality and our
fellowship, our personality and our union with the Lord, our separate existence
and our absorption into Christ;–these are the themes upon which I am going to
dilate.

Perhaps my one thought will come better if I give you a text from the 1st of
Corinthians, the 15th chapter, and 10th verse: "I labored more abundantly than
they all: yet not I." "I, yet not I;"–I to the very full, every bit of me: Paul,
once the Pharisee, the blasphemer, the persecutor, called now to be an apostle,
who finds it cause of joy that this grace is given unto me to preach among the
Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ; I, not a whit behind the very chief
of the apostles: and yet not I, for I feel myself to be nothing, yea, and less
than nothing, and Christ is all and in all. So it is I, yet not I.

I. Commencing, then, let me speak of OUR INDIVIDUALITY. Dear brethren, may we,
every one of us, be as far removed as possible from anything like egotism, which
is hateful to the last degree! It is to be hoped that vanity is rare in
ministers, for vanity is the vice of novices, and may be sooner excused in young
students than in actual teachers of the Word. Experience, if it be worth having,
exterminates a man's vanity; but so bad is our nature, that it may increase his
pride if it be an experience sweetened with success. It were hard to say which
is the greater sin, vanity or pride; but we know which is the more foolish and
ridiculous. A proud man may have some weight, but a vain man is light as air,
and influences no one. From both these egotisms may we be kept, for they are
both injurious to ourselves and hateful to God. Too frequent an intrusion of
self is another form of egotism to be avoided. I hope our sermons will never be
of the same order as those which were set: up in a certain printing office, and
the chief compositor had to request the manager to send for an extra supply of
capital I's. The letter "I" is a noble vowel, but it may be sounded too loudly.
Great "I" is very apt to become prominent with us all; even those who labour
after humility can barely escape. When self is killed in one form, it rises in
another; and, alas! there is such a thing as being proud of being humble, and
boasting of being now cleansed from everything like boasting.

Brethren, I hope that, however useful God may have made us in our several
spheres, we do not conceive ourselves to be vastly important, for indeed we are
no such thing. The cock was of opinion that the sun rose early every morning on
purpose to hear him crow; but we know that Sol did nothing of the kind. The
world does not revolve, the sun does not blaze, the moon does not wax and wane,
the stars do not shine, entirely for the especial benefit of any one brother
here, however admirable he may be in his own place; neither does Christendom
exist for the purpose of finding us pulpits, nor our own particular church that
it may furnish us with a congregation and an income; nay, nor does even so much
as one believer exist that he may lay himself out for our sole comfort and
honour. We are too insignificant to be of any great importance in God's vast
universe; He can do either with us or without us, and our presence or absence
will not disarrange His plans.

Yet, for all that, our subject is individuality, and we hope that each man will
recognize and honorably maintain his personality. The proper recognition of the
EGO is a theme worthy of our attention. I will make a word if I may: let egotism
stand for proud, vainglorious, intrusive selfhood, and let egoism stand for the
humble, responsible, and honest selfhood which, finding itself in being,
resolves to be at the Divine bidding, and to be at its best, to the glory of
God. In this age, when crowds follow their leaders, and bold men easily command
a following; when the flocks cannot move without their bell-wethers, and rough
independence is rarely to be found, it is well for us to be self-contained,
whole men, and not merely limbs of a body, maintaining ourselves in the
integrity of personal thought, conscience, manner, and action. Nowadays,
monopolizers almost push the individual trader out of the market: the members of
one party cry up "wood" as the only material for building the house of the Lord,
and those who belong to another sect with equal zeal extol their own "hay and
stubble." We shall not, by all their efforts, be induced to cease from building
with the few "precious stones" which the Lord has entrusted to us; nor shall
even our brethren, who so admirably pile up the "gold and silver," persuade us
to hide away our agates and carbuncles. We must each build with such material as
we have; if the work be true and honest, we ought neither to censure others nor
to condemn ourselves because our labour is after its own kind.

Upon this matter of individuality, note first, the necessity of an earnest sense
of our individual interest in the gospel which we preach. Brethren, we shall
never preach the Savior of sinners better than when we feel ourselves to be the
sinners whom He came to save. A penitent mourning for sin fits us to preach
repentance. "I preached," says John Bunyan, "sometimes, as a man in chains to
men in chains, hearing the clanking of my own fetters while I preached to those
who were bound in affliction and iron." Sermons wrung out of broken hearts are
often the means of consolation to despairing souls. It is well to go to the
pulpit, at times, with "God be merciful to me a sinner" as our uppermost prayer.
Some mourners will never be cheered till they see the preacher smite upon his
own breast, and hear him confess his personal sense of unworthiness.

It would not be right, however, for us to stay upon such low ground, for we
preach the gospel, and not the law; we are bound, therefore, to rejoice because
we feel the power of the blood of Jesus upon our own consciences, giving us
peace and pardon in Him. Our joy will give life to our message. We have also
tasted of the honey of communion with Jesus: we have not, perhaps, feasted upon
handfuls of it, as some of our Samsons have done; but we have at least, like
Jonathan, dipped the end of our rod into it, and our eyes have been enlightened,
so that our hearers can see them sparkle with joy while we tell them how
precious Jesus is. This gives emphasis to our testimony. When we speak as
ministers and not as men, as preachers instead of penitents, as theologians
instead of disciples, we fail; when we lean our head too much upon the
Commentary, and too little upon the Savior's bosom; when we eat too largely of
the tree of knowledge, and too little of the tree of life, we lose the power of
our ministry. I am myself a sinner, a sinner washed in the blood, and delivered
from the wrath to come by the merit of my Lord and Master;–all this must be
fresh upon our mind. Personal godliness must never grow scanty with us. Our own
personal justification in the righteousness of Christ, our personal
sanctification by the indwelling power of the Holy Spirit, our vital union with
Christ, and expectancy of glory in Him, yea, our own advancement in grace, or
our own declension; all these we must well know and consider.

We must never preach to others with a counterfeit voice, narrating an experience
which we have not ourselves enjoyed; but if we feel that we have backslidden to
any degree, we must either rally to the mark, or penitently speak from the
standpoint we actually occupy. On the other hand, if we have grown in grace, it
is wicked to conceal what we have tasted and handled, and affect a mock
humility; in fact, we dare not do so, we cannot but speak what Christ has taught
us. We must speak out of the God-given fulness within, and not borrow from
another; better far to be silent than to do that. We must be true to our
personal condition before God, for perhaps the Lord allows the state of heart of
His ministers to vary on purpose that their roving paths may lead to the
discovery of His wandering sheep. I have sometimes traversed a portion of the
pilgrim path by no means to be desired, and I have groaned in my soul, "Lord,
why and wherefore is it thus with me?" And I have preached in a way which made
me lie in the dust, fearing that the Lord had not spoken by me, and all the
while He was leading me by the hand in a way that I knew not, for the good of
His own. There have come forward, ere long, one or two who have been just the
people God intended to bless, and they were reached by the very sermon which
cost me so much, and grew out of an experience so exceedingly bitter. The
prophet Ezekiel said, "The hand of the Lord was upon me, and carried me out in
the Spirit of the Lord, and set me down in the midst of the valley which was
full of bones;" and such carryings, so often as they occur, are matters for
praise. Not so much for our own good or edification, as for the benefit of our
fellowmen, are we borne into valleys of dry bones and chambers of imagery. We
must watch these phases of soul, and be true to Divine impulses. I would not
myself preach upon the joy of the Lord when I felt broken-hearted, neither would
I enlarge upon a deep sense of indwelling sin while rejoicing in a full sense of
cleansing by the Word. We must pray the Holy Spirit to elevate and keep up our
individual life in its connection with our ministry. We must ever remember that
we are not preaching doctrine which is good for others merely, but precious
truth which has been proved to be good for ourselves. We may not be butchers at
the block chopping off for hungry ones the meat of which we do not partake; but
we must ourselves feed upon it, and must show in our very faces what fattening
food it is which we present to the starving sons of men.

Brethren, this personality of life in Christ being well kept in our minds, it
will be well for us never to forget our personal commission to preach the
gospel. for I hope you have each of you received such a personal commission, and
know it; or else why are you here? Leave the ministry, brethren, if you have not
received it of the Lord. I preach–I dare to say it–because I can do no
otherwise; I cannot refrain myself; a fire burns within my bones which will
consume me if I hold my peace. Every God-sent Christian minister is as much
called to preach the gospel as was that apostle to whom Ananias spoke concerning
"the Lord, even Jesus, that appeared unto thee in the way." This makes our
preaching a solemn business. Suppose that, this morning, in going down the
stairs of this College alone, an angel should meet you, and lay his hand upon
you, and say, "The Lord God Almighty hath sent me to commission you to preach
the gospel henceforth." Brother, you would feel a burden laid upon you, and yet
you would feel renewed confidence and ardour. But no mere angel's hand has
touched thee, brother; the Lord Jesus Christ Himself, who redeemed thee with His
most precious blood, has laid this "necessity" upon thee. The pierced hand,
which gave thee healing, has appointed thee to thy Lord's service, and made thee
a chosen vessel to bear His Name. Hear afresh from His lips the commands, "Feed
My sheep" and "Feed My lambs," even as Peter did by the Sea of Galilee.

Keep that matter of your commission always clearly before you. Who shall stand
to oppose your preaching if the Lord has bidden you preach? Who shall dictate
your message, or drive you to change it, if the Incarnate Wisdom has taught you
what to say? You are well equipped for preaching the gospel if you can truly
say, with Paul, "For I neither received it of man, neither was I taught it, but
by the revelation of Jesus Christ." Dear brothers, we must feel just that; I
believe you do, and I want you to keep the feeling fresh and warm. Kings, you
know, claim to reign by the grace of God. It may be so. God is very gracious to
allow some of them to reign. But of this thing I am sure; every true minister is
a defender of the faith, "Dei gratia." "By the grace of God I am what I am" both
as a minister and as a believer. There may be a question about the legitimacy of
monarchs, and a tribunal of judges is too often needed to test the election of
senators; but if we have the witness of the Holy Spirit within us, our kingdom
cannot be moved, our election cannot be disproved.

Brethren, in connection with our individuality, we ought to feel a great respect
for our own sphere of labour. You who are pastors are not only set to be
watchmen for souls, but to be watchmen for the souls in particular places. You
brethren, as a whole, are to go into all the world to preach the gospel, but
each one of you must feed that flock of Christ over which the Holy Ghost has
made you an overseer. There your principal labors must be expended, for there
your principal responsibilities lie. I would have every brother think very
highly of the position in which God has placed him. If I am a sentinel, set to
guard the army at a certain point, I know that every post in the whole cordon is
important; but I am not to dream that mine is not so. If so, I may be inclined
to sleep, and the foe may surprise the camp at the point which I ought to have
guarded. I am to feel as if the whole safety of the entire camp depended upon
me;–at least, I ought to be as zealous and as watchful as if it were so. You see
the links of that chain; each one of them has a certain strain upon it. Suppose
that one of them should say, "I may rust through; it does not matter, for many
other links are strong." No, my friend, the chain depends upon each link; and
so, for the completeness of church work, and for the perfect edification of the
body of Christ, a great weight of responsibility lies upon you. I am very
responsible; I admit it, but you have each one your measure of responsibility,
which you cannot shift to another's shoulders. If all the rest of the world
should be blest, and the hamlet to which you minister should be unvisited, the
general revival would be no joy to you if your negligence had made your little
vineyard a mournful exception to the rule. You might rejoice in the increase of
blessing elsewhere, but the deeper would be your regret that you had none of it
at home.

Let each man stick to his own work. If I felt that I had a call to be an
evangelist, and to go everywhere preaching the Word, I would not retain my
pastorate, because it would be unjust to the people who call me their Pastor. I
rejoice when I see very useful brethren travelling far and wide, but I lament
when I find their churches left to be starved and scattered. That is a sad
confession of the spouse in the Canticles, "They made me the keeper of the
vineyards; but mine own vineyard have I not kept." If we cannot do the two
things, we had better not try. I am not for a moment wishing to discourage the
most extended labors on the part of any of our brethren;–the farther you can go,
the better, for all the world is your parish;–but this must not be done at the
expense of the work to which you have pledged yourselves by accepting
pastorates. A dear brother said to me, "I wish you would go abroad, and preach
the Word;" and he urged as a reason that my people would appreciate me better if
they had less of me. I:replied that I did not want my people to appreciate me
any more, for they go already as far in that direction as would be safe, and I
assured him that I should stop at home for fear they should appreciate me more.
I might have rambled all the world over, and done great good, if that had been
my calling; but the day will declare whether I have not been more in the path of
duty and real usefulness by fostering Institutions at home, and scattering the
Word by my printed sermons far more widely than I could have done with my voice.
Be it so or not, brethren, when you know which part of the Lord's work He has
committed to you, give your whole soul to it. Going through the famous factory
at Sevres, the other day, I noticed an artist painting a very beautiful vase. I
looked at him, but he did not look at me; his eyes were better engaged than in
staring at a stranger. There were several persons at my heels, and they all
looked at him, and made various observations, yet the worker's eye never moved
from his work. He had to paint the picture upon that vase, and what benefit
would he get from noticing us, or from our noticing him? He kept to his work. We
would fain see such abstraction and concentration in every man who has the
Lord's work to do. "This one thing I do." Some frown, some smile, but "this one
thing I do." Some think they could do it better, but "this one thing I do." How
they could do it, may be their business; but it certainly is not mine.

Remember, dear brother, if you give your whole soul to the charge committed to
you, it does not matter much about its appearing to be a somewhat small and
insignificant affair, for as much skill may be displayed in the manufacture of a
very tiny watch as in the construction of the town clock; in fact, a minute
article may become the object of greater wonder than another of larger
dimensions. Quality is a far more precious thing than quantity. Have you ever
seen the famous picture at the Hague, called "Paul Potter's Bull"? It is one of
the world's immortal paintings. What is it? Well, it is only a bull; and there
are, besides, a man, and a tree, and a frog, and a few weeds. It is only a bull;
ah, but there is not upon canvas another bull in the world to equal it! Many a
man has attempted to depict a marvellous piece of natural scenery in the Alps or
in Cumberland, or he has tried his pencil upon a magnificent sea-piece, with a
fleet of yachts dancing on the waves, and he has not succeeded. The subjects
were superior, but the art was poor. We must never think, because the particular
work we have in hand seems to be insignificant, that therefore we cannot do it,
or should not do it, thoroughly well. We need Divine help to preach aright to a
congregation of one. If a thing is worth doing at all, it is worth doing well.
If you had to sweep a crossing, it were well to sweep it better than anybody
else. If you only preach in Little Peddlington, let Little Peddlington know that
you are doing your best, and seeking its good. Many a minister has achieved
fame, and, what is far better, has brought glory to God, in a congregation which
could be counted by units, while another has presided over a large church, and
though at first there was a great blast of trumpets, it has ended in the silence
and sadness of utter failure. Know your work, and bend over it, throwing your
heart and soul into it; for, be it great or small, you will have to praise God
to all eternity if you are found faithful in it.

Come fair or come foul, my comrades, hold ye the fort. Some men attempt to
excuse their own negligence by blaming the times. What have you and I to do with
the times, except to serve our God in them? The times are always evil to those
who are of morbid temperament. A scholar tells us that he once read a passage
from a book to a worthy gentleman of the desponding school; it described "these
days of blasphemy and rebuke,"–I think that is the correct expression,–and
lamented the failure of the faithful from among men "Ah, how true!" said the
worthy man, "it is the precise picture of the times." "What times?" exclaimed
the scholar. "These times, of course," was the reply. "Pardon me," said the
scholar, "the sentiment was delivered about four hundred years ago; examine for
yourself the date of the volume." The benefit of railing at the times it would
be hard to discover, for railing does not mend them. What have you to do with
the times? Do your own work. Charles the Twelfth of Sweden had his secretary
sitting by his side writing from dictation, when a bombshell fell through the
roof into the next room. The secretary, in alarm, dropped his pen, upon which
the king exclaimed, "What are you doing?" The poor man faltered, "Ah, sire, the
bomb!" The king's answer was, "What has the bomb to do with what I am telling
you?" You will say that the secretary's life was in danger. Yes, but you are
safe in any case, for you are side by side with Jesus in holy service, and no
evil can befall you. Watch on, and work on, even to the crack of doom. Leave the
times and the seasons with God, and go on with your work. Carlyle speaks
somewhere of the house-cricket chirping on while the trump of the archangel is
sounding;–who blames it for so doing? If God had made you a house-cricket, and
bidden you chirp, you could not do better than fulfil His will. As He has made
you a preacher, you must abide in your vocation. Even if the earth should be
removed, and the mountains should be cast into the midst of the sea, would that
alter our duty? I trow not. Christ has sent us to preach the gospel; and if our
lifework is not yet finished, (and it is not,) let us continue delivering our
message under all circumstances till death shall silence us.

We should consider, in the fourth place, our personal adaptation, desiring to
keep it ever in the best possible condition. There is not only a work ordained
for each man, but each man is fitted for his work. Men are not cast in moulds by
the thousand; we are each one distinct from his fellow. When each of us was
made, the mould was broken;–a very satisfactory circumstance in the case of some
men, and I greatly question whether it is not an advantage, in the case of us
all. If we are, however, vessels for the Master's use, we ought to have no
choice about what vessel we may be. There was a cup which stood upon the
communion table when our Lord ate that passover which He had so desired to eat
with His disciples before He suffered; and, assuredly, that cup was honored when
it was put to His lips, and then passed to the apostles. Who would not be like
that cup? But there was a basin also which the Master took, into which He poured
water, and washed the disciples' feet. I protest that I have no choice whether
to be the chalice or the basin. Fain would I be whichever the Lord wills so long
as He will but use me. But this is plain,–the cup would have made a very
insufficient basin, and the basin would have been a very improper cup for the
communion feast. So you, my brother, may be the cup, and I will be the basin;
but let the cup be a cup, and the basin a basin, and each one of us just what he
is fitted to be. Be yourself, dear brother, for, if you are not yourself, you
cannot be anybody else; and so, you see, you must be nobody. The very worst
notes in music are those which are untrue; each true sound has its own music. In
my aviary are many birds, and they sing very sweetly; but there are among them
three grass paroquets, which do not sing, but imitate the other birds, and very
effectually spoil the concert. Their imitation seems to drown the natural music
of the rest. Do not be a mere copyist, a borrower and spoiler of other men's
notes. Say what God has said to you, and say it in your own way; and when it is
so said, plead personally for the Lord's blessing upon it.

Keep your adaptation for your work up to the highest pitch. Be not in so much
hurry to do that you forget to be,–so anxious to give out that you never take
in. This is the haste which makes no speed. Old Nat had a large wood pile before
him, and he sawed very hard to make that pile smaller. His saw wanted sharpening
and re-setting, and it was dreadful work to make it go at all. An honest
neighbor stepped up to him, and said, "Nat, why don't you get that saw
sharpened? You want to get that put to rights, and then you could do a deal more
than you are now doing." "Now then," replied Nat, "don't you come bothering
here. I have quite enough to do to saw that pile of wood, without stopping to
sharpen my saw." It is unnecessary to point the moral of that anecdote; take
note of it, and act accordingly in future. It is a waste of time, not an economy
of it, to dispense with study, private prayer, and due preparation for your
work.

Keep your adaptation right, especially in a spiritual sense. We have more cause
to pray and read our Bibles than any other people in the world. It was a very
wet day the last time I was at Cologne, and I occupied a room in the hotel,
which presented me with a highly-picturesque view of a public pump. There was
nothing else to see, and it rained so hard that I could not shift my quarters,
so I sat and wrote letters, and glanced at the old pump. People came with pails
for water, and one came with a barrel on his back, and filled it. In the course
of an hour, that individual came several times; indeed, he came almost as often
as all other comers put together, and always filled up his vessel. He was
coming, and coming, and coming all the while; and I rightly concluded that he
was a seller of water, and supplied other people; hence he came oftener than
anybody else, and had a larger vessel. And that is precisely our condition.
Having to carry the living water to others, we must go oftener to the well, and
we must go with more capacious vessels than the general run of Christians. Look,
then, to the vigor of your personal piety, and pray to be "filled with all the
fulness of God."

Once more, remember our personal responsibility. I shall not trust myself to go
very deeply into this question, but every brother should remember that, however
well or ill another man may do his work, it can have no effect whatever upon our
own personal responsibility before God. Some blame others with a kind of
silently-implied belief that they are thereby praising themselves; for, if we
censure the methods adopted by other workers, we tacitly suggest that our own
modes are–or, if we had any, would be–superior to theirs. Well, brother, it may
be so. It may be that others are not wise, are scarcely sound, are fanatical,
erratic, and the like; but what hast thou to do with them? To their own Master
they shall stand or fall, and God's grace is able to make them stand; but your
supposed wisdom, which leads you to criticize them, may prove a snare to you,
and make you fall. You have yet to bring your work before God, to be tried by
fire. Souls are entrusted to you, and for these you must give account. God does
not mean to bless those souls by anybody else, they are to be converted through
you; so, are you acting, living, and preaching in such a way that God is likely
to convert them through you? That is the question for each one of us to answer.

We ought to feel our personal responsibility now, or it may one day come home to
us in a way both forceful and painful. If you are smitten with sickness, and lie
hour after hour tossing upon your bed in the silent watches of the night, if you
have a little respite from pain, or even if you have not, you will, in all
probability, occupy your mind mainly with the overhauling of the work which you
have hitherto done or left undone. Believe me, brethren, this overhauling does
not minister to one's gratification. There are portions of your work over which
you linger with joy, and you say, "Glory be to God, this work was done, at any
rate, with a pure heart, and to His glory, and He blessed it;" and you feel
ready to sing over it; but you have hardly time to finish the song before you
have to weep over a piece of work that was slurred and blotted, and you cannot
help wishing that you could do it all over again. O brethren, we shall soon have
to die! We look each other in the face to-day in health, but there will come a
day when others will look down upon our pallid countenances as we lie in our
coffins, and we shall not be able to return their glances. It will matter little
to us who shall gaze upon us then, but it will matter eternally how we have
discharged our work during our lifetime. "Thou art weighed in the balances, and
art found wanting,"–will that be the verdict on any one of us when we shall
stand before the Lord God Almighty, who trieth the hearts and searcheth the
reins of the children of men? His fire is in Zion, and His furnace is in
Jerusalem. His jealousy is most fierce against those who come nearest to Him; He
will not tolerate sin in His choicest servants, for He slew Nadab and Abihu
because they offered strange fire upon His altar, and He made the false apostle
to be an eternal monument of scorn. May we be kept faithful by grace almighty,
or the responsibility which rests upon us will grind us to powder!

I feel that this matter of personality may be pressed very earnestly upon you,
my brethren, in all five of its points; and in all it will be useful. If our
individual responsibility be rightly felt, we shall refrain from judging others.
We are all too ready to ascend the judgment-seat. One man judges his fellow, and
condemns him because he has had so few additions to his church. I should myself
be sorry if I saw few conversions, and I should severely censure myself; but I
should be very, very wrong if I were to utter an indiscriminate censure upon
others. Our brother's congregation may be smaller than ours; the people's hearts
may have been long steeled by a cold, dead, stereotyped ministry, and it may be
that there is a good deal of work to be done before they will become interested
in the gospel, much less affected by it. Possibly it may happen that the
preacher, who has one convert, might say as the lioness did about her one cub,
when the fox boasted that she had so many, "One, but that one is a lion!" The
minister, whose whole year's work ended with one convert, and that one was
Robert Moffat, did not reap a scanty harvest. On the other hand, I have
noticed–and I think rather more frequently–that brethren who have few converts
judge those who have many. Now, that also would come to an end if each man knew
his own place, and had joy in his own work, and was not envious of another. You
say, "Oh, but these numerous conversions cannot all be genuine!" Why not? Why
should their number create suspicion? I have very few sovereigns in my purse,
and there are heaps at the Bank of England; yet I guess that, in the multitudes
of golden coins which pass into the Bank of England, there is not so much
probability of there being a counterfeit as in the few which reach my pocket or
yours. Quantity need not deteriorate quality. I have an idea sometimes,–I do not
know whether it is correct,–that where there are very few converts added to the
church, there may be some unbelief. When I came along the Corniche Railway, from
Genoa, it was broken in several places; and in one spot the embankment was not
quite destroyed, but it was weakened, and therefore they passed the carriages
over it one by one. They were afraid of the road, and so did not allow too many
upon it at one time. I may not judge, but I sometimes think that, when brethren
bring the converts in so very slowly, they have a little trembling about the
power of saving grace to bear so many. It would not be difficult to be
censorious on either side, but we shall not be so if we look well to the charge
committed to us, and feel our own need of Divine help. Our individuality will
preserve us, by God's grace, from envying others. This vice is loathsome, and
eats as doth a canker. "Wrath is cruel, and anger is outrageous; but who is able
to stand before envy?" I have known persons utter sentiments which condemned
themselves merely with the view of injuring others. They cared not if they
perished, like Samson, so long as they pulled the house down upon others. An
ancient story tells us that a king invited to his palace two men, one of whom he
knew to be the slave of envy. "Now," said he, "I will give you whatever you
please, upon the condition that this man shall choose first, and his companion
shall have twice as much as he." The first man was envious: he desired great
wealth, but he could not endure that the other man should have double. He
therefore thought that he would reduce what he asked for, but this also left his
companion his superior; and as the fable goes,–for peradventure it was only a
fable,–his envy so prevailed that he chose to have one of his eyes torn out that
the other man might be rendered totally blind. Somewhat similar is the spirit of
those who oppose others upon principles fatal to their own work. Brother, do not
so. If thy neighbor be honored of God, thank God for it; if thou art not so
honored, be humbled, and pray more earnestly. If the blessing comes not to thee,
still rejoice that it gladdens thy comrade. In any case, do not envy others. On
the other hand, dear brethren, this sense of individuality ought to prevent our
despising others. The question sometimes comes to the lip concerning a very weak
and scantily-gifted brother, "Lord, and what shall this man do?" The answer of
the Lord is, "What is that to thee? Follow thou Me." There are much better ways
of spending our time than in deriding or despising our brethren. A nobler work
by far is to help those who are weak, and to encourage those who are cast down.

Dear brethren, I have said enough upon this first point, and I shall not be so
long upon the other lest I should weary you. I wish, however, that what I have
said may abide in the hearts of us all.

II. Come we now to THE OPPOSITE OF INDIVIDUALITY. I shall not imitate the old
logicians, who could "confute, change sides, and then confute," for what I have
to say is not in opposition, but in apposition; it is not the reverse, but the
converse. I cannot find the word with which to head it. Our language is still
imperfect; it does not contain the converse of individuality. I looked in
Roget's Thesaurus, I did more, I consulted a living dictionary now among you;
but I could not find the word, and there is not such a word, though there ought
to be. Will anybody here, who is a word-maker, be so kind as to coin me a word
to stand in opposition or apposition to the word individuality? Till that is
done, I must dispense with a catchword, and proceed.

Let us all feel, dear brethren, that, though we have each one a work to do, and
are personally fitted to do it, we are not the only workers in the world.
Brother, you are not the only lamp to enlighten earth's darkness, you are not
the only sower to sow the field of the world with the good seed, you are not the
only trumpet through which God proclaims His jubilee, yours is not the only hand
by which He feeds the multitudes. You are only one member of the mystic body,
one soldier of the grand army. This thought should encourage you, and relieve
the despondency engendered by loneliness. When God sent the flies, and locusts,
and caterpillars to conquer Egypt, Pharaoh might have ridiculed any one of those
insignificant warriors, and said, "What can this caterpillar do? I defy the Lord
and His caterpillars." But the caterpillar might have answered, "Beware, O king,
for there are ten thousand times ten thousand of us! We come in mighty armies,
and will cover all the land. Weak as we are one by one, the Lord will evidence
His omnipotence by the multiplication of our numbers." Thus was it in the early
days of Christianity. Christians came into Rome,–a few poor Jews they were, and
they dwelt in the Ghetto, in obscurity; by-and-by, there were more. Meanwhile, a
few had passed over into Spain; soon there were more. A few had reached Britain;
soon there were more. The nations, angry at this invasion, set to work to
destroy those pests of society, which turned the world upside down. They
tormented, burned, and destroyed them; but they continued to come in shoals and
swarms, and though they were slain without mercy, there were always more to
follow. The foes of God could not possibly stand against the vast host that
pressed forward. "The Lord gave the Word: great was the company of those that
published it." Even so it is at this day. You are not alone in sounding the
praises of Christ, your voice is but one, of a mighty orchestra. The whole world
is full of the praises of God: "their line is gone out through all the earth;
and their words to the end of the world." Nor do we think only of the church
militant; we lift our eyes beyond the firmament, and see a still more glorious
band; for the Master's honour and glory are not left in the hands of workers
here below, toilworn and weary. His glory is sounded forth from harps that never
clash, struck by hands that are never defiled. As a College, we have our
comrades in yonder host whose memories are yet green. I will not mention many
names; but I can never forget our early brother, Alfred Searle, in character
beautiful as a choice flower; and Paterson, in perseverance indomitable, who
wore himself out in self-denying labour. Never can we fail to remember our
apostolic brother Sargeant, worthy of a monument of precious stones; and
Benjamin Davies, unwearied in his Master's cause. It would only awaken mournful
reflections if I were to continue the right noble list of those who have gone up
higher; may we prove as faithful as they were! But it is not merely with them
that we have fellowship; we are one with all the faithful. Luther, and Calvin,
and Wycliffe, and Latimer, and Whitefield, and Wesley, are our comrades, and all
the saints who have preached Jesus Christ. They are not preachers now, it is
true; but they are still glorifying God, and that after the noblest fashion. It
refreshes my heart to think of those whose battle is fought and won for ever. We
are told that the Venetian women, when their husbands are out upon the Adriatic
fishing, go down to the verge of the sea on the sweet summer evenings, when all
is calm and bright, and begin to sing a hymn. They sing the first stanza in the
shrill silvery notes of woman's voice, and then they wait. They cannot see a
single boat upon the sea, the blue Adriatic is not dotted with a sail; but,
presently, mysteriously wafted across the waters, comes the second stanza. Their
husbands are out of sight, but they are not out of hearing; and they have taken
up the second part of the hymn. Even thus, at this moment, our friends on the
shores of Heaven are chanting to us. Hearken, I pray you! This is the strain,–

"All we who dwell above, In realms of endless love, Praise Jesu's Name; To Him
ascribed be, Honour and majesty, Through all eternity, Worthy the Lamb!" Did you
not hear that canticle? Shall we reply? Come, my brethren, let us answer them!
Let us rapturously sing,–

"While you, around the throne,

Cheerfully, join in one,

Praising His Name;

We who have felt His blood

Sealing our peace with God,

Sound His dear fame abroad;

Worthy the Lamb!"

Brethren, we are not alone. Legions of angels are all around us. Hosts of
glorified spirits look down upon us. We are surrounded with a mighty band of
helpers. We are compassed about with a great cloud of witnesses; wherefore, "let
us lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and let us
run with patience the race that is set before us, looking unto Jesus."

It is well for us to remember, in addition to this, that, although we are
individuals, and must keep up our personality, we are only instruments for the
accomplishment of the Divine purposes. We are nothing at all apart from God;
and, blessed be God, we are not apart from Him. It is well to fall back, every
now and then, in sheer weariness, upon the great truth of Divine predestination.
It is a bed for some men's idleness; to us, it should be a couch for our
refreshment. After all, God's will is done. His deep, eternal, immutable
purposes are accomplished. The rage of hell and the enmity of men are neither of
them able to stay the course of the eternal decrees. God doeth as He wills, not
only among the armies of Heaven, but among the inhabitants of this lower world.
He maketh the wrath of man to praise Him, and out of evil He bringeth forth
good.

It is very blessed to feel that God is behind you, that God is in you, and that
He is working with you. Mr. Oncken, in the early days of his preaching at
Hamburg, was brought up before the burgomaster many times, and imprisoned. This
magistrate one day said to him, in very bitter terms, "Mr. Oncken, do you see
that little finger?" "Yes, sir." "As long as that little finger can be held up,
sir, I will put you down." "Ah!" said Mr. Oncken, "I do not suppose that you see
what I see, for I discern not merely a little finger, but a great arm, and that
is the arm of God, and as long as that arm can move, you will never put me
down." The opposition which is waged against the true minister of Christ does
not, after all, amount to more than the burgomaster's little finger, while the
power which is with us is that eternal and onmipotent arm whose forces sustain
the heavens and the earth. We need not, therefore, fear. God's presence makes us
bold. Let the Uhlan in the late war be our example. Picture him, a solitary man,
brave and cool, riding upon a fleet horse. He is going along one of those
interminable French roads which have no variety, except that now and then one
poplar may be half an inch taller than another; he rides hard and fearlessly,
though there are foes on all sides. That one man passes through a hamlet, and
frightens everybody. He enters a town. Is he not foolhardy? All alone he has
ridden up to the Town Hall, and demanded beds and stores. Why is he so bold?
They are all afraid of him, evidently. Ask the man why he is so daring, and he
replies, "There is an army behind me, and therefore I am not afraid." So must
you, dear brother, be one of the Uhlans of the Lord God Almighty, and never be
afraid, for the eternal God will be your rearward. "All power is given unto Me
in Heaven and in earth," says our Commander; "go ye therefore, and teach all
nations, baptizing them in the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the
Holy Ghost." I feel as if He were here, this very morning, looking on you as His
soldiers, and saying, "Conquer in My Name." Go, then, my brethren, ride to those
villages, and arouse them. Go to those towns, and summon them to surrender. Go
to the great cities, and say to the people in them, "Christ demands that you
yield your hearts to Him." Do this, and He will make your word effectual.

It is well for us to feel, in association with this matter of individuality,
that we have the Spirit of God in us. I am what I am; but I am much more than I
am, for there is resident within me the Holy One of Israel. "Know ye not that ye
are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you?" Not the
country residence, the mountain chalet of a travelling personage who will tarry
there for a little while,–your bodies are the temple of the Holy Ghost. This
ought to make us respect ourselves;–understand me, and do not misconstrue the
expression. You should feel that what you do, under the influence of the Divine
Spirit, is not such a feeble work as otherwise it would be. Where the Spirit of
God is, there is power for the accomplishment of the Divine purposes. It would
be far better to speak six words by the Spirit than to speak six thousand
without him. A sermon is not to be judged according to its words, a certain
inner force is its soul and life; and God's judgment of the discourse will be
according to how much there was of the real flower and fruit of the indwelling
Spirit underlying the leaves of the sermon. Dear brethren, I have known a person
say, "I heard So-and-so preach, and there really was nothing in it; but still a
great many were impressed." Just so; God does not need a painted temple; stained
glass, and all manner of adornments and outward array, He cares not for. The man
who thinks so is Popish, whether he thinks so concerning the temples made with
hands, or the temples of our manhood. Is there not a Popery of intellect, and a
Popery of elocution, in consequence of which we suppose that God is not resident
in the uneducated or hesitating speaker, but only dwells with fluency and
elegance? Where God chooses to dwell, there is a palace; His presence glorifies
the place of His abode. Is there anything very wonderful in the architecture of
Shakespeare's house at Stratford-on-Avon? Yet, from the utmost ends of the
earth, admirers of the world's great poet will come, because Shakespeare once
lived there. Suppose Shakespeare were there now! What would his admirers do
then? Now, this day, brethren, our poor humble constitutions and frames and
bodies,–be they what they may,–are the temples of the Holy Ghost. It is not only
that He was there;–that fact makes us respect the very ashes of the saints, but
He is there now. May we never have to lament His absence! You may often see a
fine house, of which the owner is dead, only the picture of him hangs on the
wall; but our delight is that the living Christ is in us now by the power of His
Spirit. I went to the monastery which adjoins the church of St. Onofrio, in
Rome, some years ago, and they showed me there the rooms in which Tasso lived,
and they had so skillfully drawn his likeness on the wall, that it looked for
all the world as if Tasso were there. There were also his bed, and his pen, and
his inkstand, and some of the paper on which he wrote; but there were no fresh
stanzas of "Jerusalem Delivered" to be heard. Even so, we may have the likeness
of Christ in our theological knowledge of Him, in our power of speaking for Him,
we may have the pen with which He used to write, and we may have the paper on
which He was accustomed to write in hearts that were interested in the gospel;
but no "Jerusalem Delivered" will be produced, unless Jesus Himself is there.
Brethren, we must have Christ in us, the hope of glory; the Spirit dwelling in
us, the pure, the ever-flowing life, or our lives will be failures. O Lord,
abide with us, and abide in us!

I must conclude with the remark that it is a very delightful thing to feel that
all the work we are doing is Jesus Christ's work. All the sheep we have to
shepherd are His sheep; the souls we have to bring to Him were bought with His
blood; the spiritual house that is to be built is for His habitation. It is all
His. I delight in working for my Lord and Master, because I feel a blessed
community of interest with Him. That is not my Sunday-school, it is my Lord's;
and He says, "Feed My lambs." It is not my church, but His; and He cries, "Feed
My sheep." Mine are His, and His are mine; yea, all are His. In the days when
servants used to be servants, and were attached to their masters, one of our
nobility had with him an old butler who had lived with his father, and was
getting grey. The nobleman was often much amused with the way in which the good
old man considered everything that was his master's to be his own. I was not
only pleased with the story, but it touched my heart when I heard it. His
lordship once said to him, "John, whose waggon is that which has just come up
loaded with goods?" "Oh!" said he, "that is ours. Those are goods from our town
house." His lordship smiled, and as a carriage came up the drive, he said,
"John, whose coach is that coming into the park?" "Oh!" said he, "that is our
carriage." "But," said the master, "there are some children in it, John; are
they our children?" "Yes, my lord, they are our children, bless them, I will
run, and bring them in." My Lord Jesus, how dare I have the impertinence to
claim anything which is Thine? And yet, when I gaze upon Thy Church, I am so
completely Thy servant, and so wholly absorbed in Thee, that I look upon it as
mine as well as Thine, and I go to wait upon Thy beloved ones. Yea, Lord, and
all these my brethren are going, too. Come with us, Lord, for Thy love's sake!
Amen.


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  CHAPTER 83: 04. HOW TO MEET THE EVILS OF THE AGE
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Chapter 4—How To Meet the Evils of the Age

BELOVED friends, allow me to welcome you all most heartily. I have already
received a blessing in the prayers which have been offered; and we have all, I
think, enjoyed the earnest of a Divine refreshing during the first hallowed hour
of our meeting. Let us continue in the believing confidence that He, who has
already deigned to visit us, will tarry with us until the time shall come for us
all to say," Let us go hence."

I can hardly indicate in a few words the run of my address; you will discover
its subject or range of subjects as we go along, but if one line could contain
it, it would be–

HOW TO MEET THE EVILS OF THE AGE. So far as I remember, every year has been an
exceedingly critical period; and so far as I can see in history, almost every
six months some fervid spirit or another has written about "the present solemn
crisis." There are persons who always believe in the imminent peril of the
universe in general and of the Church of God in particular, and a sort of
popularity is sure to be gained by always crying "Woe! Woe!" Prophets who will
spiritually imitate Solomon Eagle, who went about the streets of London in the
time of the plague, naked, with a pan of coals on his head, crying "Woe! Woe!"
are thought to be faithful, though they are probably dyspeptic. We are not of
that order: we dare not shut our eyes to the evils that surround us, but we are
able to see the Divine power above us, and to feel it with us, working out its
purposes of grace. We say to each of you what the Lord said to Joshua in the
chapter we have just read, "Be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the
Lord thy God is with thee whithersoever thou goest." Our trust is in the living
God, who will bring ultimate victory to His own cause.

Still, it is a wise thing to admit that these days have their own peculiar
perils and trials. The kaleidoscope shifts, the scenes presented to our gaze are
changed, whether for good or evil; good has infinite varieties, and so has evil.
We are not troubled, as our Puritan forefathers were, by persecution and
oppression such as would take from us our civil rights and our liberty to
worship God. Evil has assumed quite another form with us, and we must meet it as
we find it. The battle-front is altered, but do not imagine that the conflict
will be less severe. I look for a sterner struggle than we have ever yet engaged
in, and we must be prepared for it. During the progress of a battle, the Duke of
Wellington was observed riding along the lines to a certain part of the field,
and a soldier said to his fellow, "There goes the Duke, and there's sure to be
warm work." Brethren, we have evidence that the Lord Jesus is with us, let us
therefore set the battle in array. He is not a general who rides about for mere
parade, He means fighting wherever He comes, and we may expect warm work. When
He girds His sword upon His thigh, and rides forth on His white horse, you may
rest assured that His sword will smite heavily, and His arrows will fly thick
and fast, while on the other hand His enemies will furiously rage.

First among the evils of the age, we must notice the return of superstition.
Ritualism has sprung up among us, and spread as most ill weeds do. It is, I
suppose, distinguishable from Romanism by omniscience, but it is also probable
that omniscience sees more of its likeness to Romanism than we do. It is sadly
spreading,–spreading everywhere. It suits our Evangelical brethren in the Church
of England to speak of "a noisy minority practising Ritualism," and to remind us
that each denomination has its difficulties; but to us, who are impartial
onlookers, it seems that the most vital and vigorous part of the Anglican Church
is that which is tainted with this error. The difference in the two parties is
most marked, for, the Ritualists are brave as lions, and the Evangelicals are
timid as hares. You have only to go into the churches immediately around us, or
into those of large towns, such as Brighton, to see the strength, the force, the
determination, in a word, the detestable vitality of Ritualism. Every doctrine
of Romanism is preached by these men except the infallibility of the Pope, and
perhaps the celibacy of the clergy;–the presence of certain rosy-cheeked boys
and girls in the rectory garden proving many Anglicans to be soundly Protestant
upon that point. I am persuaded that there are many priests in the Church of
Rome who preach more gospel, and understand it better, than do these pretended
priests in the Church of England. The worst of it is, that the growth of
sacramentalism in the Established Church is not like that of the mistletoe or a
fungus upon an oak, it is a real and legitimate branch of the parent stem. There
is no man living, and there never was a man, and never can be one, who believes
the whole of the Book of Common Prayer in its natural signification. The only
way in which it can be done is by some such device as that of the two nuns who
had borrowed a mule which would not go without being sworn at. As neither of
them could be so profane as to swear, one good sister pronounced the first
syllable of the French word sacre, and the other finished it, and thus between
the two the mule was made to go. So must it be with belief in the Prayer-book,
no one man can believe it all; possibly High Church, Low Church, and Broad
Church can manage it between them. But if I were driven, at the point of the
bayonet, to certify that one of the parties was a grain or two more consistent
with the Prayer-book than the others, I must declare in favor of the High Church
party. It is true that the Articles are against them, but what are the Articles?
They are only read over perhaps once in a lifetime. The. mischief is in the
Catechism and. the service book which are in constant use. We have not to deal
with a parasitical evil, but with a natural offshoot of the national vine, which
will remain as long as the Book of Common Prayer is unrevised; and when will it
be revised?

Then, too, this mischief is carried on by men who mean it. They are in downright
earnest. I believe there is among them a remnant who, despite their
ceremonialism and their mummeries, are true believers in the Lord Jesus Christ.
With them, there is a host of mere believers in postures, masquerading, and
drapery, and all that kind of rubbish; but there is, nevertheless, a gracious
company, whose sweet spirit breathes in holy hymns, and in devout, Herbert-like
utterances concerning our Lord, which we should be sorry to have missed. As a
party, they are earnest, they compass sea and land to make one proselyte, and
great are the sacrifices which they make for the cause which they have espoused.
This system, my brethren, is well entrenched, and you have to dislodge it. This
superstition, too, is in harmony with the innate idolatry of the human heart; it
offers gratification to the eye and to the taste, it sets up a visible priest
and outward symbols, and these man's fallen heart craves after. It offers to
save men the necessity of thought by offering an outward service, and furnishing
a priest to do their religion for them; but, alas! it takes man off from the
real and spiritual, it consoles him without true regeneration, and buoys him up
with hope though he has not submitted himself to the righteousness of Christ. A
second, and what I regard as an equally terrible evil, is abounding unbelief. I
am not speaking now of that coarse kind of infidelity which rails at the
Scriptures, and blasphemes the Name of the Lord our God. There is not much
mischief in such a devil as that; he is too black, too plainly a fiend of hell!
There is a more dangerous spirit now abroad, entering into Nonconformist
churches, climbing into their pulpits, and notably perverting the testimony of
some who count themselves somewhat, and are regarded as leaders by those who
reckon themselves to be men of culture and intellect. Macaulay rightly said that
theology is immutable; but these men are continually contradicting that opinion
in the most practical manner, for their theology is fickle as the winds.
Landmarks are laughed at, and fixed teaching is despised. "Progress" is their
watchword, and we hear it repeated ad nauseam. Very far are we from denying that
men ought to make progress in the knowledge of the truth, for we are aiming at
that ourselves; and by daily experience, by study, and by the teaching of the
Holy Ghost, we trust that, in some humble measure we are gaining it. But words
need interpreting,–what is intended by "progress" in this case? Which way does
it go?

It is too often progress from the truth, which, being interpreted, is
progressing backwards. They talk of higher thought, but it is an ascending
downwards. I must use their terms, and talk of progress; but their progress is a
going from, and not a going to, the place of our desires. Evidently, it is
progress from usefulness. They invite us to follow them in their advance towards
a barren Socinianism, for thither the new theology tends, or to something worse.
Now, we know, at the present time, certain ancient chapels shut up, with grass
growing in the front of them, and over the door of them is the name Unitarian
Baptist Chapel. Although it has been said that he is a benefactor of his race
who makes two blades of grass grow where only one grew before, we have no desire
to empty our pews in order to grow more grass. We have in our eye certain other
chapels, not yet arrived at that consummation, where the spiders are dwelling in
delightful quietude, in which the pews are more numerous than the people, and
although an endowment keeps the minister's mouth open, there are but few open
ears for him to address.

It is pretty certain that Christ is not lifted up there, for He does not draw
all men unto Him. There is no attractive force, no power, no influence for good;
it is a frost-bound religion, and we are not at all desirous of making an
excursion to that sea of ancient ice. "Sir," we say to the preacher, "you are
immensely clever; we often wonder how one small head can carry all you know;
but, for all your cleverness, we cannot give up the old, old gospel, for the
results of your preaching do not fascinate us. Where are your converts? Where
are your hearers? Where will your members soon be found?" Handel, on one
occasion, played the organ in a country church; and, at the close of the
service, he gave a voluntary of such a sort that all the people lingered to hear
it. The old organist was indignant, and said, "Now, let that organ alone, you
can't play the people out; let me do it." These progressive gentlemen certainly
can play the people out. Their gifts of dispersion are amazing. Put them down in
any warm-hearted Christian community, and see if they will not scatter and
divide it; place them in any town you may select, and though they may be at
first attractive (for some people are attracted by any novelty, however
erroneous), yet, after a short time, there being no life, there will be no power
to retain the people. We remember the experiment of Daventry, under that
eminently godly man, Dr. Doddridge, and we are not inclined to try the like
under any circumstances. That worthy man did not dogmatize to "the dear young
men" who came to his College, but adopted the plan of letting them hear the
argument upon each side, that they might select for themselves. The result was
as disastrous as if error had been taught, for nothing is worse than
lukewarmness as to truth. Dissent became enervated with a faint-hearted
liberalism, and we had a generation of Socinians, under whom Nonconformity
almost expired. Both General and Particular Baptists have had enough of this
evil leaven, and we are not inclined to put it again into the people's bread.

Besides, we are invited to follow the guidance of men who are not qualified to
be leaders. I have waited, with a good deal of interest, to see whether modern
thought would be capable of producing a man, a man of mark, of profound mind,
and philosophic genius; but where is he? Where is the man who will found a
school, and sway his fellows; a man for the orthodox to tremble at, a great
Goliath, head and shoulders above his fellows? Truly, there are some who think
they have power, and so they have amongst those young gentlemen whose
moustachios are on the point of developing; but they have no influence over
those who read their Bibles, have had experience, and are accustomed to "try the
spirits." The great lights are the literary men who produce articles in certain
Reviews which are the oracles of the elite, or of those who think themselves so.
I wonder how many of these precious Reviews are sold; but that, of course, is of
small consequence, because the quality of their readers is so high! See what
airs a man gives himself because he reads a Review! Are these things so very
clever? I am unable to see it. I used to hear that Evangelical writers produced
platitudes; I believe they did, but surely they never wrote more watery trash
than is published in the present day in opposition to the orthodox faith; but
then, you see, it is given out in such a Latinized jargon that its obscurity is
mistaken for profundity. If you have the time and patience to read a little of
what is written by the modern-thought gentlemen, you will not be long before you
are weary of their word-spinning, their tinkering of old heresies into original
thought, and their general mystifying of plain things. It only needs a man of
power to smash them up like potters' vessels, but then the result would only be
pieces of broken pottery. "Show us a man worth following," say we, "and when you
do, we will not follow him, but fight with him; at the present, we are not
likely to leave Calvin, and Paul, and Augustine, to follow you."

We are invited, brethren, most earnestly to go away from the old-fashioned
belief of our forefathers because of the supposed discoveries of science. What
is science? The method by which man tries to conceal his ignorance. It should
not be so, but so it is. You are not to be dogmatical in theology, my brethren,
it is wicked; but for scientific men, it is the correct thing. You are never to
assert anything very strongly; but scientists may boldly assert what they cannot
prove, and may demand a faith far more credulous than any we possess. Forsooth,
you and I are to take our Bibles, and shape and mould our belief according to
the ever-shifting teachings of so-called scientific men. What folly is this!
Why, the march of science, falsely so-called, through the world, may be traced
by exploded fallacies and abandoned theories. Former explorers, once adored, are
now ridiculed; the continual exposure of false hypotheses is a matter of
universal notoriety. You may tell where the learned have encamped by the debris
left behind of suppositions and theories as plentiful as broken bottles. As the
quacks, who ruled the world of medicine in one age, are the scorn of the next,
so has it been, and so will it be, with your atheistical savants and pretenders
to science. But they remind us of facts. Are they not yet ashamed to use the
word? Wonderful facts, made to order, and twisted to their will to overthrow the
actual facts which the pen of God Himself has recorded! Let me quote from "Is
the Book Wrong?" by Mr. Hely Smith, a pamphlet worthy of an extensive reading:–

"For example, deep down in the alluvial deposits in the delta of the Nile were
found certain fragments of pottery. Pottery, of course, implies potters; but
these deposits of mud, Sir Charles Lyell decreed, must have taken 18,000 years
to accumulate, therefore there must have been men carrying on the occupations of
civilized life at least 7,000 years before the creation of man as recorded in
Scripture. What clearer proof could be wanted that the Book was wrong? For who
would presume to suspect Sir C. Lyell of making a mistake in his work? A
mistake, however, he had made, for, in the same deposits of mud, at the same
depth in which this 'pre-Adamite pottery' was discovered, there also turned up a
brick bearing the stamp of Mahomet Ali! [Yet we were bound to shift the Bible to
suit that 'fact'–muddy fact!] Again, some curiously-shaped pieces of flint were
discovered in 1858 in what has been called 'the famous cavern at Brixham.' It
was at once decided that the flints showed signs of human workmanship, and as
they were found in company with the bones of extinct animals, it was also at
once considered proved that man must have existed in immensely remote ages, and
the evidence was said to have 'revolutionized the whole of Western Europe on the
question of man's antiquity.' The history of these flints is remarkable. For
fourteen years, they were kept under lock and key in the rooms of the Geological
Society; but public curiosity was gratified by plaster casts shown at the
cavern, and by illustrated descriptions published in an imposing volume.
According to the evidence thus afforded to the public, there seemed no doubt
left but that these flints bore the marks of the mind and hand of man, thus
associating man with a pre-Adamite race of animals. The cause of truth owes a
debt of gratitude to Mr. Nicholas Whitley, Honorary Secretary of the Royal
Institution of Cornwall, for the acuteness which led him to suspect that there
was something wrong, the perseverance with which he followed up his suspicions,
and the boldness with which he made public the result, which was simple, but
suggestive. The plaster casts the drawings and descriptions, were not the casts,
drawings, or descriptions of the real flints found in the cavern! The originals
were, with one or two exceptions, evidently purely natural specimens of flints;
and persons who have seen the landscape stones, and the marvellous likeness of
human faces on inaccessible rocks, will not be disposed to overthrow the whole
of Revelation because of one or two curiously-shaped stones found in company
with the remains of extinct animals. If the cause had not been so weak, what was
the necessity for trying to strengthen and supplement it by presenting the
public with false statements? With regard to all these supposed flint implements
and spears and arrow-heads, found in various places, it may be as well to
mention here the frank confession of Dr. Carpenter. He has told us from the
presidential chair of the Royal Academy that no 'logical proof can be adduced
that the peculiar shapes of these flints were given them by human hands.'" So
the bubbles go on bursting, and meanwhile more are being blown, and we are
expected to believe in whatever comes, and wait with open mouth to see what
comes next. But we shall not just yet fall down and worship the image of human
wisdom, notwithstanding all the flutes, harps, sackbuts, psalteries, dulcimers,
weekly papers, quarterly reviews, and boastful professors. Show us a man of
science worthy of the name, and then we will not follow him if he dares to
oppose revealed truth; but show us one in whom the next generation will believe;
at present, there is not one alive worthy to be compared with Newton and other
master-minds reverent to the Scriptures, compared with whom these men are mere
pretenders. See, my brethren, we have unbelief, scientific and otherwise, to
contend with, and we must meet it in the Name of the Lord.

Another manifest evil of this our time is not so serious, but it is exceedingly
annoying; I refer to the spirit of disintegration which infects portions of the
Church of God, and causes much heartburn and discord in certain quarters. Years
ago, when a man was converted, he used, as a matter of course, to unite with
that church with which he most nearly agreed, and work for the Lord in
connection with it; but now, a brother does not like to go to the place where
most of the Christians in the town or village assemble, but he prefers to hold a
meeting in his own room, in order to show that he dislikes sectarianism, and
believes in Christian unity. Not caring to work with any recognized
organization, because it is denominational, he feels bound to form a little
denomination of his own. We would not, in an angry spirit, forbid these brethren
because they follow not with us; but we cannot conceal the fact that, by thus
working alone, they are injuring themselves, weakening our churches, and robbing
us of those who ought to be our most efficient helpers. I fear that some are
bitten with the notion that work outside the church is more useful than regular
efforts; but a little experience will, I hope, teach many of them better.
Christian labors, disconnected from the church, are like sowing and reaping
without having any barn in which to store the fruits of the harvest; they are
useful, but incomplete. I trust the evil of Ishmaelitish enterprise will
gradually cure itself, but meanwhile it goes on, and loving, earnest people are
decoyed away from our fellowship. On the other hand, it is a good thing for some
brethren, who "count themselves something though they be nothing," to have the
opportunity of finding a sphere of activity, where they will probably be less
troublesome to us than they would have been nearer home. Some persons,
distinguished by a kind of piety which might be called mag-piety, are happiest
where they can talk most. They are fond of hearing themselves speak, and can
sing, "How charming is the sound!" Such people are best accommodated in
assemblies of their own convening. We have this to deal with, and to some
brethren it is a cause of heartbreak, and has bowed them down with grief of
soul. Many an earnest pastor can testify to this. The fourth evil is one to
which I call your very earnest attention, the growth of wickedness in the land,
especially in two forms, which we ought not to overlook. One is, the growing
worldliness among professing Christians. They are indulging in extravagance in
many ways; in luxurious habits, dress, equipages, feastings, and so on, and
wasting the substance of which they are stewards. When a man is giving liberally
to the cause of God, I count it very foolish to forbid his spending liberally in
other ways, for men usually spend by scale. It would be absurd to hold up a
wretched miser, who gives nothing either to God or man, as an example to a
liberal spender; but there is too much of ostentatious extravagance abroad,
which wastes the Master's money in worldly pleasures and doubtful amusements,
yea, and amusements worse than doubtful. Some, who are called ministers of
Christ, have in these days even defended amusements which.moralists have felt
bound to abandon, but let us hope that such ministers will not repeat the
mistake. We must be careful, wise, and yet decided in our dealings with this
growing evil, or we shall lose all spirituality from the churches.

But, beside this, have you not noticed with horror the increase of the national
sin of drunkenness throughout the land? Only look at the bill for intoxicating
drinks! That amount cannot be expended annually without producing a terrible
record of drunkenness, crime, disease, and death. Ten years ago, it is pretty
certain that men drank quite enough; to what must we impute this ever-growing
consumption? The evil is positively appalling. I look upon the law permitting
the sale of wines and spirits at the grocers' as one of the most mischievous
pieces of modern legislation. To my grievous knowledge, the sin of intoxication
among women has been suggested in some instances, and promoted in others, by
this easy and respectable method of obtaining strong drink. For women to drink,
is loathsome even to men who can freely indulge in it themselves. Is it really
more shameful that women should be drunken than men? It has that appearance, and
the frequency of the evil among them proves that the drink cancer is getting
nearer to the heart of the body politic.

I was in France, at the Carnival at Mentone, and I remarked again and again that
I saw no sign of intoxication. All day long, the peasants and townspeople amused
themselves with masks, and music, and confetti,–amusements fit for little
children; but I saw no drunkenness, and do not think there was any. Yet France
is a Popish country: do we not blush to think that it should excel us in so
ordinary a virtue as sobriety? One of my friends said to me, "If this Carnival
had been held in England, these people would all have been drunk before they
started the procession." Several years ago, when staying on the island of
Heligoland, I noticed with regret a regulation that no more than four English
sailors should come ashore at one time, and then each one must be attended by a
soldier till he returned to the boat. I saw hale and hearty sailors come to the
little town, and walk up the street; but how differently they reeled back, and
how difficult it seemed to get them safely away! Are our fellow-countrymen to
become the scorn of mankind for their drunkenness? The world will begin to cry
shame upon the Christian Church unless something is done in this matter.
Consider the suffering and poverty which arise out of the waste of money
involved in this vice, and the crime which is its inevitable result. The whole
land reeks before the Lord, and is corrupt with this sin. If Christians do not
labour to stay this evil, who will do it? If ministers do not seek to the utmost
of their ability to apply a remedy, the world will think that their outcry
against unbelief and other evils is not very sincere. He who does not cry out
against the wolf cannot surely be at enmity with the lion.

These are the mischiefs. Now for THE REMEDY. What are we to do to meet this
superstition, and this unbelief, and this disintegration, and this growing
worldliness and drunkenness? I have only one remedy to prescribe, and that is,
that we do preach the gospel of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, in all its
length and breadth of doctrine, precept, spirit, example, and power. To give but
one remedy for many diseases of the body, is the part of an empiric; but it is
not so in the affairs of the soul, for the gospel is so divinely compounded as
to meet all the evils of humanity, however they may differ from one another. We
have only to preach the living gospel, and the whole of it, to meet the whole of
the evils of the times. The gospel, if it were fully received through the whole
earth, would purge away all slavery and all war, and put down all drunkenness
and all social evils; in fact, you cannot conceive a moral curse which it would
not remove; and even physical evils, since many of them arise incidentally from
sin, would be greatly mitigated, and some of them for ever abolished. The spirit
of the gospel, causing attention to be given to all that concerns our neighbor's
welfare, would promote sanitary and social reforms, and so the leaves of the
tree which are for the healing of the nations would work their beneficial
purpose. Keep to the gospel, brethren, and you will keep to the one universal,
never-failing remedy. You have read of sieges, in which the poor inhabitants
have been reduced to skeletons; and fevers and diseases, scarcely known at other
times, have abounded: when the city has at last surrendered, if you wished to
give the people what would meet all their wants, you would begin by giving them
food. Hunger lies at the bottom of the fever, hunger has caused the other
diseases, gaunt and grim; and when the constitution is again built up by food,
it will throw off most of the other ills. Give the bread of life to the
multitude, and the maladies and diseases of fallen humanity will be divinely
removed; I am sure it is so.

It is evident enough that the gospel meets superstition. In the Revelation we
read, "Babylon is fallen, is fallen," and we see her cast like a millstone in
the flood. But was it not because, as we read a little before, "I saw another
angel fly in the midst of Heaven, having the everlasting gospel to preach unto
them that dwell on the earth"? Between the flight of the angel and the fall of
Babylon there was an intimate connection. If you were to enter a ruin, and could
not bear the hooting of the owls and the presence of the bats, and wanted to
disperse them, if you could let the blessed light shine into the deserted halls,
the bats and owls would soon find their wings. Let the flambeaux blaze in every
corner, and the creatures of darkness will quit the scene. Do you wish to put an
end to baptismal regeneration, the lie of lies? Proclaim spiritual regeneration
by the Holy Ghost, and exalt the work of the Spirit of the Lord. Would you make
men see through the sham of Romish and Anglican priesthood? Proclaim the
everlasting priesthood of our great Melchisedec. If you would end belief in
sacraments, proclaim the substance, of which ordinances can never be more than
the shadow. You will find men turn away from the husks when you set before them
solid food, God by His Spirit being with you to give them the wisdom to discern
between things that differ. As to the unbelieving business, my brethren, I bear
my witness that the preaching of the gospel confronts it well. I was speaking to
a brother-minister concerning the number of young men who fall into one form or
another of false doctrine. When I told him that I was very little troubled in
that way, he replied, "I don't suppose you are. Calvinism drives them away, it
does not allow them enough scope. A man of that kind would not come to hear you
many times." Now I am bold to say that, in some preaching, dovecots are provided
for the birds of doubt, and I am not surprised that they fly in clouds, and as
doves to their windows. Preach the doctrines of grace, dear brethren, and. those
who like not your Lord will either be changed themselves or change their
minister. Preach the gospel very decidedly and firmly, no matter what people may
say of you, and God will be with you. Some would like us to treat the Bible as
if it were a peal of bells, sounding forth from a church steeple, which we can
make to say whatever we please; rather let us sound forth Scriptural truth like
a trumpet, giving a certain sound, that people may know that there is a meaning
in it, and may learn at the same time what that meaning is.

I give the progressive gentlemen at motto to be engraved on their escutcheon,
for which I hope they will be very grateful; it is this,–"Ever learning." It is
their boast that they are ever learning. Accept it, gentlemen, but take the
whole of it: "ever learning, and never able to come to the knowledge of the
truth." (2 Timothy 3:7.) They themselves confess that they do not come to
definite knowledge, for they are always telling us that what they teach to-day
they may repudiate to-morrow, for a process of development is going on, so that,
having commenced with the oyster of Calvinism, they may yet reach the
superlative manhood of atheism, for where else will it stop? Preach the truth
with all your hearts as God teaches it to you, and this plague will be stayed.
As to disintegration, I know of no way of keeping God's people together like
giving them plenty of spiritual meat. The simple shepherd said that he tied his
sheep by their teeth, for he gave them such good food that they could not find
better, and so they stayed with him. Be this our custom as the Holy Spirit shall
help us. Let us also labour, by our preaching, to make church-fellowship a great
deal more real. Have we not many times heard the remark, perhaps a pardonable
one, "I will never go to another church-meeting"? Why should it be so? An old
story furnishes me with an illustration. A clergyman was burying a corpse, and
not knowing whether to use the word "brother" or" sister" in the service, he
turned to one of the mourners, and asked, "Is it a brother or a sister?" "No
relation at all, sir," was the prompt reply, "only an acquaintance." We are
always talking about beloved brethren and sisters; but, on examination, how much
of real brotherhood is there in most churches? Does it not amount to this,–"No
relation at all, only an acquaintance"? Do you wonder that people start a little
meeting of their own, where they hope that there will be a little more
communion? Try to make church-fellowship full of life and love by preaching and
living the gospel of love and brotherhood. Be to your people like a father among
his children, or an elder brother among his brethren, that you may be the means
of blessing to them, and at the same time meet the evil of disintegration. As to
that terrible matter of drunkenness, I believe there are many palliations for
the disease, but I am equally certain that there is no complete and universally
applicable cure for it except the gospel. The best way to make a man sober is to
bring him to the foot of the cross. It is a practical question, well worth your
pondering, whether, in order to bring him there, it may not be necessary to get
him sober first, for we cannot hope to see men converted when they are drunk.
You may find it wise to use with vigor all the appliances which the temperance
movement has so amply provided; but whether you personally agree to do so or
not, if you see others earnestly warring with the demon of drink, even though
they use weapons which you do not admire, do not despise them, nor treat them
otherwise than as allies. Let your own personal habits be such as shall tend to
overthrow the evil, and to encourage those who are laboring to that end. Let the
current and tone of your conversation be always friendly to the man who fights
this foe, even if he does not come upon your platform, for the enemy is so
strong and so all-devouring that no honest helper may be scorned. But, after
all, the gospel is the needle-gun of the conflict. If you could make every man
in England sign the pledge of total abstinence, you could not secure sobriety
for any length of time, since pledges are too often broken; but if men's hearts
are changed, and they become believers in the Lord Jesus Christ, then the
stamina of principle will, by Divine grace, be given to the mental constitution,
promises will be kept, and vices will be forsaken. So far you have followed me
in the general truth, I will now give you a few practical exhortations. The old,
old gospel is to be preached; it is not to be ground out, like tunes from a
barrel organ; but to be preached in the very best way; and, by God's blessing,
we are so to work up the church that both ourselves and our fellow-members shall
confirm the witness of the gospel, and be hearty and unanimous in spreading it.
To begin with, we must have more knowledge of the gospel. It is not every
minister who understands the gospel; many ministers, who understand its
elements, have never attempted to grasp and to preach the whole of it, and even
he who knows most of it needs to understand it better. You must preach the whole
of the gospel. The omission of a doctrine, or an ordinance, or a precept, may
prove highly injurious. Even points which others think trivial must not be
trivial to the man who would make full proof of his ministry. Do not, for
instance, fail to be faithful upon believers' baptism; for if that part of your
testimony be left out, an ingredient essential to meet superstition will be
wanting. Though it may seem, at first sight, as if you might very well leave out
a minor doctrine without mischief, do not so; for, since the God who put it into
the Word is supremely wise, he is not a wise man who would leave it out. Fulfil
the whole of your commission: "teaching them," says your Lord, "to observe all
things whatsoever I have commanded you." Preach the gospel North, South, East,
and West; but be sure that you preach the whole gospel as far as God has taught
it to you, and preach nothing else. To accomplish this, we are bound to search
and study in order to know more and more of the inspired Word. Have you not
found that the precious gospel is like a cavern into which you must enter
bearing the torch of the Holy Spirit, who alone can show you all things? Were
you not astonished as you stood in the first chamber, and saw its clear soft
silver light? What treasures were all around you, for all its walls were slabs
of silver, and the roof was hung with filagree of the precious metal! "I have
found it! I have found it!" you cried, for very joy. But, just then, one of the
shining ones touched you on the shoulder, and said, "Come hither, and I will
show thee greater things than these." You passed through a portal hitherto
unobserved, and, lo! there opened up another chamber, more lofty and more
spacious than the last. The floor, the roof, and the pendant stalactites were
all of gold,–pure gold, like unto transparent glass; and then you said, "Now
have I entered the innermost shrine of truth." Yet was there more to be seen,
for again the shining one touched you, another secret door flew open, and you
were in a vast hall, where every form of precious stone flashed forth upon you;
rubies, and jaspers, and emeralds, and amethysts emulated each other's beauties,
while all in a blaze of light the terrible crystal and all manner of choice gems
made the cavern to shine like a thousand firmaments crowded with stars. Then you
marvelled indeed. And now, perhaps, having seen such treasures, you are of
opinion that nothing more remains; but no mortal hath fully seen God's glory as
yet, and the Divine Spirit waits to lead you by study and prayer to a yet
clearer vision of the deep things of God. In order to preach the gospel well, we
must have such a knowledge of it that we are practically conversant with it. We
must have it in our hearts, and also, as the common saying has it, at our
fingers' ends. We must be rich that we may scatter treasures. We must be scribes
well instructed that we may be apt to teach. Let us see well to this, dear
brethren; and if any of you have at all slurred your private studies, and your
communion with God, and your deep searching of the Word, I pray you do not so;
for you may get on a little while with the stores you have on hand, but they
will soon be spent, or become mouldy. Gather fresh manna every morning; gather
it fresh from Heaven. Manna is all very well out of a brother's omer if I cannot
go where it falls, but God's rule is for each man, to fill his own omer. Borrow
from books if you will; but do not preach books, but the living Word. Get much
inward knowledge, and then deal it out to your people.

Secondly, we must seek after a deeper and more experimental acquaintance with
the gospel. The word "experimental" is one which theology has manufactured; but
it is not correct, for true religion is no expemnent. Surely it is a
well-ascertained fact, a force the result of which may safely be predicted, for
no cause more certainly ensures its effect. But we mean "experiential"–that
which groweth out of experience,–pardon the uncomely coinage. Does a man know
any gospel truth aright till he knows it by experience? Is not this the reason
why God's servants are made to pass through so many trials, that they may really
learn many truths not otherwise to be apprehended? Do we learn much in sunny
weather? Do we not profit most in stormy times? Have you not found it so–that
your sick-bed–your bereavement–your depression of spirit, has instructed you in
many matters which tranquillity and delight have never whispered to you? I
suppose we ought: to learn as much by joy as by sorrow, and I hope that many of
my Lord's better servants do so; but, alas! others of us do not; affliction has
to be called in to whip the lesson into us.

Brethren, a minister who handles the Word of God as one who has tried and proved
it, is known at once by his congregation. Even the unconverted recognize the
touch of the practised surgeon of souls. If a woman, who had never nursed
anybody before, were to come to your bedside to attend to you during an illness,
you would find it out without being told. But mark the skilled nurse. Note the
wonderful way in which she makes up your pillow! What an art she has in putting
on the bandages! How downy are her fingers when she touches the wounded flesh!
And if she has ever been afflicted as you now are, how pleasantly she says, "Ah,
I know how you suffer! I understand that feeling; for I have felt the same."
Why, you feel that nurse to be the very one you needed. There is a way of
talking about the gospel, and its privileges and duties, in a style which does
not come home to the heart at all. I once read the following criticism upon a
certain preacher. I do not think it was at all just as applied to him, so I
shall not mention his name; but the remarks were as follows:–"He preaches as if
you had no father or mother, no sister or brother, no wife or child, no human
struggles and hopes; as if the great object of preaching was to fill you with
Biblical pedantry, and not to make you a better, wiser, stronger man than
before. Perhaps it may be, because this is the case, that the church is so
thronged. You need not tremble lest your heart be touched, and your darling sin
withered up by the indignant denunciations of the preacher. He is far away in
Genesis or in Revelation, telling you what the first man did, or the last man
will do; giving you, it may be, a creed that is Scriptural and correct, but that
does not interest you, for it has neither life, nor love, nor power; it is as
well adapted to empty space as to this gigantic Babel of competition, and crime,
and wrong, in which we live and move."

Such a criticism would justly apply to many preachers. They do not treat the
gospel as a practical thing, or as a matter of fact which immediately concerns
the people before them. If the gospel referred only to certain unclothed
humanities in the bush of Australia, they could not themselves appear to be less
interested in it. A pleading experimental sermon from them we could not expect,
nor even the simple gospel, except so far as they may occasionally condescend to
men of low estate by abasing themselves from the serenities in which their
highnesses exist in order to consider a few of the depravities of the lower
classes! This will never do. No; we must have personal experience of the things
of God. As to our own depravity, we must feel it, and mourn it; and as to the
glorious power of the grace of God, and the wondrous riches of Christ, we must
go on to realize these in our own souls more and more, if we are to preach with
power, and meet the evils of the times.

I have to say, thirdly, that we must keep to the gospel more continually. I do
not know any audience to whom there is less need to say this than to the
present; but, still, let me "stir up your pure minds by way of remembrance." It
is worth while stirring up that which is pure; the impure will be best let
alone. Seeing that ye have these things, let me excite you to have them more
abundantly. Often, very often, ought we to teach the simple rudiments of the
gospel. It is astonishing, after all the preaching that there has been in
England, how little the gospel is understood by the mass of men. They are still
children, and have need to be told the A B C of the gospel of Christ. Keep most
to those themes, brethren, which are most soul-saving,–to those which are
practically useful to the people. Keep close to the cross of Christ. Point
continually to the atoning sacrifice, and to the doctrine of justification by
faith, which, when preached aright, are never preached without the Divine
approbation. Every truth is important, let it have its due place; but do not
suffer any secondary truth to take you away from the first. Aristotle, in his
wonderfully unnatural natural history, tells us that, in Sicily, the herbs in
the woods and fields smell so exceedingly sweet that the dogs lose all scent of
their prey, and so are unable to hunt. Let us beware of such herbs. There is to
our minds–to mine, I know,–a great fascination in poetry, in true science, in
metaphysics, and the like; but you, I trust, dear brethren, will prove to be
dogs of so keen a scent that the perfume of none of these shall prevent your
following closely after the souls of men, for whom you hunt at your Master's
bidding. No doubt many are drawn off from the main pursuit, and think, when they
have taken to frivolous philosophizings, that they have outgrown their
fellow-Christians; but be not ye of their mind. A woman was once very busy in
fetching out of her burning house her pictures and her choicest pieces of
furniture. She had worked a long while, toiling hard to save her little
treasures; when, on a sudden, it came to her mind that one of her children was
missing. The child had been left in the burning house; and when the mother
rushed back again, that chamber had long ago been consumed, and the child had,
doubtless, perished. Then did she wring her hands, and bitterly bewail her
folly. She seemed to curse every bit of furniture that she had saved, and wished
that she had not saved it, because, by looking after such poor stuff, she had
lost her child. Even so, every little piece of curious learning, and quaint
proverb, and deep doctrine, that you manage to save from the fire, will only
accuse your conscience if you let men's souls perish. We must have them saved;
and it is infinitely better that fifty of those admirable discourses upon a
difficult point should lie by till we are dead than that we should bring them
out, and waste fifty Sundays when precious souls are waiting for the good news
of mercy.

I have often wondered why certain sermons were ever preached, what design the
preacher had in concocting them. I would not suspect the preachers of wishing to
display themselves; yet what else they were doing, I do not know. Caligula
marched his legions, with the beating of drums, and sounding of trumpets, and
display of eagles and banners, down to the sea-shore, to gather cockles! And
there are sermons of that sort: beating drums, and sounding trumpets, and
flaunting flags, and cockles! A beautiful story is told of the famous Bernard.
He preached one day to a congregation with marvellous eloquence and poetic
diction; he charmed them all; but when the sermon was done, Bernard was observed
to walk away disquieted. He wandered into the wilderness, and spent the night
alone, fasting because of his sadness. The next day, at the time for preaching,
he was ready, and delivered himself of a commonplace discourse, of which the
great gentlemen who had listened to him the day before thought nothing; but the
poor of the people understood his words, and drank them in; and though he heard
the censures of the critics, he was observed to walk away with a smile upon his
face, and to eat his bread with a merry heart. When one asked him the reason, he
said, "Heri Bernardum; hodie Jesum Christum." "Yesterday, I preached Bernard;
but to-day, Jesus Christ." You, my brethren, will feel happy when you have
preached unto them Jesus; and, whoever frowns, your sleep will be sweet to you,
for your Master will have accepted you.

Keep to the gospel, then, more and more and more. Give the people Christ, and
nothing but Christ. Satiate them, even though some of them should say that you
also nauseate them with the gospel. At every meal, set out the salt without
prescribing how much. If they do not like it (and there are creatures that
cannot endure salt), give them all the more of it, for this is according to your
Lord's mind.

I would add that, in our preaching, we must become more and more earnest and
practical. That paragraph, which I read to you just now concerning a certain
divine, must never be true concerning us. We must preach as men to men, not as
divines before the clergy and nobility. Preach straight at them. It is of no use
to fire your rifle into the sky when your object is to pierce men's hearts. To
flourish your sabre finely is a thing which has been done so often that you need
not repeat it. Your work is to charge home at the heart and conscience. Fire
into the very centre of the foe. Aim at effect. "Oh! oh!" say you, "I thought we
ought never to do that." No, not in the perverted acceptation of the term; but,
in the right sense, aim at effect,–effect upon the conscience and upon the
heart.

Some preachers remind me of the famous Chinese jugglers, who not long ago were
everywhere advertised. One of these stood against a wall. and the other threw
knives at him. One knife would be driven into the board just above his head, and
another close by his ear, while under his armpit and between his fingers quite a
number of deadly weapons were bristling. Wonderful art to be able to throw to a
hair's breadth and never strike! How many among us have a marvellous skill in
missing! "Be not afraid," says the preacher, "I am never personal. I never give
home-thrusts." Stand quite still, my friend! Open your arms! Spread out your
fingers! Your minister has practised a very long while, and he knows how to
avoid troubling you in the least with truth too severely personal. Brethren,
cultivate that art if you desire to be damned, and wish your hearers also to be
lost; but if you want to be the means of saving both yourselves and them that
hear you, cry to your Lord for faithfulness, practicalness, real heart-moving
power. Never play at preaching nor beat about the bush; get at it, and always
mean business. Plutarch tells us of two men at Athens who were nominated for a
public office. One of them was famous for his oratory; and to gain the election,
he gave a description of what he could and would do if the citizens would choose
him. He would have charmed them with his fine promises, but they knew him too
well. His rival was a man of few words, and simply said, "All that this
gentleman has said, I mean to do." Now, be ye of that kind, not speakers of the
Word only, but doers also. Have you not heard scores of sermons about the
gospel, and about what the gospel is to do? Is it not a grand thing, at a public
meeting, to give a glorious description of what the gospel has accomplished, and
what it will accomplish, though you have contributed nothing to the grand
result? But of what avail is it to preach about the gospel? Let us preach the
gospel itself. Hope not to alarm the foe by a description of a Krupp-gun; but
wheel up your artillery, and open fire. Do not be content with describing
conviction of sin; but labour, in the power of the Spirit, to produce conviction
at once. Do not satisfy yourself by picturing the peace which follows upon
believing; but preach the truth which men are to believe, so that they may
actually obtain the peace which you describe. We want more of what I call the
"doing" preaching, and less of the "talking" preaching. Set yourselves steadily
to labour with men even to an agony. Show them their sin; set it out before
them, and say, "Sinners, is not this sin? Are you so blind that you cannot see
it? If you cannot see it, I will mourn your blindness, and pray the ever-blessed
Spirit to open your eyes. And, sinners, do you not see Christ? I have seen Him!
It was the most blessed sight I ever beheld, for His wounds are my healing, and
His death is my life. I have nothing to show you but Christ my Master; but a
look at Him will save you. I will pray the Holy Spirit to illuminate you; but if
you do not understand, it shall be the fault of your mind, and not of my
language." We have heard sermons preached, in which the minister prayed God to
save souls; but, unless He had departed from His usual laws of procedure, it was
not possible even for the Almighty God to use such discourses for any such
purpose, for they have consisted of mere trifling with words, or an exposition
of some minute point of opinion, or a philosophizing away of the mind of the
Spirit. Pray the Lord to save your hearers, and then drive at them as though you
could save them yourself. Trust in God, and then employ such logical arguments
as may convince the judgment, and such pathetic appeals as may touch the heart,
so that, if effects depend upon causes, you may see them produced, God's hand
being with you.

I need scarcely add to you, brethren, that we must be more and more simple and
clear in the preaching of the gospel. I think we are pretty clear and plain
already; but, sometimes, young men are fascinated by some famous preacher whose
style is grandiose, sublime, or involved. They see the thing done very
splendidly, and as they look on, they marvel, and by degrees they think they
will try that style, too; and so they put on the seven-league boots, large
enough for them to live in, and the result is ridiculous, nay, worse than that,
it is spiritually useless. When a man tries to do the magnificent, with
elaborate sentences, and pompous diction, and grandeur of manner, it must and
will come to nought. There is also a tendency, among some young gentlemen, to go
off into excessive quotation of poetry. There are superfine young men who
probably were born with a rose between their lips, and with a nightingale
singing above their bed when first their infant cries were heard, and they seem
to be consecrated to the sublime and beautiful. Every breeze wafts to them from
the mountains of Araby the sweet odors of poetic thought. It was concerning a
man of this school that Samuel Butler wrote,–

"For rhetoric, he could not ope His mouth, but out there flew a trope." That
style of speaking is very fine, brethren; but do not you be beguiled by it. As
much as ever you can, avoid all artificial oratory, or what simpletons nowadays
mistake for eloquence. The word is shamefully misused; but, in the common
acceptation of the term, the most detestable thing is eloquence. Speak from your
heart, and never mind about eloquence. Do not speak after the manner of the
orator; speak as a lover of souls, and then you will have real eloquence. The
oratory which allies itself with the dancing-master, and practises before a
looking-glass, and is fond of classical quotations, and obscure verses from
unknown poets, is for ever to be abhorred by you. Perishing sinners do not want
your poetry, they want Christ. If you are poetical, ride on the back of your
poetry, but do not let it ride you. What you have to do is to be the means of
saving souls, and look you well to that. If soldiers can win a battle and sing
sweetly at the same time, by all means let them sing; but if it so happens that,
while regarding the harmonies, they miss a cut at their enemies, let the singing
come to an end at once. There, young warrior, give over your crochets and
quavers, and vault into your saddle! Regard your pulpit as your steed, and dash
into the battle like Khaled of old, smiting right and left with dauntless
valour; and when you come back, you will have more honour from your Master than
he will who stayed at home to arrange the plumes of his helmet, and then at
length rode out bedizened to admiration, only to come home like that inglorious
hero of whom the poet sings,–

"The King of France with forty thousand men.

Went up a hill, and so came down agen."

I must hasten on to notice that, if we are to make the gospel meet the evils of
the time, we must be quite sure to exemplify it in our lives when out of the
pulpit. I thank God I know, in the case of numbers of brethren here, that the
gospel which they preach is illustrated in their lives by their self-denials and
self-sacrifices. It charms me when I hear a brother say, "I left my position to
go to one where my income would be twenty pounds a year less, for I felt that
there was a wider sphere of usefulness before me, and that I should not be
building on another man's foundation, but conquering new territory for Christ."
I glory in God's grace as shown in many of you, because of your zeal, your
endurance of poverty, and your faith in God. The Lord will bless you. It
delights my soul to think that the spirit of the apostles and martyrs is in many
of you. You make sacrifices for Christ, and say nothing about them, content to
do grandly though none proclaim it. Go on, my brethren, in the Name of the Lord.
I hope you will not have to suffer more than needs be; but where there is a
needs be, take you the suffering joyfully. If we cannot conquer without the loss
of a few men, do not let us hesitate for a moment. If we cannot take this
Malakoff without filling the trench with dead bodies, let us leap in. Let us
never shrink from poverty, rebuke, or hard labour; but determine that the old
flag shall be carried to the top of the fortress, and, in the Name of the Lord
Jesus Christ, error shall be trodden under foot as straw is trodden for the
dunghill. It is a cause worthy of your utmost zeal; if you could spill your
blood in a thousand martyrdoms a day, the cause deserves it. It is the cause of
God, the cause of Christ, the cause of humanity. Preach the gospel, brethren,
preach it all, and preach it with the Holy Ghost sent down from Heaven, and you
shall yet be the means of helping to save this perishing world; but may God give
you grace to live in the spirit of the gospel, or else you will surely fail.

I am afraid that there are some ministers who get into a pulpit, intending to
stick there. There is no moving them, and they never move the people. It is
sometimes remarked to me, "Some of your men move about a good deal." "Yes," I
reply, "many shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall be increased." I like the
self-sacrifice of a man who feels that he can move, and will move when he can do
more good elsewhere. Never move or stay for selfish reasons, but hold yourself
at your great Captain's beck and call. An old Scotch minister, as he was riding
along, saw, according to his own description, something coming which greatly
alarmed him. It was a gipsy riding aloft upon an ass which he had loaded high
with faggots. The beast, which the minister was riding, was alarmed as well as
its rider, set its feet down very firmly, and put its ears back, after the
manner of amiable horses! "And," said the minister in describing it, "I prepared
myself for a fall, so that I fell somewhat more easily." "But," said a friend,
"I should have got off." That idea had never crossed the worthy man's mind. So
it is with some ministers, they prepare themselves to be dismissed by their
people, but never propose to remove of their own will. It is within my knowledge
that a brother, not of our Conference, said to his people, when they were in a
most earnest manner endeavoring to get rid of him, "It was the Spirit of God
that brought me here, and I shall never go till the Spirit of God leads me to go
away, and that will be a very long while." The last sentence cast suspicion on
all that preceded it, for, surely, he could not foretell what the mind of the
Spirit might be. Stay or move, brethren; go to Africa, or America, or Australia,
or flit from. John O' Groat's house to the Land's End, only do accomplish your
mission, and glorify God. Be holy, be gracious, be prayerful, be disinterested,
be like the Lord Jesus; thus only will your lives be consistent with the gospel
you are called to preach.

One thing more, and it is this. Let us, dear brethren, try to get saturated with
the gospel. I always find that I can preach best when I can manage to lie a-soak
in my text. I like to get a text, and find out its meaning and bearings, and so
on; and then, after I have bathed in it, I delight to lie down in it, and let it
soak into me. It softens me, or hardens me, or does whatever it ought to do to
me, and then I can talk about it. You need not be very particular about the
words and phrases if the spirit of the text has filled you; thoughts will leap
out, and find raiment for themselves. Become saturated with spices, and you will
smell of them; a sweet perfume will distil from you, and spread itself in every
direction;–we call it unction. Do you not love to listen to a brother who abides
in fellowship with the Lord Jesus? Even a few minutes with such a man is
refreshing, for, like his Master, his paths drop fatness. Dwell in the truth,
and let the truth dwell in you. Be baptized into its spirit and influence, that
you may impart thereof to others. If you do not believe the gospel, do not
preach it, for you lack an essential qualification; but even if you do believe
it, do not preach it until you have taken it up into yourself as the wick takes
up the oil. So only can you be a burning and a shining light. Personally, to me,
the gospel is something more than a matter of faith; it has so mingled with my
being as to be a part of my consciousness, an integral part of my mind, never to
be removed from me. Faith in the old orthodox creed is not a matter of choice
with me now. I am frequently told that I ought to examine at length the various
new views which are so continually presented. I decline the invitation; I can
smell them, and that satisfies me. I perceive in them nothing which glorifies
God or magnifies Christ, but much that puffs up human nature, and I protest that
the smell is enough for me.

"Should all the forms that men devise

Assault my faith with treacherous art,

I'd call them vanity and lies,

And bind the gospel to my heart."

I hope the truths of the gospel have become our life; experience has
incorporated them with our being. Be laid low with pain, and nothing will then
suffice you but gracious realities. Bind philosophy around an aching heart, and
see if it will relieve the agony. Take a draught of modern thought, and see if
it will cure despair. Go to death-beds, where men are looking into eternity, and
see if the principles of the sceptical school can help the sick to die in
triumph.

Brothers, I beseech you keep to the old gospel, and let your souls be filled
with it, and then may you be set on fire with it! When the wick is saturated,
let the flame be applied. Fire from Heaven is still the necessity of the age.
They call it "go", and there is nothing which goes like it; for when fire once
starts upon a vast prairie or forest, all that is dry and withered must
disappear before its terrible advance. May God Himself, who is a consuming fire,
ever burn in you as in the bush at Horeb! All other things being equal, that man
will do most who has most of the Divine fire. That subtle, mysterious element
called fire,–who knoweth what it is? It is a force inconceivably mighty. Perhaps
it is the motive force of all the forces, for light and heat from the sun are
the soul of power. Certainly fire, as it is in God, and comes upon His servants,
is power omnipotent. The consecrated flame will, perhaps, consume you, burning
up the bodily health with too great ardour of soul, even as a sharp sword wears
away the. scabbard; but what of that? The zeal of God's house ate up our Master,
and it is but a small matter that it should also consume His servants. If, by
excessive labour, we die before reaching the average age of man, worn out in the
Master's service, then, glory be to God, we shall have so much less of earth and
so much more of Heaven! And suppose we should be abused, misrepresented, and
slandered for Christ's sake, then glory be to God that we had a reputation to
lose for His sake, and blessed be our Lord who counted us worthy to lose it! Be
on fire within yourselves with perfect consecration to God, and then you will
blaze in the pulpit.

There are the evils, brethren. I have tried to set them forth; you will not
forget them. But we have, only one remedy for them; preach Jesus Christ, and let
us do it more and more. By the roadside, in the little room, in the theatre,
anywhere, everywhere, let us preach Christ. Write books if you like, and do
anything else within your power; but whatever else you cannot do, preach Christ.
If you do not always visit your people (though I pray God you may not be
blameworthy there), yet be sure to preach the gospel. The devil cannot endure
gospel preaching; nothing worries him so much as preaching. The Pope cannot bear
it; nothing makes him so ill as preaching. Preaching is our great weapon, so use
it perpetually. Preaching is the Lord's battering-ram, wherewith the walls of
old Babylon are being shaken to their foundations. Work on with it, brothers,
work on. Preach, preach, preach, preach, preach, preach, till you can preach no
more, and then go above to sing the praises of God in Heaven, and to make known
to the angels the wonders of redeeming love.


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  CHAPTER 84: 05. “A NEW DEPARTURE”
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Chapter 5—"A New Departure"

BELOVED fellow-servants of Christ, our work requires us to be in the best
possible condition of heart. When we are at our best, we are feeble enough; we
would not, therefore, fall below our highest point. As instruments, we owe all
our power for usefulness to the Divine hand; but, since tools should always be
kept in order, we would have our spirit free from rust, and our mind sharp of
point and keen of edge to answer at once to the Master's will. It is because I
fear we do not always keep up to the mark that the subject for this morning's
address shall be "A New Departure," or, in other words, a renewal, a revival, a
starting afresh, a return to our first love, even the love of our espousals,
when first our soul was wedded to our Redeemer's work. The subject is
exceedingly needful to us all, because the process of running down is such a
very easy one. Upon that topic, let me speak for a few minutes. To run down,
requires no care or effort: it can be accomplished without a wish; it can come
to pass, in a measure, in opposition to our wish; we can decline and decay
without so much as being conscious of it, and all the more easily because we
fancy that we are rich and increased in goods. By a law which asks no help from
us, we gravitate to a lower level. Do not wind up the weights, and the wheels
will soon cease to move, and the old clock on the stairs will remain motionless,
useless, silent, dead, like a coffin set on end. To keep a farm in good order,
needs constant labour and watchfulness; but to let the land get out of heart
till it would starve a lark, is a very simple matter, which can be accomplished
by any sluggard; simply let it alone, or take crop after crop from it, and give
it neither manure nor rest, and you will change fruitful fields into barrenness,
and turn a garden into a desert. It is just so with ourselves. Only do not wind
up your soul with daily prayer, and you will soon run down; only neglect the
culture of the heart, and thorns and briers will grow uninvited. Neglect your
inner life, and your whole being will. deteriorate.

I do not know, my brethren, that we can expect to see energy continuous at its
full in any one of us. I suspect that he who burns like a seraph knows moments
in which the flame somewhat abates. As the sun itself is not at all times alike
powerful, so the man who, like the shining light, shineth more and more unto the
perfect day, is not uniformly bright, nor always at his noon. Nature does not
hold the sea for ever at flood; ebbs intervene, and the ocean pauses a while ere
it returns again to the fulness of its strength. The vegetable world has its
winter, and enjoys a long sleep beneath its bed of snow. It is not wasted time,
that ebb or that winter; flood and summer owe much to ebb and frost. I suspect
that, because we are in affinity with nature, we, too, shall have our changes,
and shall not abide at one elevation. No man's life is all climax. Let us not
despond if, just now, our spirit is at a low ebb; the tide of life will roll up
as before, and even reach a higher point. When we stand leafless and apparently
lifeless, our soul having become like a tree in winter, let us not dream that
the axe will cut us down, for our substance is in us though we have lost our
leaves, and before long the time of the singing of birds will come, we shall
feel the genial warmth of returning spring, and our lives shall again be covered
with blossoms, and laden with fruit.

It will not be wonderful if there should be lulls and pauses in our spiritual
work, for we see the like in the affairs of men. The most eager after worldly
objects, who can by no means be accused of a want of earnestness in their
endeavours, are yet conscious that, by a sort of law, dull times will come,
wherein business necessarily flags. It is not the tradesman's fault that,
sometimes, trade must be pushed, and that after pushing it remains as dull as
ever. It seems to be the rule that there should be years of great prosperity,
and then years of decline; the lean kine still devour the fat kine. If men were
not what they are, there might be a perpetuity of equable progress, but it is
evident that we have not reached that point yet. In religious affairs, history
shows us that churches have their palmy days, and then again their times of
drought. The Universal Church has been thus circumstanced; it has had its
Pentecosts, its Reformations, its revivals; and between these there have been
sorrowful pauses, in which there was much more cause for lamentation than for
rejoicing, and the Miserere was more suitable than the Hallelujah. I should not,
therefore, wish any brother to condemn himself if he is not conscious just now
of possessing all the vivacity of his youth.–he may find it return before our
meetings close. I would have the husbandman long for spring, and yet not despair
because of the present cold; so would I have a man lament every degree of
decline, and yet not despond. If any man walk in darkness, and see no light, let
him trust in God, and look to Him for brighter days.

Still, taking all this into account, and allowing all margin and discount, I
fear that many of us do not maintain our proper elevation, but sink below par.
Many things tend that way, and it may do us good to think of them. A degree of
running down in spirit may be purely physical, and arise out of the evaporation
of our youthful vigour. Some of you enjoy all the force of your early manhood;
you are fleet of foot as the roes of the field, and swift of movement as birds
on the wing; but others of us wear a tinge of grey in our locks, and middle life
has sobered us. Our eye has not yet waxed dim, nor has our natural force abated;
but yet the flash and flame of our youth have departed, and from the style of
our speech and the manner of our action men miss that morning dew which was the
glory of life's young hours. Older men are apt to ridicule young fellows for
being too zealous; let them not retaliate, but cautiously abstain from ever
charging the elder brethren with excess of fervour. Surely, malice itself would
not dare to invent such a libel. For my own part, I would have remained a young
man if I could, for I fear I am by no means improved by keeping. Oh, that I
could again possess the elasticity of spirit, the dash, the courage, the
hopefulness of days gone by! My days of flying are changed to those of running,
and my running is toning down to a yet steadier pace. It is somewhat cheering
that the Scriptures seem to indicate that this is progress, for such is the
order which it prescribes for saints: "They shall mount up with wings as
eagles;" away they go, out of sight. In your first sermons,–how you mounted up!
Your first evangelistic efforts,–what flights they were! After that, you
slackened and yet improved your pace; but it grew more steady, and perhaps more
slow, as it is written: "They shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk,
and not faint." God grant that we may not faint; and if our running days are
over, may we walk with God as Enoch did, till the Lord shall take us home!

Another cause which frequently conduces to the abatement of vigour is the
possible cessation of early success. I do not mean that it is always so; but,
usually, when a man goes to a new field, there are many unreaped portions, and
he gathers a large harvest, which he does not find afterwards because there is
less to reap. If you have a narrow pond, you cannot keep on catching as many
fish as you did at first, because there are not so many fish remaining. In
London, we are, as it were, in an ocean, and we may spread our nets as often as
we please; but in a small town or village, a man may soon have done all his
direct converting work if the Lord greatly blesses him; and if, after a time,
more souls are not saved, it may be because few unconverted persons attend his
ministry. God may have given the brother all those whom He intended to bless by
him in that place, and it may be wise for him to fish in other waters. I have
read of a lighthouse-keeper who puts a rope round the lighthouse, and then to
this cord he attaches a number of lines and hooks. These are all under water at
high tide, and at favourable times the fish bite, and when the tide goes down,
the lighthouse is festooned with fish of all kinds; there they hang, and the
successful fisherman has nothing to do but to gather the spoils. Thus it was
with us at first; we baited our hooks, and we drew in the fish without stint.
But perhaps, later on, the lighthouse-keeper peers out from his tower, and he
cannot see, for the fog is dense, the storm-cloud has settled down around his
light, and the wind rages furiously; he is obliged to keep every door and window
closed, or he could not live, and then he thinks it hard to be a
lighthouse-keeper, and wishes himself ashore. We also are, at times, in a
similar condition. We are asked, "Watchman! what of the night?" And the answer
is, "No morning cometh, but the night thickens, and the darkness grows denser."
We do not every day draw the net to land full of great fishes, but we experience
dreary intervals of fruitless toil, and then it is no wonder that a man's spirit
faints within him. The natural wear and tear of an active life also tend to our
running down. Some of our people think that we have little or nothing to do but
to stand in the pulpit, and pour out a flood of words two or three times a week;
but they ought to know that, if we did not spend much time in diligent study,
they would get poverty-stricken sermons. I have heard of a brother who trusts in
the Lord, and does not study; but I have also heard that his people do not trust
in him; in fact, I am informed that they wish him to go elsewhere with his
inspired discourses, for they say that, when he did study, his talk was poor
enough, but now that he gives them that which comes first to his lips, it is
altogether unbearable. If any man will preach as he should preach, his work will
take more out of him than any other labour under heaven. If you and I attend to
our work and calling, even among a few people, it will certainly produce a
friction of soul and a wear of heart which will tell upon the strongest. I speak
as one who knows by experience what it is to be utterly exhausted in the
Master's service. No matter how willing we may be in spirit, the flesh is weak;
and He who made a tender apology for His sleeping servants in the garden knows
our frame, and remembers that we are dust. We need that the Master should say to
us, every now and then, "Come ye yourselves apart into a desert place, and rest
a while;" and He does say so, for He is not a hard taskmaster, and whoever may
use the lash, and cause the weary steed to die in harness, our gentle Lord doth
not so.

Besides this, we are very apt to run down through our duty becoming routine
work, by reason of its monotony. Unless we are careful, we shall be likely to
say to ourselves, "Monday evening here again, I must give an address at the
prayer-meeting. Thursday evening, and I have to preach, although I have not yet
a topic! Sunday morning, Sunday evening; I have to preach again! Yes, preach
again! Then there are all those extra engagements; it is for ever preach,
preach, preach! I am always preaching. What a weariness it is!" Preaching ought
to be a joy, and yet it may become a task. Constant preaching should be constant
enjoyment, and yet, when the brain is tired, pleasure flies. Like the sick boy
in the prophet's day, we are ready to cry, "My head! my head!" We ask, "How can
we keep up our freshness?" It is hard to produce so much with such scant leisure
for reading; it is almost as bad as making bricks without straw. Nothing can
maintain us in the freshness of our beginnings but the daily anointing of the
Spirit.

I do not wonder that some brethren run down through want of association with
others of warm heart and of kindred spirit. I will give you another lighthouse
illustration; a gentleman, who called to see the keepers of a lone light, said
to one of them, "I suppose, after all, you fellows are quite happy in this
tower?" "We might: be happy," replied the man, "if we had a chat with one
another; but my mate and I have not exchanged a word with each other for a
month." If you are banished to a country place, where you have no superior or
even equal mind to converse with, no intellectual or spiritual friend near at
hand, I can feel for you. "Iron sharpeneth iron; so a man sharpeneth the
countenance of his friend," and when that sharpening is missed, it is no marvel
that the mind grows dull. We cannot live alone, brethren, and yet a dreadful
solitude as to our higher cares is one of our sorest trials. Oh, for a twin
spirit to converse with! The worst of it is that, if we have few to refresh us
with their conversation, we have many to vex us with their chatter; and when we
would fain be uplifted to noble themes, we find ourselves dragged down by the
dreary gossip of a hamlet. What wonder if, with such surroundings, we lose
force, and run down!

Yet, dear brethren, none of these things furnish us with an excuse for falling
into a low state, and it may possibly be true that our mental decline is the
result of our weak spiritual condition. It may be that we have left our first
love, that we have wandered away from the simplicity of our faith, that we have
backslidden in heart, and grieved the Holy Spirit, so that our God walks
contrary to us because we walk contrary to Him. Perhaps the rain is withheld
because prayer has been restrained, and the heavenly wind has ceased to blow
because we have been too indolent to spread the sail. Has there been no unbelief
to hinder the blessing? We often talk of unbelief as if it were an affliction to
be pitied instead of a crime to be condemned. For us to give the lie to Him who
has unveiled the secrets of His heart to us, and almost, I was about to say,
gone out of His way to bless us in an extraordinary and unusual manner, must
pain the great Father's heart. Perhaps we feel less love to Jesus than we once
did, less zeal in doing His work, and less anguish for the souls of others; if
so, it is no wonder that we enjoy less of the presence of God, and are soon cast
down. If the root is not strong, how can the branches flourish? May not
self-indulgence have mixed with unbelief? Have we made provision for the flesh?
Have we lost the intimacy with Jesus which we once enjoyed? Have we violated the
consecration with which we started? If so, the blue mould will settle on the
unsound place. Selfishness will mar our strength, and destroy our usefulness. I
will not suppose that this is the case with any of you; or, at least, I will
only suppose it, and let it remain a supposition.

It is a dreadful fact that, sometimes, these runnings down end in a catastrophe.
After secret backsliding comes a sin which is publicly reported, and men cry,
"Shame!" Yet it is not that one sin, but the general state of the man's heart
which is the saddest part of it. No man becomes bad all at once. True, the
single lightning flash slew its victim, but the bolt had not fallen if there had
been no previous gathering of the elements into the condition of storm. The
overt scandal is only the development of what was in the man,–the root of the
evil lies deeper still. When we hear of a man who has mined his character by a
surprising act of folly, we may surmise, as a rule, that this mischief was but
one sulphurous jet from a soil charged with volcanic fire; or, to change the
figure, one roaring lion from a den of wild beasts. As you would, on your bended
knees, cry day and night that no moral catastrophe may occur to you, beware of
the sin which leads to it, beware of the backsliding which culminates in it; for
if we have not the cause, the effect will not follow. The Lord will preserve us
if, day by day, we cry unto Him to cleanse our way.

There is an evil under the sun which is as terrible as an open
catastrophe,–indeed, it works greater ill to the church in the long run,–and
that is, when a man's ministry is eaten through and through with spiritual dry
rot.

I heard an old Indian describe the way in which furniture may be devoured by the
white ants. The ants will come into the house, and eat up everything; and yet,
to all appearance, nothing is touched. The bookcases stand just where they did,
and the trunks and everything else remain exactly as they were; at least, it is
so to the eye; but directly they are touched, they all crumble to pieces, for
the ants have eaten the substance out of them. In the same way, some men still
remain in the ministry, and yet the soul of their ministry has gone. They have a
name to live, yet they are dead: what can be worse than this condition? One
might almost sooner have an explosion, and have done with it, than see men
continuing to maintain the form of religion after vital godliness has gone,
scattering death all around them, and yet maintaining what is called a
respectable position. God save us from this last as much as from that first! If
I am a rotten bough, let me be cut off; but to hang upon the tree, all verdant
with parasitical lichen and moss, is deplorable. A respectable ministry, devoid
of spiritual life, is little better than respectable damnation, from which may
God deliver us! When men drift into this condition, they generally adopt some
expedient to hide it. Conscience suggests that there is something or other
wrong, and the deceitful heart labours to conceal or palliate this fact. Some do
this by amusing themselves with hobbies instead of preaching the gospel. They
cannot do the Lord's work, so they try to do their own. They have not honesty
enough to confess that they have lost gospel power, so they ride a hobby; and it
is a very mild form of evil when they raise some side issue, which has no other
fault about it than that it diverts them from the main point. Many are these
playthings; I have no time to mention more than one.

I have known certain brethren give themselves solely to expound prophecy. Now, a
man full of the life of God may expound prophecy as much as he likes; but there
are some who, having lost their love of the gospel, try to win back what little
popularity they once had by taking up with guesses at the future. They may be
quite, sure that, if they cannot profit men by bringing them to the manger and
the cross, they will make a complete failure of it if they handle the seals and
the vials. Did you ever notice, in Calvin's Commentaries, that there is no
exposition of the Book of Revelation? Why not? He said, "I have not expounded
that Book because I do not understand it." When I hear a man say, "I have found
much in Matthew which does not belong to the Church, I have outgrown much of the
Romans and Galatians, and I cannot enjoy the Psalms, for they do not rise to the
perfection of my experience; I want something more elevated and spiritual, more
abstruse and wonderful;" I conclude that this brother is spinning his last hank,
and spending his last pennyworth of sense.

I have been amused by observing the manner in which speculators have been taken
in when they have left the old ship of the gospel to become prophets. The beast
of the Revelation was reported to be Napoleon I., and then the creature suddenly
reappeared in his nephew, Napoleon III. By-and-by, the deadly wound was healed,
and the Prince Imperial wore the dreadful honours of the prophetic book; but the
prince is now dead, and it will be needful for the seers to invent a new theory.
There is no fear but what they will do it before long; and, meanwhile, "our
Israelitish origin" will do to fill up the time. In the story of Sindbad the
Sailor, it is said that, as they sailed along, they saw an island, and at the
sight thereof they greatly rejoiced. The crew left the ship, and feasted on the
island, and were going to take possession of it in the name of the king, when
suddenly it began to quiver and to plunge, and finally it went down altogether,
for it was a whale's back, and not an island at all! I have known brethren
disport themselves upon the back of some novel speculation, when suddenly the
facts of history have gone against them, and the whole thing has gone down very
like a whale. I have mentioned one of the more harmless hobbies, but some have
taken to fancies which have bred greater mischief. Speculation is an index of
the spiritual poverty of the man who surrenders himself to it. His flour has all
been used, so he tries plaster of Paris; he has no more gold or silver, so he
coins the baser metals. He cannot prophesy after the measure of faith, so he
exercises his immeasurable imagination. His own experience does not serve him
with topics for his ministry, and therefore he takes airy flights into regions
of which he knows nothing.

Far worse is it when a man so runs down in heart and spirit that he has no
principles left, and believes nothing at all. He is a Baptist, but he would very
cheerfully minister to a Paedo-baptist church. He is a Calvinist, but he is not
narrow, and will promise to offend no one. He holds certain views, but "a view
to the pastorate" is the chief of them, and in that view the salary is the
charm. He boasts of possessing large-heartedness, and receptivity of spirit, and
all that sort of thing. He has dry rot in his soul! That is the truth of the
case, and he tries to cover it up with this nonsense! Such persons remind me of
an advertisement of a school in France; its concluding paragraph was to this
effect: "The pupils will be taught any religion which may be selected by their
parents." It is abominable when ministers as good as say that any religion will
be taught which may be selected by the deacons. "Pray inform me whether the
church likes a hightoned Calvinism, or prefers Arminianism." It is with such as
it was with the showman who exhibited the battle of Waterloo, and in answer to
the question, "Which is Wellington, and which is Napoleon?" replied, "Whichever
you please, my little dears; you pays your money, and you takes your choice."
These broad-churchmen are prepared to supply any article for which there is a
demand. This is a terrible condition of things, but men do not generally rest
there; in the lowest depth, there is still a lower deep. When the heart has got
out of order, and the spiritual life has run down, men soon fall into actual
doctrinal error, not so much because their head is wrong, for many of them have
not erred very much there, but because their heart is in an ill condition. We
should never have known that some men had brains at all if they had not addled
them. Such departers from the faith usually fall by little and little. They
begin by saying very little concerning grace. They serve out homoeopathic doses
of gospel: it is marvellous what a very small globule of the gospel will save a
soul, and it is a great mercy that it is so, or few would be saved. These
snatches of gospel, and the preacher who gives them, remind us of the famous dog
of the Nile, of whom the ancients said that he was so afraid of the crocodiles
that he drank of the river in a great hurry, and was away from it directly.
These intellectual gentry are so afraid of the critical crocodiles that the
moment they touch the living water of the gospel they are away again. Their
doubts are stronger than their beliefs. The worst of it is that they not only
give us very little gospel, but they give us much that is not the gospel. In
this they are like mosquitoes, of whom I have often said that I do not mind
their taking a little of my blood, but it is the poison which they put into me
which is my great cause of quarrel with them. That a man should rob me of the
gospel, is bad enough; but that he should impregnate me with his poisonous
doctrine, is intolerable. When men lose all love to the gospel, they try to make
up for the loss of its attractions by sparkling inventions of their own. They
imitate life by the artificial flash of culture, reminding me of the saline
crystals which cover the salt deserts. There is a lifeless plain, in the heart
of Persia, so sterile and accursed that even saline plants do not thrive; "but
the salt itself, as if in bitter mockery, fashions its crystals in the form of
stems and stalks, and covers the steppe with a carpet of unique vegetation,
glittering and glistening like an enchanted prairie in the dazzling light of the
Eastern sun." Woe be unto the poor congregations who behold this substitute for
life, this saline efflorescence of dainty errors and fascinating inventions!
Alas, whatever a man may now propound, he will find learned personages to
support him in it! Fontenelle used to say that, if he could only get six
philosophers to write in its favour, people could be made to believe that the
sun is not the source of light and heat; and I think there is a great deal of
truth in the remark. We are told, "Well, he is a very learned man, he is a
Fellow of Brazenface College, and he has written a book in which he upsets the
old dogmas." If a learned man writes any nonsense, of course it will have a run;
and there is no opinion so insane but, if it has the patronage of so-called
scientific men, it will be believed in certain quarters. I have myself watched
the labours of novelists in theology, and have tried to get what I could out of
their books, but I have been struck with the remarkably poor results of their
lucubrations. I have stood by the shore at Mentone, and seen fishermen with
miles of line, and a vast net buoyed up by great tubs, visible far out at sea. A
dozen men are hauling at one rope, and as many more are pulling in another,
drawing this great net to land. Pull away! Ahoy! Pull away at the ropes, and
bring the fish to land. I believe that, on one occasion, I did see them produce
a fish not so long as my little finger, but that was a rather successful
occasion! Our German friends have diligently made vast nets with which they have
enclosed the sea of thought: and upon drawing them out, what a noise there has
been, and what a sensation, and what at trembling and a fainting among the old
ladies of Christendom; but when we have seen their mighty catch, it has not been
the tenth part of a sardine! The next philosopher who came along, has fitted on
his spectacles, with due gravity, after wiping them most solemnly, and then he
has put his critical fork into this small fish, and, holding it up to be admired
of all, he. has discoursed upon its species, till another philosopher equally
wise has declared that it was rotten, and pitched it back into the deeps. This
kind of game is continually going on, and many young ministers have been fools
enough to give up the apostolic fishery to join in this stupid waste of mental
effort. What have they ever done, these doubters, since the world began? What
will they do? What can they do? All that they can do now is to wriggle into our
churches, and hiss from pulpits which were once filled by the orthodox. They
cannot build places of worship of their own,–they could not build a mousetrap;
as a rule, there is not power enough in their teaching to gather a congregation,
or to keep one when it is gathered. All the vitality, force, and energy they
possess are spent, cuckoo-like, in laying their eggs in the nests which we take
the trouble to fashion, for they cannot build their own.

God forbid that we should ever try to cover our decline of heart by the
invention of our self-conceit! I hope that, when our ministry begins to lose
power, we shall be driven to our knees, and to our God, that He may quicken us
again by His good Spirit.

Perhaps I have spoken at too great length upon the former part of my subject; I
now propose to dwell upon the necessity of renewing grace. If any of us have
come down from the heights, it is time that we returned to them again. If we
have fallen from our first love, it is most needful that we should at once renew
the ardour of our youth. If we have gone down even in a small degree, it behoves
us to ask for help to get back what we have lost. This is necessary on account
of our own happiness; for I appeal to any brother who declines in heart, and
grows weak in faith, and doubtful in spirit, whether he is not unhappy. Do you
not derive the purest joy and the most solid satisfaction from walking with God?
Indeed, those who are "called to be saints" are doomed to be unhappy apart from
Christ. It is a doom which destiny has fixed upon you that, if you depart from
Christ, you must depart into hell; for it is hell for you to depart from Christ.
If, therefore, in any measure, you have roamed away from Christ, mind that you
fly home again to Him at once. Last year, when sojourning in the South of
France, I went for a mountain ride to the foot of Castiglione, an old,
half-deserted town. It was clear and bright at the time, and while the friends
who were with me went up the hill to survey the place, I remained a little lower
down. I soon observed that the clouds were coming from the other side of the
mountains, and in a few minutes I was in a fog, chilled to the bone. I could
just see Mentone under the bottom of the clouds, and I said to my man-servant,
"Get the horses in, for I must get down again into the sun at once." Soon, the
fog was all round me, and I hastened to descend until I reached the sunlight
again. You must feel like that, my brethren; if you are caught in a mist, and a
chill is upon you, you must hurry back to Christ. You may joyfully repose in
Him, and find every blessing and comfort surrounding you; but if you have
climbed into high notions, and entered upon the cold regions of speculation, you
must hasten down again. You must say of the old gospel," I can see the blessed
spot of my repose, and I will get back to it at once." This is wise advice for
those who are conscious of lost comfort through leaving the good old way.

We cannot afford, I am sure, to be in a state of running down, for we were never
too much alive. Our shortcomings, at our best, are quite sufficient to warn us
against what we should be if we were worse. I can imagine some men losing a part
of their courage, and yet remaining brave; but if any of mine were to evaporate,
I should be a coward indeed. There would have been power in Calvin even if half
the steadfastness of his mind had gone, for he was a man of mighty faith; but if
I were to lose any measure of my faith, I should be a sorry unbeliever, for I
have not a grain of faith to spare.

Dear brethren, have we ever reached our right condition as compared with our
early ideal of what we hoped to be? Do you recollect when you first entered the
College or the ministry? Do you remember what a high standard you set up for
yourself? You did well to fix the mark high; for, if you aim at the moon, you
will shoot higher than if you fired at a bush. You did well to have a high
standard, but you do not well to fall short of it; and, yet, who does not fall
short even of his own ideal? Do you not wish to hide your head when you contrast
yourself with your Lord? He saved others, and therefore could not save Himself;
but we are keen to guard ourselves and our reputations, and often act as if we
thought self-preservation the highest law of nature. Our Lord endured great
contradiction of sinners against Himself, while we are provoked if we are
thwarted in any degree. He loved His sheep, and followed them when they went
astray; but we have far too little pity even upon those who gather at our call.
We are far, far, far below the true glory of the Well-beloved, and even fall
short of our poor ideal of Him. Neither in private in His prayers, nor in public
in His life, or His ministry, or His teaching, do we approximate to Him so
nearly as we should; and yet, to fall short of likeness to Him, ought to make us
blush and weep. We cannot afford, therefore, to run down.

Indeed, if we do not compare ourselves with our Master, but only with our
brother-ministers (for certain of them have done right noble work for Jesus), we
shall come to the same conclusion. Some of our brethren have held on under
fearful discouragements, serving the Lord faithfully; others have won souls for
Christ, to whom the winning of one soul has cost more self-denial than the
winning of hundreds has cost certain of us. I could sit with delight at the feet
of such consecrated brethren as I am now thinking of, and look up to them, and
glorify God in them. Such have been found among men of inferior abilities,
slender powers, and small attainments; but how they have worked, and how they
have prayed, and how God has blessed them! It may be that, with ten times their
ability and opportunity, we have not done anything like as much as they have. Do
we not mourn over this? Can we afford to decline?

Beloved brethren, we cannot afford to remain in any state lower than the very
best; for, if so, our work will not be well done. Time was when we preached with
all our might. When we began to preach, what preaching it was for zeal and life!
In looking back, it must increase our self.-humiliation if we perceive that, in
our younger days, we were more real and intense than we are now. We preach much
better, so the critics say; and we know that there is more thought and more
accuracy in our sermons, and that we use better elocution than we did in our
young days; but where are the tears of our early ministry? Where is the
heartbreak of those first sermons in our first sphere? Where is the passion,
where is the self-annihilation that we often felt when we poured out our very
life with every syllable we spoke? Now, sometimes, we go into the pulpit
resolved that we will do as we did then, just as Samson went out to shake
himself as he had done aforetime. He had snapped the cords and bands before, and
he was going to do the same again; but the Lord had departed from him, and he
was weak as another man. Brethren, what if the Lord should depart from us? Alas
for us, and for our work!

Nothing can be done if the Holy Spirit be withdrawn; indeed, nothing truly good
will be attempted. I have marvelled at the way in which certain persons avoid
preaching the gospel when they profess to be doing it. They get a text which you
think must cut into the conscience, and they contrive to speak so as neither to
arouse the careless nor distress the self-confident. They play with the sword of
the Spirit as if they were mountebanks at a show, instead of thrusting the
two-edged sword into the hearts of men, as soldiers do in actual combat. The
Emperor Gallienus, when a man hurled a javelin many times at a bull without
hitting him, and the people hissed him, called the performer to his seat, and
placed a wreath on his head, saying, "You are most clever to be able to miss so
large a mark so many times." What shall we twine into a crown for those
ministers who never strike the heart, never convince men of sin, never drive a
Pharisee out of his own righteousness, never influence the guilty so that he
casts himself as a lost sinner at the feet of Jesus? He may expect one day to be
crowned with shame for such a crime. Meanwhile, twine the deadly nightshade
about his brows. Be it ours to be like the left-handed men of Benjamin who
"could sling stones at an hair breadth, and not miss." We cannot reach to this
unless the life of God be in us and abound. A man ought to take care of himself,
merely as a man, for the sake of himself and his household; but much more should
a man, who is a minister, take care of himself for the sake of those who are
committed to his charge. A captain, in the South Seas, was observed to go beyond
the usual point for turning into the harbour, taking a longer but a safer
course. On someone remarking to him that he was too careful, he replied, "I have
so many souls on board, I cannot afford to run any risk." How many souls there
are on board of some of our vessels! How many souls–ay, notwithstanding that the
doctrine is unfashionable, I repeat it,–how many souls, not of creatures which
will die out like cats and dogs, but of priceless, immortal beings, are
committed to our charge! Since, upon our ministry, under God, hang everlasting
things,–life and death, Heaven and hell,–what manner of persons ought we to be?
How careful we ought to be as to our inner health! How anxious to be always at
our very best! If I were a surgeon, and I had to operate upon a patient, I
should not like to touch either the knife or his flesh if I felt bilious, or if
my hand was quivering; I would not like to be in any but the calmest, coolest,
most forceful condition, at the moment in which the difference of a hair's
breadth might touch a vital chord, and end a precious life! God help all
soul-physicians to be always at their best!

I believe the headway of God's cause in the world depends upon our being in
prime condition. We are come to the kingdom for such a time as this. As much as
ever Simon Menno was raised up to preach believers' baptism in Holland, and keep
the lamp burning for God there, and as surely as ever, in our own land, such men
as Hansard Knollys, and Kiffin, and Keach, and the like, were bold to stand the
brunt of the battle for the Lord, so I believe that you are intended to be in
lineal succession defenders of the purest form of gospel truth. We have it in
charge to pass on to the next age the everlasting gospel which our venerable
sires have handed down to us. As Neander said, there, is a future for the
Baptists. There is a future for any church which has faithfully kept the
ordinances of God, and is resolved in all things to be obedient to its covenant
Head. We have neither prestige, nor wealth, nor the State at our back; but we
have something better than all these. When a Spartan was asked what were the
boundaries of his country, he replied, "The limits of Sparta are marked by the
points of our spears." The limit of our church is also determined by the points
of our spears; but our weapons are not carnal. Wherever we go, we preach Christ
crucified, and His word of solemn proclamation, "He that believeth and is
baptized shall be saved." The enquirer turned, and said to the Spartan, "You
have no walls to Sparta." "No," he replied, "the walls of Sparta are the breasts
of her sons." We have no defences for our churches, either in Acts of Parliament
or enforced creeds; but the regenerated hearts and consecrated spirits of men,
who resolve to live and die in the service of King Jesus, have hitherto
sufficed, in the hands of the Spirit, to preserve us from grievous heresy. I see
no beginning to this business, this battle of truth commenced so long ago; and I
see no end to it, except the coming of the Master and the eternal victory. Yet
some trembling persons say we ought to stop, and let the young men already in
College learn a trade, and forego the ministry, lest England should become
over-ministered; and they add that there is no use in preparing men for the
foreign fields, for the Missionary Society is in debt, and its expenses must be
curtailed. God bless the Missionary Society! But the condition of a Society is
not the limit of our personal endeavour; besides, the Society will soon throw
off its burden. If you, my brethren, are worthy of your calling, you will be
bravely independent, and not hang too much upon the help of others. Sparta could
not have been defended by a race of timid creatures armed with pointless spears,
neither can young men of timorous spirit do great things for God. You must be
braced to heroism, brethren, if you are to meet the demands of the hour. May God
make the feeblest among you as David, and the house of David as God! (Zechariah
12:8.)

I have a proposal to make before I come to my conclusion, and it is this: let
this be the time of renewal to each one of us. Let us each seek for a personal
revival by the Divine Spirit.

We shall see that it is a fit time if we take an outlook upon our own nation.
Politically, we have come back to a condition in which there will be a respect
for righteousness, justice, and truth, rather than for self-assertion, and
national gain, and conquest. We shall, I trust, no longer be steered by a false
idea of British interests, and the policy which comes of it; but by the great
principles of right, justice, and humanity. This is all I want to see: parties,
as such, are nothing to us; nor individual statesmen, except so far as they
represent right principles. We are for those who are on the side of justice,
peace, and love. And now, instead of lying still year after year, and making no
progress,–no laws amended, no home legislation attended to, but time wasted upon
glittering foreign adventures,–something will be done that is worth doing. At
this period, also, our schools are educating the people, and I thank God for
that. Though education will not save men, it may be a means to that end; for
when all our peasants can read their Bibles, we may surely hope that God will
bless His own Word. It will be a grand thing for all our agricultural laborers,
by going to the New Testament for themselves, to escape from receiving their
religion at second-hand. Godly people must take care to supply them with good
books, and so feed the new appetite with healthy food. All light is good, and
we, who most of all prize the light of revelation, are on the side of all kinds
of true light. God is raising up the people, and I think our time is come to
avail ourselves of their advance; and as our one business is to preach Jesus
Christ, the more we keep to our work the better, for true religion is the
strength of a nation, and the foundation of all right government.

Whatsoever things are honest, true, kind, humane, and moral, may reckon on our
aid. We are on the side of temperance, and therefore on the side of the
limitation of the abominable traffic which is ruining our country; and we are
opposed to all that licenses vice among men, or allows cruelty to animals. We
are up to the hilt advocates of peace, and we earnestly war against war. I wish
that Christian men would insist more and more on the unrighteousness of war,
believing that Christianity means no sword, no cannon, no bloodshed, and that,
if a nation is driven to fight in its own defence, Christianity stands by to
weep and to intervene as soon as possible, and not to join in the cruel shouts
which celebrate an enemy's slaughter. Let us always be on the side of right.
To-day, then, my brethren, I beg you to join with me in seeking renewal. Now is
the time for a man to buckle on his harness, and bestir himself.

Surely our holy fellowship at this happy hour should help us all to rise to a
higher level. The sight of many of our brethren is cheering and stimulating.
When I remember concerning some their holiness, their depth of piety, their
perseverance, I feel comforted in the belief that, if the Lord has strengthened
others, He has yet a blessing in reserve for us also. Let this Feast of
Tabernacles be the time for renewing our vows of consecration unto the Lord our
God.

Let us begin it with repentance for all our mistakes and shortcomings. Let each
one do this for himself. You remember how the ancient giant fought with
Hercules, and the hero could not overcome him, because every time he fell he
touched his mother earth, and received new strength. Let us, too, fall upon our
faces, that we may rise invigorated; let us go back to our first simple faith,
and recover our lost strength. Men who have been sore sick have cried, "Take me
back to my native air, and I shall soon be well. Among the buttercups and
daisies of the meadows, in which I used to play when I was a child, and near the
brook where I caught the minnows, I shall soon revive." Ah! it does our soul
good to get back to our days of child-like faith, when we sang,–

"Just as I am,–without one plea But that Thy blood was shed for me, And that
Thou bidd'st me come to Thee, O Lamb of God, I come." This will help you to
renew your youth: it seems an easy way, but it is the only way.

Next, let us renew our consecration. I do not invite any of you literally to
stain the door-post of the College with your blood, but I ask you to think upon
that Israelitish slave whose time had run out, but who chose to remain in
service because he loved his master and his master's children, and therefore he
put his ear against the post of the door, and they bored it through with an awl.
May the Lord bore the ear of each of us, that we may be His servants for ever!
We love our Master, do we not, brethren? We love our Master's work; and we love
our Master's servants and His children, and for His sake we will serve them all,
for better or worse, till death doth part us from this lower service. Oh, to get
back to the old moorings! I would like for us to preach our old sermons; I do
not mean the same sermons, but with the saute force as when we began to–

"Tell to sinners round, What a dear Saviour we had found."

People said, "That dear young man does not know very much, but he loves Jesus
Christ, and he talks about nothing else." I would like to preach again as I did
at first, only a great deal better. I intensely believed and meant every word I
spoke; I do so now, but doubts will arise now which never vexed me then. I would
like to be a child again before the Lord, and to keep so, for I am sure that
questions and doubts are a sad loss to any man.

Return, my brethren, to your earliest Bible-readings, when you were wont to let
the promise lie under your tongue as a dainty morsel. Ah! this Book, as I turn
it over, wakes up many a memory; its pages glow with a light which I cannot
describe, for they are set with stars which in my many hours of gloom have been
the light of my soul. I did not then read this divine volume to find a text, but
to hear my Lord speak to my own heart; I was not then as Martha, cumbered with
much serving, but as Lazarus, who sat at the table with Jesus.

God grant us also a revival of the first aims of our spiritual career! Then, we
thought nothing of pleasing men, but only aimed at pleasing God and winning
souls; we were rash enough to care for nothing but the fulfilment of our
mission; is it so now? We can preach now, can we not? We feel that we are
proficient in our art. It might be better if we did not feel quite so well
equipped. I find it better to go to the pulpit in prayerful weakness than in
self-reliant strength. When I groan out, "What a fool I am!" and come down,
after the sermon, ashamed of my poor attempt, I am sure it is better with me
than when I am pleased with my performance. Are any of us such babies as to feel
like that? What a sense of responsibility we had in our first services; do we
retain that solemnity of spirit? We then prayed about the choice of every hymn,
and the manner of reading the Scriptures; we did nothing carelessly, for a heavy
anxiety pressed upon us. I always read the Scripture carefully at home, and
tried to understand it before I read it to the people, and I thus formed a habit
from which I have never swerved; but it is not so with all. Some say, "I have
been about all the day, and I have to preach to-night, but I can manage." Yes,
but it will not please God for us to offer Him that which costs us nothing.
Others have a stock of sermons, and I have heard that, just before the time for
entering the pulpit, they turn over their precious manuscripts, pick out a
likely one, and without further preparation read it as God's message to the
people. The Lord deliver us from a state of mind in which we dare to put on the
table of shewbread the first loaf which comes to hand! No; let us serve the Lord
with growing carefulness and reverence.

It would be well for many to get back to their first prayers and watchfulness,
and all else that is good. Can it be done? Brother, it can be done. You can have
all the life you had, and more, by the blessing of the Holy Spirit. You can be
as intense as you ever were. I have seen old horses turned out to grass, and
come back fresh and vigorous. I know a pasture wherein, if a worn-out steed doth
graze, it shall come back to be harnessed to the gospel chariot with strength
renewed. Let us remember those hallowed spots where Jesus has met with us in
former days, where, or ever we were aware, our soul was made "like the chariots
of Amminadib." Lord, renew Thy former mercies, and we shall rise, like the
phoenix, from our ashes!

It may cost you a great deal to be set right again. John Bunyan speaks of the
pilgrim who lost his roll, and had to go back for it, so that he travelled three
times over the road, and then found the sun setting ere he reached his lodging.
But cost us whatever it may, we must get right with God. I read a dream, the
other day, which was the means of a man's conversion. He thought that he was
going with his friend into one of the Eastern towns, and as he was about to
enter, the portcullis above the gate began to fall. As it descended, he stooped;
but it fell so fast that he could not get through, stooping, kneeling,
crouching, or even lying down. He felt that he must enter, so he made a
desperate effort. He had on a very fine laced vest, and he pulled that off, but
the portcullis still descended, till he found that the only thing he could do
was to strip himself, and then, close to the earth, and grazed by the gravel, he
crept through. When he was safely inside the gate, a shining one covered him
from head to foot with glittering garments. It may be that, in order to get
right with God, we shall have to part with that fine vest, that splendid theory,
that love of popularity, that rhetorical flourishing; but, oh! if we once get
through that gate, and God covers us with the robe of acceptance in the Beloved,
it will well repay us for anything that the struggle may cost us.

I am sorry to say that I am made of such ill stuff that my Lord has to chasten
me often and sorely. I am like a quill pen that will not write unless it be
often nibbed, and therefore I have felt the sharp knife many times; and yet I
shall not regret my pains and crosses so long as my Lord will write with me on
men's hearts. That is the cause of many ministers' afflictions; they are
necessary to our work. You have heard the fable of the raven that wished to
drink, but the pitcher had so little water in it that he could not reach it, and
therefore he took stone after stone, and dropped them into the vessel until the
water rose to the brim, and he could drink. There is so little grace, in some
men, that they need many sicknesses, bereavements, and other afflictions to make
their graces available for usefulness. If, however, we receive grace enough to
bear fruit without continual pruning, so much the better.

It is expected of us, brethren, that from this time we rise to a higher point.
It is the Lord's due, if we think of what He has done for us. Some of my
comrades in arms, now before me, have gone through battles as hard as any men
may wish to fight; and after such success as they have had, they must never say
die. After what the Lord has done for us, we must never strike our flag, nor
turn our backs in the day of battle. Sir Francis Drake, when it was feared that
he would be wrecked in the Thames, said, "What! have I been round the world, and
am I now to be drowned in a ditch? Not I." So say I to you, brethren: you have
done business in stormy waters, and will you sink in a village pond? We shall
not be worse treated than we have been. We are now in fine fighting trim, for we
are hardened by former blows. A great pugilist at Rome was so battered, his
nose, eyes, and face were so disfigured, that he was always ready to fight,
because he said, "I cannot look worse than I do." Personally, I am in much the
same plight. Men cannot say anything worse of me than they have said. I have
been belied from head to foot, and misrepresented to the last degree. My good
looks are gone, and none can damage me much now.

Some of you have had more to batter you than you are ever likely to endure
again; you have had trial and tribulation and affliction as heavy as you can
have them; and after having stood in the lists so long, surely you are not going
to yield, and slink away like cowards? God forbid it! God forbid it! God grant,
on the contrary, that the elder ones among you may have the pleasure, not only
of winning battles for Christ, but of seeing others, who have been saved under
your instrumentality, trained to fight for Jesus better than you yourselves have
fought! The other day, I read a story, and with that I will conclude, desiring
that I may, in spiritual things, have the same joy myself, and that it may be
the lot of you all. Diagoras the Rhodian had, in his time, won many wreaths at
the Olympian games. He had two boys, and he brought them up to the same
profession. The day came when his own force abated, and he was no longer able to
strive for masteries in his own person; but he went up to the Olympian games
with his two sons. He saw the blows they gave and received, and rejoiced when he
discovered that they were both victorious. A Lacedaemonian said to him," You may
die now, Diagoras;" meaning that the old man might be content to die, because he
had, in his own person, and in that of his sons, obtained the highest honours.
The old man seemed to feel that it was even so, for when his two sons came, and
shouldered their father, and carried him through the arena amid the ringing
cheers of the great assembly, the old man, flushed with excitement, died under
the eyes of the assembled Greeks. It would have been a wiser thing to have
lived, for he had a third son, who became more renowned than the other two; but
he passed away on a wave of victory. O brethren, may you have spiritual children
who shall win battles for the Lord, and may you live to see them doing it; then
may you say, with old Simeon, "Lord, now lettest Thou Thy servant depart in
peace, according to Thy Word." In the Name of the Ever-blessed, we this day
again set up our banners. Our watchword is "Victory." We mean to win for the
grand old cause of Puritanism, Protestantism, Calvinism,–all poor names which
the world has given to our great and glorious faith,–the doctrine of Paul the
apostle, the gospel of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. We can both strike,
and bear the strokes which are returned. Through Divine grace, we have given to
us both energy and patience; we can work, and we can wait. May the Divine life
in us put forth its mightiest force, and make us strong to the utmost of human
possibility, and then we shall gain the victory, and give all the glory of it to
our omnipotent Leader. The Lord be with you, beloved! Amen.


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  CHAPTER 85: 06. LIGHT, FIRE, FAITH, LIFE, LOVE
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Chapter 6—Light. Fire. Faith. Life. Love.

I NEVER needed help more than now, and never felt so utterly unfitted to give
the key-note to the Conference. As you grow more numerous, more gifted, and more
experienced, I feel more and more my unworthiness to stand foremost, and to lead
your ranks. However, I will trust in God, and believe that He will, by His Holy
Spirit send a word that shall be encouraging and quickening.

Years ago, an eccentric judge, known as Judge Foster, went upon circuit in
extreme old age during a. very hot summer; and on one of the most sultry days of
that summer, he addressed the grand jury at Worcester in some such terms as
these, "Gentlemen of the Jury, it is very hot, and I am very old; you know your
duties very well; go and do them." Following his example, I feel inclined to say
to you, "Gentlemen, here you are assembled; I have many infirmities to bear, and
you will have great difficulty in bearing with my talk; you know your duties; go
and do them." Action is better than speech. If I speak for an hour, I shall
scarcely be able to say anything more practical than that,–"You know your
duties; go and do them." "England expects every man to do his duty," was the
rousing signal of Nelson at Trafalgar; need I remind you that our great Lord
expects every one of His servants to occupy his post until his Master comes
again, and so to be a good and faithful servant? Go forth, brethren, and fulfil
your Master's high behest, and may God's Spirit work in you the good pleasure of
your Lord!

Those who truly serve God are made to feel more and more forcibly that "life is
real, life is earnest," if it be indeed life in Christ. In times of great pain,
and weakness, and depression, it has come over me to hope that, if I should
again recover, I should be more intense than ever; if I could be privileged to
climb the pulpit stairs again, I resolved to leave out every bit of flourish
from my sermons, to preach nothing but present and pressing truth, and to hurl
it at the people with all my might; myself living at high pressure, and putting
forth all the energy of which my being is capable. I suppose you, too, have felt
like this when you have been laid aside. You have said to yourselves, "Playtime
is over with us, we must get to work. Parade is ended, now comes the tug of war.
We must not waste a single moment, but redeem the time, because the days are
evil." When we see the wonderful activity of the servants of Satan, and how much
they accomplish, we may well be ashamed of ourselves that we do so little for
our Redeemer, and that the little is often done so badly that it takes as long
to set it right as we spent in the doing of it. Brethren, let us cease from
regrets, and come to actual amendment. A great German philosopher has asserted
that life is all a dream. He says that "it is a dream composed of a dream of
itself." He believes in no actual existence, not even in his own; even that he
conceives to be but a thought. Surely, some who are in the ministry must be
disciples of that philosophy, for they are half-asleep, and their spirit is
dreamy. They speak of the eternal truth as though it were a temporary system of
belief, passing away like all other visions of earth. They live for Christ in a
manner which would never be thought of by a person who meant to make money, or
to obtain a degree at the University. "Why," said one, of a certain minister,
"if I acted, in my business, as he does in his ministry, I should be in the
Gazette within three months." It is an unhappy thing that there should be men
calling themselves ministers of Christ to whom it never seems to occur that they
are bound to display the utmost industry and zeal. They seem to forget that they
are dealing with souls that may be lost for ever or saved for ever, souls that
cost the Saviour's heart's blood. They do not appear to have understood the
nature of their calling, or to have grasped the Scriptural idea of an ambassador
for Christ. Like drowsy waggoners, they hope to get their team safely home,
though they themselves are sound asleep.

I have heard of ministers who are most lively when playing croquet or cricket,
or getting up an excursion, or making a bargain. It was said of one, in my
hearing, "What a fine minister he would have been if he had only been
converted!" I heard it said of a very clever man, "He would have been a great
winner of souls, if he had only believed in souls; but he believed in nothing."
It is said of the Russian peasants that, when they have done their work, they
will lie on the stove, or around it, and there sleep hour after hour; and there
is a current opinion among them that they are only awake when they are asleep,
and that their waking and working hours are nothing but a horrible dream. The
moujik hopes that his dreams are facts, and that his waking sufferings are
merely nightmares. May not some have fallen into the same notion with regard to
the ministry? They are asleep upon realities, and awake about shadows; in
earnest about trifles, yet trifling about solemnities. What God will have to say
to those servants who do their own work well, and His work badly, I will not
attempt to foreshadow. What shall be done to the man who displayed great
capacity in his recreations, but was dull in his devotions; active out of his
calling, and languid in it? The day shall declare it. Let us arouse ourselves to
the sternest fidelity, labouring to win souls as much as if it all depended
wholly upon ourselves, while we fall back, in faith, upon the glorious fact that
everything rests with the eternal God.

I see before me many who are fully aroused, and are eager in seeking the lost;
for I speak to some of the most earnest spirits in the Christian
Church,–evangelists and pastors whose meat and drink it is to do the will of
their Lord. But even these, who are most awake, will not differ from me when I
assert that they could be yet more aroused. My brethren, when you have been at
your best, you might have been better. Who among us might not have had greater
success if he had been ready to obtain it? When Nelson served under Admiral
Hotham, and a certain number of the enemy's ships had been captured, the
commander said, "We must be contented; we have done very well." But Nelson did
not think so, since a number of the enemy's vessels had escaped. "Now," said he,
"had we taken ten sail, and allowed the eleventh to escape when it had been
possible to have got at her, I could never have called it well done." If we have
brought many to Christ, we dare not boast, for we are humbled by the reflection
that more might have been done had we been fitter instruments for God to use.

Possibly some brother will say," I have done all that I could do." That may be
his honest opinion, for he could not have preached more frequently, or held more
meetings. Perhaps it is true that he has held enough meetings, and the people
have had quite enough sermons; but there might have been an improvement in the
spirit of the meetings, and in the sermons, too. Some ministers might do more in
reality if they did less in appearance. A Bristol Quaker–and Quakers are very
shrewd men,–years ago stepped into an alehouse, and called for a quart of beer.
The beer frothed up, and the measure was not well filled. The Friend said to the
landlord, "How much trade art thou doing?" "Oh!" he answered, "I draw ten butts
of beer a month." "Dost thou know how thou mightest draw eleven butts?" "No,
sir; I wish I did." "I will tell thee, friend; thee can do it by filling thy
pots." To any brother who says, "I do not know how I can preach more gospel than
I do, for I preach very often," I would reply, "You need not preach oftener, but
fill the sermons fuller of gospel." The Saviour at the marriage-feast said,
"Fill the waterpots with water." Let us imitate the servants, of whom we read,
"They filled them up to the brim." Let your discourses be full of matter,–sound,
gracious, and condensed. Certain speakers suffer from an awful flux of words;
you can scarcely spy out the poor little straw of an idea which has been hurried
down an awful Ganges or Amazon of words. Give the people plenty of thought,
plenty of Scriptural, solid doctrine, and deliver it in a way which is growingly
better,–every day better, every year better,–that God may be more glorified, and
sinners may more readily learn the way of salvation.

I shall now commend to you, for the perfecting of your ministry, five things,
which should be in you and abound. You remember the passage which says, "Salt,
without prescribing how much." There is no need for limiting the quantity of any
of the matters now commended to you. Here they are,–light, fire, faith, life,
love. Their number is five, so you may count them on your fingers; their value
is inestimable, so grasp them with firm hand, and let them be carried in your
hearts.

I. I commend to you most earnestly the acquisition and distribution of LIGHT. To
that end, we must first get the light. Get light even of the commonest order,
for all light is good. Education upon ordinary things is valuable, and I would
stir up certain loitering brethren to make advances in that direction. Many
among you entered the College with no education whatever; but when you left it,
you had learned enough to have formed the resolution to study with all your
might, and you have carried it out. I wish that all had done so. It is a great
advantage to a minister to commence his public life in a small village, where he
can have time and quiet for steady reading; that man is wise who avails himself
of the golden opportunity. We ought not only to think of what we can now do for
God, but of what we may yet be able to do if we improve ourselves. No man should
ever dream that his education is complete:. I know that my friend Mr. Rogers,
though he has passed his eightieth year, is still a student, and perhaps has
more of the true student spirit about him now than ever: will any of the younger
sort sit down in self-content? We shall continue to learn even in Heaven, and
shall still be looking deeper and deeper into the abyss of Divine love: it were
ill to talk of perfect knowledge here below. If a man says, "I am fully equipped
for my work, and need learn no more; I have moved here after having been three
years in the last place, and I have quite a stock of sermons, so that I am under
no necessity to read any more;" I would say to him, "My dear friend, may the
Lord give you some brains, for you talk like one who is deficient in that
department." A brain is a very hungry thing indeed, and he who possesses it must
constantly feed it by reading and thinking, or it will shrivel up or fall
asleep. It is the child of the horseleech, and it crieth evermore, "Give, give."
Do not starve it. If such mind-hunger never happens to you, I suspect that you
have no mind of any consequence.

But, brethren, see to it that you have, in a sevenfold degree, light of a higher
kind. You are to be, above all things, students of the Word of God; this,
indeed, is a main point of your avocation. If we do not study Scripture, and
those books that will help us to understand theology, we are but wasting time
while we pursue other researches. We should judge him to be a foolish fellow
who, while preparing to be a physician, spent all his time in studying
astronomy. There is a connection of some kind between stars and human bones; but
a man could not learn much of surgery from Arcturus or Orion. So, there is a
connection between every science and religion, and I would advise you to obtain
much general knowledge; but universal information will be a poor substitute for
a special and prayerful study of the Scriptures, and of the doctrines contained
in the revelation of God. We are to study men and our own hearts; we ought to
sit as disciples in the schools of providence and experience. Some ministers
grow fast because the great Teacher chastens them sorely, and the chastening is
sanctified; but others learn nothing by their experience, they blunder out of
one ditch into another, and learn nothing by their difficulties but the art of
creating fresh ones. I suggest to you all the prayer of a Puritan who, during a
debate, was observed to be absorbed in writing. His friends thought he was
taking notes of his opponent's speech; but when they got hold of his paper, they
found nothing but these words, "More light, Lord! More light, Lord!" Oh, for
more light from the great Father of lights!

Let not this light be only that of knowledge, but seek for the light of joy and
cheerfulness. There is power in a happy ministry. A lugubrious face, a mournful
voice, a languor of manner,–none of these things commend us to our hearers;
especially do they fail to attract the young. Certain strange minds find their
happiness in misery, but they are not numerous. I once had a letter from a man,
who told me that he came to the Tabernacle, but as soon as he entered, he felt
that it could not be the house of God because there were so many present, and
"strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and few
there be that find it." When he looked at me, he felt sure that I was unsound in
the faith, for I should not look so cheerful in the face, neither should I be so
bulky in person, if I belonged to the tried people of God. Worst of all, when he
looked round upon the congregation, and saw their happy countenances, he said to
himself, "These people know nothing about the depravity of their hearts, or the
inward struggles of believers." Then he informed me that he wended his way to a
very small chapel, where he saw a minister, who looked as if he had been in the
furnace; and though there were only eight persons present, they all looked so
depressed that he felt quite at home. I suppose he sat down, and sang,–

"My willing soul would stay

In such a frame as this,

And sit and sing herself away

From everything like bliss."

I felt glad that the good man was enabled to enjoy a little comfortable misery
with his brethren. I did not feel at all envious; nor do I think that such a
ministry of misery will ever draw to itself a number that no man can number. The
children of light prefer the joy of the Lord, for they find it to be their
strength.

Get plenty of light, brethren, and when you have obtained it, give it out. Never
fall into the notion that mere earnestness will suffice without knowledge, and
that souls are to be saved simply by our being zealous. I fear that we are more
deficient in heat than in light; but, at the same time, that kind of fire which
has no light in it is of a very doubtful nature, and cometh not from above.
Souls are saved by truth which enters the understanding, and so reaches the
conscience. How can the gospel save when it is not understood? The preacher may
preach with a great deal of stamping, and hammering, and crying, and entreating;
but the Lord is not in the wind, nor in the fire;–the still small voice of truth
is needed to enter the understanding, and thereby reach the heart. People must
be taught. We must "go, and teach all nations," making disciples of them; and I
know of no way in which you can save men without teaching on your part, and
discipleship on theirs.

Some preachers, though they know a great deal, do not teach much, because they
use such an involved style. Recollect that you are addressing people who need to
be taught like children; for, though they are grown up, the major part of our
hearers are still in a state of childhood as to the things of God; and if they
are to receive the truth, it must be made very plain, and packed up so as to be
easily carried away, and laid up in the memory. Therefore, brethren, give forth
much holy instruction. Some give little instruction because of their involved
style; but many fail for other reasons, and mainly because they aim at something
else. Talleyrand defines a metaphysician as a man who is very clever in drawing
black lines upon a black ground. I should like to draw black lines upon a white
ground, or else white lines on a black ground, so that they could be seen; but
certain preachers are so profound that no one understands them. On the other
hand, have you not heard sermons with great oratorical display about them, and
nothing more? You have looked on while the angel wrought wondrously. The
preacher has been like Blondin on the tight-rope; and as we have looked at him,
we have trembled, lest he should never reach the end of his lofty period. Yet he
has balanced himself admirably, and moved along in his elevated position in a
marvellous manner. But, when all is over, your mind is unsatisfied, for these
acrobatic feats of rhetoric do not feast the soul. Brethren, we must not make it
our aim to be grand orators. Certain men are eloquent by nature, and it is not
possible for them to be otherwise than oratorical, any more than for
nightingales to help singing sweetly; these I do not blame, but admire. It is
not the duty of the nightingale to bring down its voice to the same tone as that
of the sparrow. Let it sing sweetly if it can do so naturally. God deserves the
best oratory, the best logic, the best metaphysics, the best of everything; but
if ever rhetoric stands in the way of the instruction of the people, a curse on
rhetoric! If any educational attainment, or any natural gift which we possess,
should make it less easy for the people to understand us, let it perish! May God
rend away from our thought and style everything which darkens the light, even
though it should be like a costly veil of rarest lace! May we use great
plainness of speech, that gospel light may shine out very clearly from our
ministry! At this time, there is a great necessity for giving much light, for a
fierce attempt is being made to quench or dim the light. Many are scattering
darkness on all sides. Therefore, brethren, keep the light burning in your
churches, keep the light burning in your pulpits, and hold it forth in the face
of men who love darkness because it favors their aims. Teach the people all
truth, and let not our distinctive opinions be concealed. There are
sheep-stealers about, who come forth in the night, and run away with our people
because they do not know our principles,–the principles of Nonconformists, the
principles of Baptists, or even the principles of Christianity. Our hearers have
a general idea of these things, but not enough to protect them from deceivers.
We are beset, not only by sceptics, but by certain brethren who devour the
feeble. Do not leave your children to wander out without the guardianship of
holy knowledge, for there are seducers abroad who will mislead them if they can.
They will begin by calling them "dear" this, and "dear" that, and end by
alienating them from those who brought them to Jesus. If you lose your members,
let it be in the light of day, and not through their ignorance. These kidnappers
dazzle weak eyes with flashes of novelty, and turn weak heads with wonderful
discoveries and marvellous doctrines, which all tend towards division, and
bitterness, and the exaltation of their own sect. Keep the light of truth
burning, and thieves will not dare to plunder your house.

Oh, for a church of believers in Jesus who know why they believe in Him; persons
who believe the Bible, and know what it contains; who believe the doctrines of
grace, and know the bearings of those truths; who know where they are, and what
they are, and who therefore dwell in the light, and cannot he deceived by the
prince of darkness! Do, dear friends,–I speak specially to the younger brethren
among us,–do let there be plenty of teaching in your ministry. I fear that
sermons are too often judged by their words rather than by their sense. Let it
not be so with you. Feed the people always with knowledge and understanding, and
let your preaching be solid, containing food for the hungry, healing for the
sick, and light for those who sit in darkness.

II. I have now, in the second place, to plead with you that you gather and use
in your ministry much heavenly FIRE. Upon this subject, you will perhaps expect
me to speak guardedly; for you have seen the mischief of wild fire, and the
perils of strange fire, and possibly you are anxious; to know what I think of a
certain "army" which abounds in fire, and blazes away most marvellously. I shall
express no opinion, except that none of the supposed evils of fire are equal to
those of lukewarmness. Even fanaticism is to be preferred to indifference. I had
sooner risk the dangers of a tornado of religious excitement than see the air
grow stagnant with a dead formality. It is far better for people to be too hot
than to be lukewarm. "I would thou wert cold or hot" is Christ's word still, and
it applies to preachers as well as to others. When a man is freezingly cold in
the things of Christ, we know where he is; and if another is red-hot, or even at
a white heat, and is thought to be too enthusiastic, we know where he is; but
when a minister preaches in such a way that, at the close of his sermon, you
say, "This is neither cold nor hot," you go away feeling that you have had
enough, or even too much of it. There was nothing to excite you; you could
almost wish to have been made angry rather than to have been lulled by such
discoursing. A lukewarm sermon sickens every healthy mind. Nor is this evil to
be found in the pulpit alone. I should gravely question whether, if an angel
were to take a thermometer, and go round the Dissenting churches in London, he
would not find a large proportion of them certainly not cold, most decidedly not
hot, but between the two. How is it with you, dear brother? Do you say, "Well, I
am not the warmest of all, but then I am not the coldest of all"? Then I have a
suspicion as to your temperature; but I leave the matter to your own judgment,
only remarking that I have never yet met with fire that is moderately hot.
Should any of you discover such an article, you will be wise to patent it, for
it might be of service in many ways. The fire with which I have been acquainted
has been such that I have never given it my hand without remembering its warm
embrace. Fire has never yet learned moderation. I am told that it is wrong to go
to extremes, and upon that ground fire is certainly guilty; for it is not only
intensely hot, but it has a tendency to consume and destroy without limit. When
it once commenced with this city, in the olden time, it left little of it but
ashes; there was no keeping it within bounds. May God grant us grace to go to
extremes in His service! May we be filled with an unrestrainable zeal for His
glory! May the Lord answer us by fire, and may that fire fall first on the
ministers, and then upon the people! We ask for the true Pentecostal flame, and
not for sparks kindled by human passion. A live coal from off the altar is our
need, and nothing can supply its place; but this we must have, or our ministry
will be in vain.

Brethren, we must, first of all, take care that we have the fire burning in our
own souls. I am happy to know that there are very few, if any, among you who are
utterly cold; for you go to be warmed into earnestness if we set about it
aright. It is very hard to warm a stone. You may clothe a man in blankets until
he is fairly warm, because there is life in him; but you cannot heat a stone in
that fashion. Life always begets a measure of warmth, and the possibility of
more; and as you have life, there is within you the capacity for heat. Some
preachers are of such a cold nature that no known means could warm them. The
attempt to find heat in some men's sermons reminds me of AEsop's fable of the
apes and the glowworm. The apes found a glowworm shining on the bank, and
straightway gathered round it to warm themselves. They placed sticks over it,
and tried to make a fire; but it did not burn. It was a very pretty thing, and
looked like flame; but they could not warm their cold hands with its cold light.
So have I known ministers, whose light was destitute of heat; and, consequently,
the poor sticks around them have never kindled into a flame, nor have frozen
hearts been melted by their influence.

It is dreadful work to listen to a sermon, and feel all the while as if you were
sitting out in a snowstorm, or dwelling in a house of ice, clear but cold,
orderly but killing. You have said to yourself, "That was a well-divided and
well-planned sermon, but I cannot make out what was the matter with it;" the
secret being that there was the wood, but no fire to kindle it. A great sermon
without heart in it reminds one of those huge furnaces in Wales, which have been
permitted to go out; they are a pitiful sight. We prefer a sermon in which there
may be no vast talent, and no great depth of thought; but what there is has come
fresh from the crucible, and, like molten metal, burns its way. I once knew a
lad who, when he used to go home from the smithy where he worked, was roughly
handled by the boys of the village, till his master suggested to him a plan of
defence, which was wonderfully efficacious. He took a rod of iron, and just
before he started to go home, he blew up the fire, and made the iron hot. When
the boys came round him, he warned them not to touch his stick; and after once
feeling it, they obeyed the admonition, and respectfully kept their distance. I
do not quote the example with any commendation of the actual fact, but with this
moral in view,–heat your sermon red-hot, and it will be likely to be remembered
by all who come into contact with it. Everything gives way before fire.

Energy still remains an essential, whatever else in oratory may have changed
since the days of old. It is said that the oft-quoted reply of Demosthenes to
the question, "What is the first thing in oratory?" was not "Action," but
"Energy." What is the second thing? "Energy." What is the third thing? "Energy."
I will not pretend to decide the classical question; but I am sure that, as a
matter of fact, energy is the main thing in the human side of preaching. Like
the priests at the altar, we can do nothing without fire. Brethren, speak
because you believe the gospel of Jesus, speak because you feel its power, speak
under the influence of the truth which you are delivering, speak with the Holy
Ghost sent down from Heaven, and the result will not be doubtful.

Let it be carefully remembered that our flame must be kindled from on high.
Nothing is more to be despised than a mere painted fire, the simulation of
earnestness. Sooner let us have an honest death than a counterfeit life. The
imitation of Baxter is detestable; but to be like Baxter is seraphic. If you
would be like Whitefield, I would say be Whitefield. Let the fire be kindled by
the Holy Ghost, and not by animal passion, the desire of honour, emulation of
others, or the excitement of attending meetings. Let the terrible example of
Nadab and Abihu for ever put away strange fire from our censers. Burn because
you have been in solemn fellowship with the Lord our God.

Recollect also, that the fire which you and I need will consume us if we truly
possess it. "Spare yourself," may be whispered by friends; but it will not be
heeded when this fire is burning. We have given ourselves up to the work of God,
and we cannot go back. We desire to be whole burntofferings and complete
sacrifices to God, and we dare not shun the altar. "Except a corn of wheat fall
into the ground and die, it abideth alone: but if it die, it bringeth forth much
fruit." We can only produce life in others by the wear and tear of our own
being. This is a natural and spiritual law,–that fruit can only come of the seed
by its spending and being spent even to self-exhaustion.

Why are many earnest ministers worn and weary till heart and brain give way?
They would be of little use if they did not run such a risk. All men, who are
eminently useful, are made to feel their weakness in a supreme degree. Can the
Spirit of God, even the Infinite Deity, ride in such frail chariots as these,
without straining the axle, and making the whole machine to quiver, as if it
would be utterly dissolved beneath its sacred burden? When God visits us with
soul-saving power, it is as though devouring flame came forth from Heaven, and
made its abode in our bosoms; and where this is the case, there may well be a
melting away of all strength. Yet let it be so: we humbly invite the sacred
burnings. Herod was eaten of worms, being cursed of God; but to be consumed by
God for His own service, is to be blessed to the full. We have a choice between
these two, to be eaten up by our corruptions, or by the zeal of God's house. It
needs no hesitation, the choice of every man among us is to be wholly the
Lord's,–ardently, passionately, vehemently the Lord's servants, let the Divine
fervour cost us what it may of brain, and heart, and life. Our only hope of
honour, and glory, and immortality lies in the fulfilment of our dedication unto
God; as devoted things, we must be consumed with fire, or else be rejected. For
us to turn aside from our lifework, and to seek distinction elsewhere, is
absolute folly; a blight will be upon us, we shall not succeed in anything but
the pursuit of God's glory through the teaching of the Word. "This people have I
formed for Myself," saith God; "they shall shew forth My praise;" and if we will
not do this, we shall do less than nothing. For this one thing we are created;
and if we miss this, we shall live in vain.

Good Dr. Wayland, the other day, walking in my garden, saw the swans out of the
water, and he remarked that they were the true representation of persons who are
out of their proper sphere, and attempt to do what they were never made for. How
ungainly the swans are on land, they waddle in a ridiculous manner; but as soon
as they are in the water, how gracefully they glide along; each one is the model
of a ship, the image of beauty; every line about it is perfect. So is it with a
man who is content to find in the ministry "waters to swim in." As God's sent
servant, he is everything that is beautiful; but as soon as he dabbles in trade,
or becomes a secular lecturer, or seeks his own aggrandizement, he ceases to be
admirable, he often becomes notorious, and is always awkward. Brethren, you are
not meant for anything but God; therefore, surrender yourselves to God, and find
in Him your wealth, your honour, and your all. If you do this, you shall be the
head, and not the tail; but if you start aside, you shall be lightly esteemed.
Let the fire of perfect consecration be heaped upon you, for so shall you glow
and shine like molten silver, which brightens amid the heat. Let us not subject
ourselves to the shame and eternal contempt which will be the portion of those
who quit the service of their Redeemer for the bondage of self-seeking. Jesus
said to His disciples, "If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and
take up his cross, and follow Me."

III. The next thing necessary to us is FAITH; I might say the first, second,
third, and last thing is FAITH. "Without faith it is impossible to please God;"
and if we are pleasing God, it is not by our talent, but by our faith.

Just now, we much need faith in the form of fixity of belief. We know more than
we did some time ago; at least, I hope we do. I just now heard one of you say to
another brother, "How broad you get!" Well, we do widen out; but not as some
men; for we are not of the Broad School, who believe little or nothing aright
because they desire to believe everything. We have cast our anchor, it has taken
a firm grip; we have ceased to drift; we remain at rest. Some men have no creed,
or, if they have, it is altered so often that it is of no use to them. It must
be like the blanket of a gentleman who came from the Emerald Isle, of which he
said, "See here! Our skipper has given me a shamefully bad blanket. Just look at
it: it is too long at the top, and it is too short at the bottom; it gets over
my head, and yet my feet are always cold. I cut a whole foot off the top, and I
sewed it on to the bottom, but it is not altered a bit; it still comes over my
eyes, and is too short to cover my feet." That is what certain "thinkers" do,
with their creed; they keep cutting it off at one end, and putting it on at the
other, but it never gets right; it is always forming, never formed. Modern
creeds are like the clothes of Italian peasants, which I have gazed upon with
wondering enquiry. It would puzzle the most learned geologist to discover the
primary formation of a pair of trousers which have been patched and mended with
cloth of all patterns and colours from generation to generation. Such and so
varied are some men's beliefs and unbeliefs; an agglomeration of philosophic
rags, metaphysical tatters, theological remnants, and heretical cast-offs.
Certain thinkers have reached the blessed ultimatum of believing nothing at all
with anything like certainty of belief. When these "cultivated" persons speak of
us, they manifest great scorn, and affect to believe that we are natural fools.
Ah, dear! People are not always what they are thought to be, and it may happen
that a man sees himself as in a glass when he thinks he is looking out of the
window at a neighbour. It is a sign of great weakness when persons are full of
contempt for others. If, in any Review or pamphlet, a writer parades his
culture, you may be sure that he has been lying fallow of late, and his
affectations are the weeds which have come of it. If it came to a fair contest
upon the matter of education and culture, the orthodox would be quite able to
hold their own. Boasting is sorry work; but, sometimes, persons must be answered
according to their folly, and I say boldly that, in any sort of mental
tournament, we should not tremble to tilt with the men of "modern thought." Be
it so or not, it is ours to believe. We believe that, when the Lord our God gave
forth a revelation, He knew His own mind, and that He expressed Himself in the
best and wisest manner, and in terms than can be understood by those who are
teachable and truthful. We therefore believe that no new revelation is needed,
and that the idea of other light to come is practically unbelief in the light
which now is, seeing the light of truth is one. We believe that, though the
Bible has been twisted and turned about by sacrilegious hands, it is still the
infallible revelation of God. It is a main part of our religion humbly to accept
what God has revealed. Perhaps the highest form of adoration possible, on this
side the veil, is the bowing of our entire mental and spiritual being before the
revealed mind of God; the kneeling of the understanding in that sacred presence
whose glory causes angels to veil their faces. Let those who please to do so,
worship science, reason, and their own clear judgments; it is our delight to
prostrate ourselves before the Lord our God, and to say, "This God is our God
for ever and ever: He will be our guide even unto death."

Brethren, rally to the old standard. Fight to the death for the old gospel, for
it is your life. Whatever forms of expression you may use as you advance in
knowledge, ever keep the cross of Jesus Christ in the forefront, and let all the
blessed truths which gather around it be heartily maintained.

We must have faith, not only in the form of fixity of creed, but also in the
shape of constant dependence upon God. If I were asked what is the sweetest
frame within the whole compass of human feeling, I should not speak of a sense
of power in prayer, or abundant revelation, or rapturous joys, or conquest of
evil spirits; but I should mention, as the most exquisite delight of my being, a
condition of conscious dependence upon God. It has been often associated with
great pain of body and deep humiliation of spirit, but it is inexpressibly
delightful to lie passive in the hand of love, to die into the life of Christ.
It is blessed to feel that: you do not know, but your Heavenly Father knows;
that you cannot speak, but that "we have an Advocate;" that you can scarcely
lift a hand, but that He worketh all your works in you. The entire submission of
our soul to our Lord, the full content of the heart with God's will and way, the
sure reliance of the mind upon the Lord's presence and power,–this is the
nearest approach to Heaven that I know; and it is better than rapture, for one
can abide in it without strain or reaction.

"Oh, to be nothing, nothing;

Only to lie at His feet!"

It is not so sublime a feeling as soaring aloft on the wings of eagles; but for
sweetness,–deep, mysterious, indescribable,–it bears the palm. It is a
blessedness which can bear to be thought of, a joy which never seems to be a
stolen one; for surely a poor, frail child of God has an unquestioned right to
depend upon his great Father, a right to be nothing in the presence of the
all-supporting One.

I love to preach in such a mood, not as though I was about to preach at all, but
hoping that the Holy Spirit would speak through me. Thus to conduct
prayer-meetings, and church-meetings, and all sorts of business, will be found
to be our wisdom and our joy. We generally make our worst blunders about things
that are perfectly easy, when the thing is so plain that we do not ask God to
guide us, because we think our own common sense will be sufficient, and so we
commit grave errors; but in the difficulties, the extreme difficulties, which we
take before God, He gives young men prudence, and teaches youths knowledge and
discretion. Dependence upon God is the flowing fountain of success. That true
saint of God, George Muller, has always struck me, when I have heard him speak,
as being such a simple, child-like being in his dependence upon God; but, alas!
the most of us are far too great for God to use us; we can preach as well as
anybody, make a sermon with anybody,–and so we fail. Take care, brethren; for if
we think we can do anything of ourselves, all we shall get from God will be the
opportunity to try. He will thus prove us, and let us see our inability. A
certain alchemist, who waited upon Pope Leo X., declared that he had discovered
how to transmute the baser metals into gold. He expected to receive a sum of
money for his discovery, but Leo was no such simpleton; he merely gave him a
huge purse in which to keep the gold which he would make. There was wisdom as
well as sarcasm in the present. That is precisely what God does with proud men;
He lets them have the opportunity to do what they boasted of being able to do. I
never heard that so much as a solitary gold piece was dropped into Leo's purse,
and I am sure you will never be spiritually rich by what you can do in your own
strength. Be stripped, brother, and then God may be pleased to clothe you with
honour, but not till then.

It is essential that we should exhibit faith in the form of confidence in God.
Brothers, it would be a great calamity if it could be said of any one of you,
"He had an excellent moral character, and remarkable gifts; but he did not trust
God." Faith is a chief necessary. "Above all, taking the shield of faith," was
the apostolic injunction. Alas! some men go to the fight, but leave their shield
at home. It would be dreadful to think of a sermon as being all that a sermon
ought to be in every respect except that the preacher did not trust in the Holy
Spirit to bless it to the conversion of souls; such a discourse is vain. No
sermon is what it ought to be if faith be absent: as well say that a body is in
health when life is extinct. It is admirable to see a man humbly conscious of
his own weakness, and yet bravely confident in the Lord's power to work through
his infirmity. We may glory at large when God is our glory. Attempting great
things, we shall not overdo ourselves in the attempt; and expecting great
things, we shall not be disappointed in our expectation. Nelson was asked
whether a certain movement of his ships was not perilous, and he replied,
"Perilous it may be, but in naval affairs nothing is impossible, and nothing is
improbable." I make bold to assert that, in the service of God, nothing is
impossible, and nothing is improbable. Go in for great things, brethren, in the
Name of God; risk everything on His promise, and according to your faith shall
it be done unto you. The common policy of our churches is that of great
prudence. We do not, as a rule, attempt anything beyond our strength. We measure
means, and calculate possibilities with economical accuracy; then we strike off
a large discount for contingencies, and a still larger percentage as provision
for our ease, and so we accomplish little because we have no idea of doing much.
I would to God we had more "pluck." I know of no fitter word to describe what I
mean; though the word may better suit the camp than the church, we will for once
borrow from the barracks. Bear in mind that there is nothing like courage even
in ordinary things. Sir Richard Sutton, when he was ambassador to Prussia, was
taken by Frederick the Great to see his regiment of giants, every one of whom
stood six feet six in his shoes. The king said to him, "Do you think any
regiment in the English army could fight my men, man for man?" Sir Richard
answered, "Please your majesty, I do not know whether the same number could beat
your giants, but I know that half the number would try at it."

Let us attempt great things, for those who believe in the Name of the Lord
succeed beyond all expectation. By faith, the worker lives. The right noble Earl
of Shaftesbury said, the other afternoon, of Ragged-school teachers and their
work, "It was evident to all thinking persons that we had a great danger in the
ignorance of the children of the lower classes, and so the senators began to
think of it, and the philosophers began to think of it, and good men of all
sorts began to think of it; but while they were all engaged in thinking, a few
plain, humble people opened Ragged-schools, and did it, This is the kind of
faith of which we need more and more; we need so to trust in God as to put our
hand to the plough in His Name. It is idle to spend time in making and altering
plans, and doing nothing else; the best plan for doing God's work is to do it.
Brothers, if you do not believe in anybody else, believe in God without stint.
Believe up to the hilt. Bury yourselves, both as to your weakness and your
strength, in simple trust in God. "Oh!" said one, "as to that man, there is no
telling what mad thing he will start next." Let the sneer pass, though it may be
as well to say, "I am not mad, most noble Festus; but carry out works of truth
and soberness." The end of all things will show that faith in God is sanctified
common sense, without an atom of folly in it. To believe God's Word, is the most
reasonable thing we can do; it is the plainest course that we can take, and the
safest policy that we can adopt, even as to taking care of ourselves; for Jesus
says, "Whosoever will save his life shall lose it: and whosoever will lose his
life for My sake shall find it." Let us stake all upon the faithfulness of God,
and we shall never be ashamed or confounded, world without end.

You must also have faith in God in the form of expectancy. Our brethren Smith
and Fullerton would not have a blessing on their work if they did not expect the
blessing to come; but expecting the blessing, they provide an enquiry-room, and
persons to look after the converts. Shall we commence farming, and provide no
barn? In many a village, the Lord has saved souls under the preaching of the
gospel, but the minister has never said, "I shall be in the vestry on
such-and-such an evening to see enquirers," or, "I shall stop after the sermon
to talk with the anxious." He has never given the people a chance of telling
what the Lord has done for them; and if he should hear that a dozen people have
been convinced of sin, he would be surprised, and fear that they were
hypocrites. We have not so learned Christ. We expect to take fish in our nets,
and to reap harvests in our fields. Is it so with you, my brethren? Let it be
more so. "Open thy mouth wide," saith the Lord, "and I will fill it." So pray
and so preach that, if there are no conversions, you will be astonished, amazed,
and broken-hearted. Look for the salvation of your hearers as much as the angel
who will sound the last trump will look for the waking of the dead. Believe your
own doctrine! Believe your own Saviour! Believe in the Holy Ghost who dwells in
you! For thus shall you see your hearts' desire, and God shall be glorified.

IV. It is time for me to talk of the fourth thing, namely, LIFE. The preacher
must have life; he must have life in himself. Are you all alive, my brother? Of
course you have been quickened as a plain believer; but, as a minister, are you
altogether alive? If there is a bone in a man's body which is not alive, it
becomes the nidus of disease; for instance, a decayed tooth may cause more
serious injury than most people imagine. In a living system, a dead portion is
out of place, and is sure sooner or later to create intense pain. It is a wise
arrangement that it should be so, for decay has a tendency to spread, and
mischief might be caused imperceptibly if pain did not sound the alarm bell. I
hope that any part of our soul which is not truly alive may pain us till the
evil is removed.

Some brethren never seem to be thoroughly alive. Their heads are alive, they are
intelligent and studious; but, alas! their hearts are inactive, cold, lethargic.
Many preachers never spy out opportunities, for death seems to have sealed up
their eyes; and their tongue also is not more than half quickened, so that they
mumble and stumble, and all around them sleep rules the hour. I have been told
that, if certain preachers would only for once stamp a foot, or lift a
handkerchief, or do anything out of their regular way, it would be a relief to
their people. I hope none of you have become quite so mechanical and monotonous
as that; but I know that some are heavy and yet not weighty, solemn and yet not
impressive. My brother, I want you to be alive from the sole of your foot to the
crown of your head, alive in brain and heart, in tongue and hand, in eye and
ear. The living God should be served by living men.

Labour to be alive in all your duties. John Bradford, the martyr, used to say,
"I never go away from any part of the service of God till I feel thoroughly
alive in it, and know that the Lord is with me in it." Carry out this rule
conscientiously. In confessing sin, go on confessing till you feel that your
tears have washed the Saviour's feet. In seeking pardon, continue to seek till
the Holy Spirit bears witness to your peace with God. In preparing a sermon,
wait upon the Lord until you have communion with Christ in it, until the Holy
Spirit causes you to feel the power of the truth which you are to deliver. "Son
of man, eat this roll." Before you attempt to give out the Word to others, get
it into yourself. Is there not too much dead praying, and dead preaching, and
dead church work of all sorts? Do you not know churches which are like the
ghostly ship in the legend,–the captain, the mate, and all the crew are dead
men?

"The mariners all do work the ropes As they've been wont to do; They raise their
limbs like lifeless tools,– They are a ghastly crew. "The body of my deacon's
self Stands by me knee to knee: The body and I pull at one rope, But nothing of
life have we." This is a grim business, but I have beheld such a sight, though
never have I seen a ghost. I recollect, long ago, preaching for a church which
was almost defunct externally, and altogether defunct internally; and after the
service, during which I felt a terrible chill of soul, I went into the vestry,
and there I saw two important persons leaning heavily against the mantelpiece. I
said to them, "Are you the deacons of the church?" They answered, "Yes, sir." I
replied, "I thought so!" I did not explain further. These pillars of the church
evidently needed propping up; but sluggish ease will not do in the work of the
Lord.

Brethren, we must have life more abundantly, each one of us, and it must flow
out into all the duties of our office: warm spiritual life must be manifest in
the prayer, in the singing, in the preaching, and even in the shake of the hand
and the good word after service. I delight in these Conferences because they are
living assemblies; the room does not feel like a vault, nor do you salute each
other like a set of living skeletons without hearts, or a company of respectable
mandarins fresh from the tea-shops, who nod and bow mechanically. I cannot
endure meetings where the only exhibition of life is seen in heated discussions
over points of order, amendments, and movings of "the previous question." One
marvels at the little things over which an assembly will waste hours of precious
time, contending as if the destiny of the whole world and the fate of the starry
heavens depended upon the debate. How the mountain heaves, but how small a mouse
is born! Brethren, may you be alive, and keep alive, and disseminate your life!
We read in Plato that the Egyptian priests said concerning the Greeks," You
Greeks are always youths, there is not an old man among you." Neither, sirs, is
there an old man among us at this hour; we are full of youth even unto this day,
and if you want to see one whose vigour and cheerfulness prove that his grey
hairs are all external, there sits the man [pointing to Mr. George Rogers]. It
is a grand thing to be perpetually renewing your youth, never getting into the
ruts, but making new tracks with your glowing wheels. Those who are old when
they are young, are likely to be young when they are old. I like to see the
liveliness of the child associated with the gravity of the father; but
especially do I rejoice to see a godly man keep up the vivacity, the joy, the
earnestness of his first love. It is a crime to permit our fires to burn low
while experience yields us more and more abundant fuel. Be it ours to go from
strength to strength, from life to more abundant life. Be full of life at all
times, and let that life be seen in your ordinary conversation. It is a shocking
state of things when good people say, "Our minister undoes in the parlour what
he has done in the pulpit; he preaches very well, but his life does not agree
with his sermons:" Our Lord Jesus would have us perfect even as our Father who
is in Heaven is perfect. Every Christian should be holy; but we are laid under a
sevenfold obligation to it: how can we expect the Divine blessing if it be not
so? God help us so to live that we may be safe examples to our flocks! In such a
case, life will go out of us to others. The man whom God uses for quickening is
the man who is himself quickened. May we and our people become like those
ornamental waters which we have seen while travelling in foreign parts; the
water leaps up as a fountain, and descends into a basin; when that basin is
full, the crystal stream runs over the brink in a sparkling sheet, and rolls
into another basin, and the process is repeated again and again till the result
charms the eye. At our Conference, my brethren, may the living waters flow into
us, and then flow from us till thousands shall receive a blessing, and
communicate it to others! This is what your Lord desires, as He said, "He that
believeth on Me, as the Scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow rivers
of living water." "This spake He of the Spirit, which they that believe on Him
should receive." God fill you to the brim, and cause you to overflow! This is
essential: life we must have. If among us there is a slumbering brother, who
does everything in a slow way, let him wake up. If anyone among us performs his
duty in a lifeless manner, as if he were paid by the pound, and would not give
half an ounce over, let him also wake up. Our work requires that we serve the
Lord with all our heart, and with all our soul, and with all our mind, and with
all our strength. Ours is no place for half-heartedness. Go, ye dead ones, take
a chaplain's place at the cemetery, and bury your dead; but work among living
men needs life,–vigorous, intense life. A corpse among angelic choirs would not
be more out of place than a lifeless man in the gospel ministry. "God is not the
God of the dead, but of the living."

V. The last thing, but not the least important, of which I have to speak, is
LOVE. Assuredly, we must abound in love. It is a hard thing for some preachers
to saturate and perfume their sermons with love; for their natures are hard, or
cold, or coarse, or selfish. We are none of us all that we ought to be, but some
are specially poverty-stricken in point of love. They do not "naturally care"
for the souls of men, as Paul puts it. To all, but especially to the harder
sort, I would say,–Be doubly earnest as to holy charity, for without this you
will be no more than sounding brass or a tinkling cymbal. Love is power. The
Holy Spirit, for the most part, works by our affection. Love men to Christ;
faith accomplishes much, but love is the actual instrument by which faith works
out its desires in the Name of the Lord of love.

Brethren, love your work. You will never preach well unless you are enamoured of
it: you will never do well in any particular charge unless you love the people,
and I would almost say the village and the meeting-house. I would have you
believe that Slocum-in-the-Marsh is a gem among villages. Think that London may
be all very well as a city, but as a village, Slocum bears the palm. Even your
chapel, with all its plainness, should have charms for you: be of opinion that
the Tabernacle is very well in its way, but that it has great deficiencies about
it; that it is too big, for one thing,–at least, too big for you. Your
meeting-house holds only three hundred and twenty; but, in your judgment, that
is quite as large a number as one man can see after with any hope of success; at
least, it involves a responsibility quite as large as you desire to bear. When a
mother's love to her children leads her to believe that they are the sweetest in
the parish, she takes more care in their washing and their dressing; if she
thought them ugly, troublesome beings, she would neglect them; and I am sure
that, until we heartily love our work, and love the people with whom we are
working, we shall not accomplish much.

I can truthfully say that I do not know anybody in all the world with whom I
would like to change places. "Ah!" say you, "that is very likely, for you have a
fine position." I am quite of that opinion; but I thought just the same of my
little pastorate at Waterbeach, and it was with the utmost reluctance that I
removed from the first to the second. I still retain the belief that there were
people in my first congregation whose like I shall never see again, and that, as
a position of usefulness, there are great attractions about that Cambridgeshire
village. It is a rule to which I know of no exception that, to prosper in any
work, you must have an enthusiasm for it.

You must have also intense love to the souls of men, if you are to influence
them for good. Nothing can compensate for the absence of this. Soul-winning must
be your passion, you must be born to it; it must be the very breath of your
nostrils, the only thing for which you count life worth the having. We must hunt
after souls, even as the Swiss hunter pursues the chamois because the spirit of
the chase has mastered him.

Above all, we must feel an intense love to God. Our dear brother, who led us in
prayer this morning, rightly spoke of the power which girds us when we burn with
love to God. Why is it that so many say to children and young people, "You must
love Jesus in order to be saved "? That is not the gospel. The gospel is,
"Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved." We are careful to
state the matter correctly to the grown people; why give it inaccurately to the
young? If we make a difference at all, it will be wiser to tell the children to
believe, and the old people to love: the error will be less injurious, for love
is the great lack of most men. The holy grace of love needs to be more preached
among us, and more felt by us. "Oh!" said a woman, when she was speaking of the
Lord to her minister, "He has heard my prayer many a time, and I can have what I
want of Him, for, by His grace, I am very thick with Him." She meant that
communion had wrought sweet fellowship, and so her prayers were heard. Oh, that
we lived on familiar terms with the Well-beloved, and felt His love within our
bosoms always! Love to God will help a man to persevere in service when
otherwise he would have given up his work. "The love of Christ constraineth us,"
said one whose heart was all his Master's. I heard one say, the other day, that
"the love of Christ ought to constrain us." This is true, but Paul did not so
much speak of a duty as of a fact; he said, "the love of Christ constraineth
us."

Beloved brethren, if you are filled with love to your work, and love to souls,
and love to God, you will gladly endure many self-denials, which else would be
unbearable. The poverty of our country brethren is very trying, and ought by all
means to be relieved; but we may well feel proud that so many men are
forthcoming who, for the sake of preaching the gospel of Christ, are willing to
leave remunerative callings, and endure hardness. Other denominations might pay
them better, but they spurn the golden bribe, and remain faithful to Christ and
to the ordinances as they were delivered. All honor to those lifelong martyrs,
who put up with sore privations for the sake of Christ and His Church! The devil
once met a Christian man, so I have heard, and said to him, "You call yourself a
servant of God; what do you do more than I do? You boast that you fast, so do I;
for I neither eat nor drink. You do not commit adultery; neither do I." The
fiend mentioned a long list of sins of which he is incapable, from which he
could therefore claim exemption. The saint at last said to him, "I do one thing
which thou never didst; I deny myself." That is the point in which the Christian
comes out; he denies himself for Christ's sake. Believing in Jesus, he counts
all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus, his
Lord. Brethren, do not leave your charges because the stipend is small. Your
poor people must be looked after by somebody. Do not despair when times are
hard, for they will be better by-and-by; and, meanwhile, your Heavenly Father
knows your need. We have heard of men who have remained in plague-stricken
cities, when others fled, because they could be of service to the sick. Abide,
then, with your people when work fails them; be as faithful to your God as many
a man has been faithful to his philanthropy. If you can anyhow manage to tide
over the present distress, stick to the people. God will help you, and reward
you, if you have faith in Him. May the Lord confirm your confidence, and comfort
you in your tribulations!

Go on, brethren, preaching the same gospel; but preach it with more faith, and
preach it better every day. Do not draw back: your place is to the front.
Qualify yourselves for larger spheres, you who are in little places; but do not
neglect your studies to look after better positions. Be prepared for an opening
when it comes, and rest assured that the office will come to the man who is fit
for the office. We are not so cheap that we need go hawking ourselves in every
market; the churches are always on the lookout for really efficient: preachers.
Men whose fitness for the ministry is doubtful are at a great discount nowadays;
but for men of ability and usefulness there is great demand.

You cannot hide a candle under a bushel, and you cannot keep a really able man
in an insignificant position. Patronage is of the smallest importance; fitness
for the work, grace, ability, earnestness, and a loving disposition soon push
the man into his place. God will bring His servant into his true position, if he
has but faith to trust in Him. I put this word at the tail-end of my address,
because I know the discouragements under which you labour. Do not be afraid of
hard work for Christ; a terrible reckoning awaits those who have an easy time in
the ministry, but a great reward is in reserve for those who endure all things
for the elect's sake. You will not regret your poverty when Christ cometh, and
calleth His own servants to Him. It will be a sweet thing to have died at your
post, not turning aside for wealth, or running from Dan to Beersheba to obtain a
better salary, but stopping where your Lord bade you hold the fort.

Brethren, consecrate yourselves to God afresh. Bring hither new cords; and bind
the sacrifice again to the altar! Struggle as it may, anxious to escape the
knife, fearful of the fire, yet bind it with cords, even with cords to the horns
of the altar; for until death, and in death, we are the Lord's. Entire surrender
of everything to Jesus is our watchword this day. Only may the Lord accept the
living sacrifice, for Jesus Christ's sake! Amen.


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  CHAPTER 86: 07. STRENGTH IN WEAKNESS
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Chapter 7—Strength in Weakness MY DEAR BRETHREN,–I greatly value your prayers,
and I feel intensely grateful for that Benjamin's share in them which is ever my
portion. I never consciously needed your intercessions more than I do just now,
for I may say with the psalmist, "He weakened my strength in the way." After my
severe illness, I am trembling like a child who is only just commencing to use
his feet. It is with difficulty that I keep myself up; what can you expect from
one who can scarcely stand? During the last six weeks, I have considered from
day to day what to say to you, but nothing has come of my consideration. My
meditations have been a failure. I have gone to the pits and found no water, and
returned with my vessel empty. My brain has been so occupied with sympathy for
the poor body that it has not been able to mount aloft with the eagle, nor even
to plume its wings for the lower flight which I must needs attempt this morning
One thing, however, is clear,–I am in special communion with my subject, and can
speak, as the good old people used to say, "experimentally." I cannot, however,
draw much aid from that fact; but I cast myself upon the power Divine, which has
so many times been displayed in weakness. "The Lord hath been mindful of us: He
will bless us."

I draw my subject from the words of Paul in 2 Corinthians 12:10. "When I am
weak, then am I strong." I shall not be guilty of uttering anything fresh upon
my theme, neither shall I be able to say anything forcible upon it. The weak
side of the experience will come out most observably; I can only pray that the
strong side may not be hidden. My own feelings supply me with a commentary upon
the text, and that is all the exposition I shall aim at. Our text is not only
written in the Bible, but it is inscribed upon the lives of the saints. Though
we are not apostles, and shall never be able to claim the inspiration of
Paul,.yet in this one particular we are as instructed as he was, for we have
learned by experience, "When I am weak, then am I strong." This sentence has
passed into a Christian proverb; it is a paradox which has; ceased to perplex
any child of God; it is at once a warning and a consolation, bidding the strong
behold. the weakness of power, and setting before the feeble the strength of
weakness.

Let it be understood, at the commencement, that OUR TEXT IS NOT TRUE IN EVERY
SENSE IN WHICH IT MIGHT BE READ. Some brethren are weak with an emphasis, and
always so; but I have never yet discovered that they are strong, except in the
sense of being headstrong and willful. If obstinacy be strength, they are
champions; and if conceit be strength, they are gigantic; but in no other
respect are they strong.

Many are weak, and yet not strong: we must alter the text concerning them, and
say, "When they are weak, they are weakness itself." There is a kind of weakness
which we may well dread, it may steal over us insensibly; but it brings no
strength, no honor, no virtue with it; it is evil, only evil, and that
continually. With it; come unfitness for holy service and want of success; and
unless infinite grace shall avert the calamity, there will arise out of it
failure of character and defeat in life. May we never know the weakness which
befell Samson after he had told his secret, and had lost his locks! He could not
say, "When I am weak, then am I strong;" but rather, "When I am shorn, I am weak
as other men." See what befalls him! "The Philistines be upon thee, Samson!" He
cannot now smite them; he cannot protect his own limbs; he cannot guard his own
eyes; he cannot obtain his own liberty. Blinded, he toils at the mill; the hero
of Israel is become a slave to the uncircumcised Philistines! Alas, that such
weakness should be possible to a man who had slain his thousands, and laid them
heaps upon heaps! Oh, that such weakness should be possible to a man who had
carried the gates of Gaza away on his shoulders, posts, and bars, and all! And
yet it was so, and it may be so with us. "Howl, fir tree; for the cedar is
fallen!"

Brethren, we must strive against all weakness which leads to sin, lest to us
also some Delilah should bring destruction. Samson's unshorn locks denoted his
Nazarite consecration, and if we ever become weak through failure of
consecration, such weakness will be fatal to true usefulness. If the man who had
"none of self, and all of God," grows downward till he craves for "some of self,
and some of God," he is in a sad condition. If he, who once lived to win souls,
now lives to win silver and gold, his money shall perish with him; if he, who
once was famous for devotion to his Master, becomes his own master, he shall be
infamous; for I trow that, even if we do nothing wrong in the eyes of man, it is
wrong enough to have declined from whole-hearted service for God. It is this
that demons laugh at, and that angels marvel at;–a man of God living like a man
of the world! Even the Lord Himself stays a while to ask, "What doest thou here,
Elijah?" The holy and the zealous grieve if they see a minister of Christ
ministering to his own ambition. We are only strong as our consecration is
perfect. Unless we live wholly for God, Gut strength will suffer serious
leakage, and our weakness will be of that kind which degrades the believer till
the ungodly scornfully inquire, "Art thou also become weak as we? Art thou
become like unto us?"

We must, dear friends, never become weak in another sense, namely, in our
communion with God David slackened his fellowship with God, and Satan vanquished
him through Bathsheba; Peter followed afar off, and soon denied his Lord.
Communion with God is the right arm of our strength; and if this be broken, we
are weak as water. Without God, we can do nothing; and in proportion as we
attempt to live without Him, we ruin ourselves. Alas! that the man who has seen
the face of the Strong One, and has been made mighty, should forget where his
great strength lieth, and so become sick and enfeebled! He who has suspended his
visits to the banqueting-house of hallowed fellowship will be ill-fed, and will
have to cry out, "My leanness! My leanness! Woe unto me!" He who walks not with
the Well-beloved will soon be a Mephibosheth in the feet, and a Bartimaeus in
the eyes; timorous in heart, and trembling at his knees. If we are weak in
communion with God, we are weak everywhere. If a man can be strong without God,
such dangerous strength may fall to the lot of the man who is out of communion;
but if it be true that only as we hang upon the Lord are we strong, then broken
fellowship will soon bring broken strength.

And, dear friends, there is a kind of weakness which I hope none of you will
ever cultivate, though it seems greatly in favor at the present day, namely,
weakness of faith; for when I am weak in faith, then I am not strong in the
Lord. When a man doubts his God, he weakens himself. A little time ago, persons
who were full of distrust and unbelief were regarded as the possessors of a deep
experience; but I hope the age has for ever gone by in which unbelief shall be
regarded as a qualification for eminent saintship. If the gospel message were,
"He that doubteth, and is not baptized, shall be saved;" there are many who have
made their calling and election sure; but while ours is a gospel of faith,
unbelief can never be regarded with complacency. Faith is our battle-axe and
weapon of war; woe to the warrior who forgets it! Therefore, brethren, let us
separate between weakness and weakness,–the weakness which is the token of
strength, and weakness in faith which is the indication of spiritual decay.

I pray that we may' never be weak in love, but that we may become like Basil,
"pillars of fire." Love is the greatest of all the powers which can possess the
human breast. I must not compare love with other graces so as to depreciate any
virtue; yet, of all active powers, love is the most forceful; for even faith
worketh by love. Faith does not overcome men's hearts for Jesus until it takes
to itself this wondrous weapon, and then believingly loves them to Christ. Oh,
for a passionate love, a love which shall be a pure flame, burning to a white
heat, and consuming us! May this sacred fire burn in the very center of our
being! May we love our God intensely, and love the people for His sake!
Brethren, be strong there! Depend upon it, if you leave off loving the people to
whom you preach, and the truth you are ordained to proclaim, the state of the
church will be "as when a standard-bearer fainteth." There may remain to you
strength of passionate temper, strength to offend, and strength to scatter; but:
the power of God will be withdrawn. You will, like Phaeton, try to drive the
horses of the chariot of the sun; but they shall only hurry you to swift
destruction.

We want, brethren,–oh, how we would pine for it!–to be delivered from all
weakness of the spiritual life. We want to outgrow the weakness natural to us as
babes in Christ, so that we may become young men who are strong; yea, we need to
go beyond this, and to become fully-developed men in Christ Jesus, "strong in
the Lord, and in the power of His might." If we are weak in that respect, we are
strong nowhere. As ministers, we ought to covet all the spiritual strength which
God is ready to bestow. Would to God that the Holy Ghost, who dwelleth in us,
found nothing within to impede Him, and nothing to restrain His influences! Oh,
that the full Godhead of the blessed Spirit might as much manifest itself in
these mortal bodies of ours as once the Godhead of the second Person of the
Trinity manifested itself in the person of Christ Jesus, the Son of man! I mean
not, of course, miraculously, nor in any way to make us rival the incommunicable
glories of our Divine Master; but even to its fullness I would that our nature,
like the bush in Horeb, were aglow with the indwelling Deity. Never mind though
the bush should be consumed; it were well to be consumed so long as the Spirit
of God would dwell in us, and manifest His power.

Thus, you see, there are senses in which we flatly contradict the text, and
thereby establish its true meaning. If it were true that all who are weak are
strong, we might straightway find a vigorous ministry by ransacking our
hospitals, enlisting a troop from our idiot asylums, and calling together all
persons of weak brain and garrulous tongue. No, no; it is not given to the
fearful and the unbelieving, the foolish and the frivolous, to claim that their
mental, moral, and spiritual weaknesses are a fit platform for the revelation of
the Divine strength. A second observation must be brought before you before I
actually come to the text. THERE IS ANOTHER FORM OF IT WHICH IS CLEARLY TRUE.
"When I am strong, then am I weak." That is true, almost as true as Paul's
declaration, "When I am weak, then I am strong;"–of course, not true in all
senses, but so nearly correct that I would recommend its acceptation as a
proverb worthy to be quoted with the text itself.

Look at the tyro who has just commenced preaching in a village chapel or in a
mission-room, and admire his boundless confidence in his own strength. He has
collected certain, anecdotes and telling metaphors, and he propounds these as if
they were the Summa Theologia, the very flower and essence of wisdom. He is
voluble and energetic, though there is nothing in what he says. See him stamp
his feet, and clench his fists! He is a wonder unto many, for they see no
sufficient cause for his powerful self-assurance. Possibly he comes to College;
he enters the classroom feeling that, for once, a man treads the College floor.
The inhabitants of London shall know that verily there is a prophet among them.
We hear about this gentleman very soon, for he is not appreciated; his brethren
are not "willing for a season to rejoice in his light;" they even show a
disposition to snuff him out. Yet how perfectly self-satisfied he is! I have
heard such a brother deliver himself of nothing at all at extreme length, and
sit down full to the brim with satisfaction. I have almost envied and altogether
grieved over him. Many an abler man is weeping over his shortcomings, while this
poor soul is glorying in his own imagined triumphs Like Cowper's poor believer,–

"Pillow and bobbins all her little store," he knows this much, and nothing
more,–his abilities transcendent and his knowledge vast. How self-con-tent he
is! But he is not strong for all that. Did you fear him when you first came into
contact with him? Did you look upon him as an ironclad, utterly impregnable? The
delusion did not last long. "Man being in honor abideth not." If I remember
rightly, you who were in the college classroom began to try your prows upon this
man-of-war. You found that it was only a wooden ship after all. There is a grim
pleasure in seeing the mighty collapse; and that fell to your share. We felt a
degree of happiness in seeing the great man lose, ounce by ounce, his boasted
strength, till he {tied outright. We never buried the body of vainglory, for we
never knew precisely what became of it; but we were glad to find, in its place,
a diffident youth, who needed cheering lest he should too much depreciate
himself,–a lowly spirit, whom; in.due time, the Lord exalted. As he grew
consciously weak, he became strong, and discovered that, when he was strong in
his own opinion, he was in many ways weak.

Since we left the college benches, we have seen many strong men. I think I see
one sitting down in his study. He has been reading the Reviews and Quarterlies,
and a little of the latest modern thought: now he is looking out for a text. He
perfectly understands it, whatever it may be. At any rate, if he does not
understand it, who does? When he falls upon his text, he interprets it, not at
all desiring to know what the men of God who lived before him have said upon it,
for they were of a darker age, and he lives in the nineteenth century, that
world of wonders, that region of wisdom, that flower and glory of all time. Now
you shall see what you shall see when this cultured divine comes forth from his
chamber as a giant refreshed with new wine. No dew of the Spirit of God is upon
him, he does not require it; he drinks from other fountains. He speaks with
astounding power, his diction is superb, his thought prodigious! But he is as
weak as he is polished, as cold as he is pretentious; saints and sinners alike
perceive his weakness, and by degrees the empty pews confirm it. He is too
strong to ask to be strengthened of the Lord, and therefore he is too weak to
bless a congregation. He seeks another sphere, and another, and yet another; but
in no position is he powerful, for he is too strong in self. His preaching is
like a painted fire, no one is either cheered or alarmed by it.

We have known other men, who were not so strong, who felt that they could not
even understand the Word of God without Divine illumination, and who went to the
great Father of lights for that illumination. Trembling and afraid, they have
asked to be helped to speak the mind of God, and not their own mind; and God has
spoken through them, and they have been strong. They were weak, for they were
afraid lest their thoughts should stand in the way of God's thoughts, they were
fearful lest their mind should darken the Word of God; and yet they have been
truly strong, and humble people have listened to them, and said that God spake
through them; and sinners have listened, and though they have become angry, they
have come again, and at last have yielded themselves to Christ. Verily, God
spoke through that man.

I have known preachers who have been very weak, and yet they have been used of
the Lord. For many, many years, my own preaching was exceedingly painful to me
because of the fears which beset me before entering the pulpit. Often, my dread
of facing the people has been overwhelming. Even the physical feeling, which
came of the mental emotion, has been painful; but this weakness has been an
education for me. I wrote, many years ago, to my venerable grandfather, and told
him of many things that happened to me before preaching,–sickness of body, and
terrible fears, which often made me really ill. The old gentleman wrote back,
and said," I have been preaching for sixty years, and I still feel many
tremblings. Be content to have it so; for when your emotion goes away, your
strength will be gone." When we preach and think nothing of it, the people think
nothing of it, and God does nothing by it. An overwhelming sense of weakness
should not be regarded as an evil, but should be accepted as helpful to the true
minister of Christ.

Look at the preacher who has no burdens. His sermon is in his pocket; there
cannot happen any mischief to it unless a thief should steal it; he has
rehearsed all his action, he is as safe as an automaton. He does not need to
pray for the Spirit of God to help him in his preaching; and though he uses the
form, one wonders what the prayer can mean. He surveys the congregation with the
complacency of a gardener looking at a bed of flowers. He has something to say,
and he: knows what it is going to be, every word of it, and therefore he says it
with ease, and comes down the stairs as pleased with himself as heart could
desire; the notion of trembling is far from him, he is not so weak. Yonder is a
poor brother, who has been tugging away with his brains, wrestling on his knees,
and bleeding at his heart; he is half-afraid that he may break down in the
sermon, and he is fearful that he will not reach the hearts of the people; but
he means to try what can be done by the help of God. Be you sure that he will
get at the people, and God will give him converts. He is looking up to God, for
he feels so feeble in himself. You know which of the two preachers you would
sooner hear, and you know who is the really strong man of the two; the weak man
is strong, and the strong man is weak. An American divine, who says a great many
things that are wise, and a few which are otherwise, says that the best
preparation for preaching is to get a good night's rest, and to eat a good
breakfast. According to his opinion, a fine constitution is a most efficient
help to preaching the gospel. If you know nothing of the headache, and nothing
of the heartache, and never allow anything to disturb the equilibrium of your
mind, you may expect to be a very successful minister. It may be so. I would not
depreciate health, appetite, a bounding spirit, and a good Saturday night's
sleep; but these things are not all, nor much. Mens sana in corpore sano, by all
means; but where that has been a good deal relied upon, it has displayed itself
in fine sensational sermons; but, brethren, I question whether the next
generation will say that it has proved itself fruitful in spiritual teaching
which will feed the soul or move the conscience. Many of the noblest specimens
of our sermonic literature have come from men who were patient sufferers. Men
who have had the most touching pathos, the highest spirituality, the most
marvelous insight into the deep things of God, have often known little of bodily
health. Calvin labored under many fierce disorders, yet shall we ever see his
like? Robert Hall was rarely free from pain, but who ever spoke more gloriously?
And here I would mention one whom all of us love, Charles Stanford, who grows
sweeter and sweeter as he grows weaker and weaker, and who sees all the more
clearly now that his eyes grow dim. My brethren, physical force is not our
strength; it may be our weakness. Health is to be desired, and carefully
preserved where we have it; but if we lose it, we may count it all joy, and look
forward to be able to exclaim with Paul, "When I am weak, then am I strong." In
some form or other, we must be tried. A preacher who has no cross to carry, a
prophet of the Lord without a burden, is an unprofitable servant and a burden to
the church.

It would be a dreadful thing to be a pastor without cares. I do not address any
such, I am happy to believe; but I do address some who, as pastors, are
overloaded with cares, and overweighed with sorrows. Perhaps the largeness of
your church, or, more likely, the smallness of it, may be to you a daily
trouble. Do not ask to be otherwise than troubled. The shepherd who can always
go to bed regularly at night, and who is able to say, "I do not have much
trouble with my flock," is not the man to be envied. He coolly says, "A few
lambs died last winter; we must expect that kind of thing. It is true that some
sheep died of starvation; but if the meadows failed, I could not help that."
That is the kind of shepherd who deserves to be eaten by the next wolf; but the
man who is able to say with Jacob, "In the day the drought consumed me, and the
frost by night," is the true shepherd. He is most irregular as to his rest; the
only thing regular about him is his labor and his disappointment, and yet faith
makes him a happy man. When you grow very weak as a pastor, and your charge
utterly overcomes you, do not repine at such weakness, for then you will be at
your full strength; but when you are strong as a pastor, and say, "I think that,
to be a minister, is an easy matter," you may depend upon it that you are weak.

Permit me here to say that, whenever a brother gets to be so strong as to talk
much of his own holiness, then also he is weak. I have not observed yet that
anybody who has had grace to make into flags has won the more victories in
consequence. I have required, as far as I am concerned, all my grace to make
into a sword; I have wanted all my power for real fighting; but, as to making a
single banner out of it to display before men, I have not yet attained unto
that, and must still take a very lowly position among the servants of God.
Coleridge was once asked whether he believed in ghosts, and he said that he did
not, for he had seen too many of them! If anyone asked me if I believed in.
perfect men, I should have to say that I have seen too many of them to believe
in them. A ghost is a wonderful affair, and when you see it at first, it makes
each particular hair of your head "to stand on end, like quills upon the fretful
porcupine." But this does not occur a second time, for a suspicion of hollow
turnip and candle steals over you. We heard of one, the other day, who even
dared to squirt carmine over a spirit which had been conjured from the vasty
deep at a séance. I have sometimes ventured to oppose a perfect man, and the
warmth of his temper has been evidence to me that, while he may have been upon
the verge of perfection among his own friends, he had not absolutely reached
that consummation when exposed to the colder judgment of strangers. The
pretender to perfection has usually avoided me from a distaste to my
Protestantism against his holiness; and I have not bewailed my loss. I am not in
love with that perfection which talks about itself. There is little virtue in
the beauty which calls attention to itself; modest beauty is the last to extol
its own charms. A number of persons, in company, were boasting of their graces
and attainments, and only one brother sat silent. At last, one said to him,
"Have you no holiness?" "Yes," he said, "but I never had any to boast of." All
the holiness that can be had let us have, and let us press on toward perfection;
but let us still recollect the fact that, when we are strong, then we are weak;
that, when we think we have reached perfection, the blue mould of pride is
coming over us. We have not afforded ourselves a complete inspection, or we
should have found some fault to repent of, some evil yet to struggle against.

Hitherto, we have been going round the text, after the example of Rowland Hill;
now let us come fairly up to it: "When I am weak, then am I strong."

I. Here is, first, A DEPRESSING EXPERIENCE: "When I am weak." When is that?
Truly we are so always. Is there ever a time when the strongest Christian is not
comparatively weak? But there are certain seasons when we are consciously weak.
Take Paul's case as an illustration. He had been caught up to the third heaven,
but he could not bear revelations so well as John, who had enough of them to
fill a book, and yet was never elated by them; but Paul was not so well
qualified to be a seer, for he was more at home with arguments than with
visions; and, therefore, when he saw a vision, he set great store by it. He kept
his secret for fifteen years; but it was such a very remarkable thing for him,
and so much out of his natural line of things, that the tendency in him was to
"be exalted above measure through the abundance of the revelations;" and
therefore the Lord sent, not Satan, but "the messenger of Satan,"–a mean,
despicable spirit,–not to fight with him with sword and buckler, but to "buffet"
him, as boys do, their playmates. Have you never had an insignificant thing to
vex you, like a fly buzzing around you? Have you not felt the trial to be
intensely worrying, and yet meanly trifling? You could have girded yourself to
meet a lion; but this trouble was a mere yelping cur, and it irritated you to
the last degree, and inflicted a pain upon you. Paul does not describe his trial
as the cut of a sword, else he would have bound it up; it was only the prick of
a thorn; he could scarcely see the cause of the pain, or he would have taken a
needle, and extracted it; but it was a little thorn which had buried itself in
the flesh, and festered there. This was Paul's worry, and it was sent to keep
him humble. Paul might have gloried in wrestling with the devil; but this "thorn
in the flesh" was a wretched business. To grapple with a great temptation, and
to hurl it to the ground, has a grandeur in it which inspires you; but; it is
very different when you are assailed by a thing so small that you despise
yourself for taking notice of it, and yet it frets your soul. You say to
yourself, "How weak I am! Why am I thus irritated and disturbed? If anyone else
made half this fuss about a little thorn, I should say, 'You ought to know
better;' and yet here am I, a preacher of the gospel, greatly tried by a trifle,
and beseeching the Lord thrice to take it away from me, for I cannot bear it."
Do we ever get into such a condition? I wish that, at such a time, we would
confess our abject weakness, and cast ourselves upon God, for then should we be
made strong. This festering of the thorn does not afflict us all, because it
does not happen to all of us to see visions; but many servants of God are made
to feel their weakness in another way, by an oppressive sense of responsibility.
Brethren, I speak to you as unto wise men, who will not: misunderstand me. I
hope you will always feel your responsibility before God; but do not carry the
feeling: too far. We may feel our responsibility so deeply that we may become
unable to sustain it; it may cripple our joy, and make slaves of us. Do not take
art exaggerated view of what the Lord expects of you. He will not blame you for
not doing that which is beyond your mental power or physical strength. You are
required to be faithful, but you are not bound to be successful. You are to
teach, but you cannot compel people to learn. You are to make things plain, but
you cannot give carnal men an understanding of spiritual things. We are not the
Father, nor the Savior, nor the Comforter of the Church. We cannot take the
responsibility of the universe upon our shoulders. While vexing ourselves with
fancied obligations, we may overlook our real burdens. I could sit down, and
meditate, until I felt the responsibility of the whole South of London upon my
back, and this would render me unable to look after my own church. What is the
practical result of making yourself, as one man, responsible for the work of
twenty men? Will you do any more? Will you do it any better? I saw a horse, this
morning, which was pulling at a three-horse load. How he tugged! How he strained
himself! I thought to myself, "There is a good horse being ruined. His master
ought to take off part of his load, or else put more horses to pull with him."
Does our Lord and Master treat us in this fashion? No; we overload ourselves. We
get tugging away as if the salvation of the world depended upon our straining
ourselves to death. Now, I do not want you to get away from feeling a due
measure of responsibility; but then you are not God, and you do not stand in
God's place; you are not the rulers of providence, and you have not been elected
sole managers of the covenant of grace; therefore do not act as if you were.

But, dear brethren, having said this much by way of caveat, lest I should lead
any of you to despair, let me now ask, Have we any of us fully felt the measure
of our responsibility? If there be one such here, let him speak; but I shall not
believe him. We have not done what we should have done, what we could have done,
nor what we ought to have done, nor what we will yet do in God's strength.
Perhaps we have worked up to the full of what was expected of us in quantity;
but how about the quality? It may be we have attended quite enough meetings, and
delivered quite enough sermons; but then, has this been done in an apostolic
spirit, and night and day with tears have we warned men, and pleaded with them
as in the sight of God? Our responsibilities, when they are thoroughly felt,
crush us, and then are we weak indeed; but this weakness is the road to
strength. "When I am weak, then am I strong." And do we not often feel weak in
the sense of utter unfitness for being ministers at all by reason of our own
sinfulness? Paul said of his calling to the ministry, "Woe is unto me, if I
preach not the gospel!" We can say that, too; yet, sometimes, we feel as if we
would speak no more for Christ, and we should sink into silence were it not that
His Word is as a fire in our bones:, and we cannot refrain. Then we think we
will go away into the far West, and in some log cabin teach a few children the
way of salvation, for we do not feel fit for anything higher. Our shortcomings
and our failures stare us out of countenance, and then are we painfully weak;
but this also is the highway to strength: "When I am weak, then am I strong."

Sometimes we grow depressed and weak because our sphere of labor seems specially
difficult. This is not the time to dilate upon the peculiar trials of cur
pastorates. Ministers in London could tell a tale that would astonish you, for
they see things which are their burden day and night. As for our country
brethren, what some of: them have had to put up with! They cannot move the
deacons and the church at all, perhaps the deacons wish to move them; they
cannot get at the people, and though they preach their hearts out, they preach
to empty pews. If we could only put certain men into the positions which their
brethren faithfully occupy under great discouragement, they would know
themselves better, and leave off boasting, and instead of finding fault, they
would wonder that so much has been accomplished under such circumstances. By
that way also we become strong; when God makes us feel that our work is
impossible to us without His aid, then are we driven to His strength.

Some of you are quite alone as to the helpful fellowship of kindred spirits.
This is a trying deprivation, and may well depress you. Beside this, many of you
are poor. and you hardly know how to support your families. As I listened to the
prayer of the brother who led our devotions just now, and remembered what he is
suffering, and how he has actually worked in the harvest-fields, with
working-men, so that he might earn his bread, and preach the gospel, I felt that
I could rejoice in him. Still, I know that poverty often makes a man feel sadly
weak; when his children are without shoes, and the wife's dress is nearly
worn-out, and he knows not where any more are to come from, his heart sinks
within him. In addition to this, it may be that reproach comes undeservedly. A
scandalous story from the father of lies may be forged against you, and you may
be quite unable to defend yourself'. You fear lest, in trying to erase the blot,
you might spoil the page. Hearts are broken over this matter. Oh, how weak a man
becomes when this is the case; he may half feel himself guilty after having
heard the accusation repeated again and again:, although all the while he is as
pure as the driven snow. This brings a weakness which may paralyze a man. Oh, to
be strong in the Lord at such times!

I suppose you do not think that I ever get dried up and find it difficult to say
anything fresh in my sermons; yet so it is. Think, dear brethren; I have already
so many volumes of sermons in print. It grows harder to say anything new as
those volumes increase. "Where will the next sermon come from?" is the question
we have asked ourselves again and again; we have feared that we could not keep
up the supply, and we have felt our own weakness to a terrible degree; but this,
also, is the way to strength. So prepare yourselves, my younger brethren, to
become weaker and weaker; prepare yourselves for sinking lower and lower in
self-esteem; prepare yourselves for self-annihilation, and pray God to expedite
the process.

Certain brethren know nothing of this experience, they are not weak at all; but
despise such confessions. Have you never met with preachers who can keep on and
on, though they never did say anything, and never will? Yet they never know what
it is to be weak; they are just as able today as ever they were. I have heard of
an old Scotch preacher, whose divisions were very numerous, and whose
subdivisions were almost innumerable; so one day the people, one by one, went
away, until at last the boy took the keys up, and said to him, "You can lock the
church up when you have done." Some are so very long in saying nothing, and are
so surely emptying their places, that it would be wise to hand them the keys so
that they might retire when they are quite through. As for some of us, we are
consciously feeble; and when we prose, we know it. We come out of the pulpit, at
times, feeling that we are less fit than ever for the holy work. Our last sermon
we judge to be our worst, and frequently for that reason it is our best; we
grow, and among other growths we grow downwards. We shall go on feeling less
fit, and still less fit, and all the while we shall be becoming more ready to be
used of the Lord. I know one who said, the other night, when she was reading,
that it seemed as if her eyes had dropped out. The truth was, her spectacles had
fallen off. Go on losing your spectacles, and be sure that you get rid of all
those holy tones and whines, and grotesque methods, and stiff-nesses and
mannerisms, which are not your eyes, but only shockingly bad spectacles.

II. I conclude by speaking upon THE BLESSED EXPERIENCE: "When I am weak, then am
I strong." How is it, and how can it be?

Well, first, it is when I am weak that I am sure to flee to God for succor and
help. The little conies mentioned in Scripture were poor, puny creatures, yet
they baffled the sportsman. Learn a lesson from them: "The conies are but a
feeble folk, yet make they their houses in the rocks." Brethren, because I
cannot think, I hide behind a doctrine which God has thought out for me; and
because I cannot invent a hypothesis, I rest my soul on a self-evident fact; and
because I cannot even be: consistent with myself, I get behind the plain
teaching of the text, and there I abide. It is wonderful how strong a man feels
in such a hiding-place. When you cannot lay a stone, and cannot lift a trowel by
yourself, then you may begin to build for God, for He will make you a worker
together with Him, your feebleness will be linked to the eternal strength, and
then the wall will rise with speed.

Next, we are strong when we are weak because we gain our strength by prayer, and
our weakness is our best argument in supplication. Jacob never conquered until
he limped, nay, until he fell. When the sinew shrank, the suppliant triumphed.
When you are engaged in prayer, plead your strength, and you will get nothing;
then plead your weakness, and you will prevail. There is no better plea with
Divine love than weakness and pain; nothing can so prevail with the great heart
of God as for your heart to faint and swoon. The man who rises in prayer to
tears and agony, and feels all the while as if he could not pray, and yet must
pray,–he is the man who will see the desire of his soul. Do not mothers always
care most for the tiniest child, or for that one which is most sick? Do we not
spend the greatest care upon that one of our children which has the least use of
its limbs; and is it not true that our weakness holds God's strength, and leads
Him to bow His omnipotence to our rescue?

There is another strength in weakness which it is well for us to have. I believe
that, when we preach in conscious weakness, it adds a wonderful force to the
words we utter. When Mr. Knill went out to distribute tracts among the soldiers,
he tells us that there was one wicked man who said to his comrades, "I will cure
him of coming to us with his tracts;" so, when a ring was made around the
minister and the blasphemer, he cursed Mr. Knill with awful oaths. Hearing those
profane words, Mr. Knill burst into tears, and said how he longed for the man's
salvation. Years after, he met that soldier again, when the man said to him, "I
never took notice of your tracts, or of anything that you said; but when I saw
you cry like a child, I could not stand it, but gave my heart to God." When we
tell our people how we are hampered, but how much we long for their souls'
salvation; when we ask them to excuse our broken language, for it is the
utterance of our hearts, they believe in our sincerity, for they see how our
hearts are breaking and they are moved by what we say. The man who grinds out
theology at so much a yard has no power over men; the people need men who can
feel,–men of heart, weak and feeble men, who can sympathize with the timid and
sorrowful. It is a blessed thing if a minister can weep his way into men's
souls, or even stammer a path into their hearts. So, brethren, do not be afraid
of being weak, but rejoice to be able to say, with the apostle, "When I am weak,
then am I strong."

Besides this, another form of strength comes of weakness, for by it our sympathy
is educated. When you and I become weak, and are depressed in spirit, and our
soul passes through the valley of the shadow of death, it is often on account of
others. One Sabbath morning, I preached from the text, "My God, My God, why hast
Thou forsaken Me?" and though I did not say so, yet I preached my own
experience. I heard my own chains clank while I tried to preach to my
fellow-prisoners in the dark; but I could not tell why I was brought into such
an awful horror of darkness, for which I condemned myself. On the following
Monday evening, a man came to see me who bore all the marks of despair upon his
countenance. His hair seemed to stand upright, and his eyes were ready to start
from their sockets. He said to me, after a little parleying, "I never before, in
my life, heard any man speak who seemed to know my heart. Mine is a terrible
case; but on Sunday morning you painted me to the life, and preached as if you
had been inside my soul." By God's grace, I saved that man from suicide, and led
him into gospel light and liberty; but I know I could not have done it if I had
not myself been confined in the dungeon in which he lay. I tell the story,
brethren, because you sometimes may not understand your own experience, and the
perfect people may condemn you for having it; but what know they of God's
servants? You and I have to suffer much for the sake of the people of our
charge. God's sheep ramble very far, and we have to go after them; and sometimes
the shepherds go where they themselves would never roam if they were not in
pursuit of lost sheep. You may be in Egyptian darkness, and you may wonder why
such a horror chills your marrow; but you may be altogether in the pursuit of
your calling, and be led of the Spirit to a position of sympathy with desponding
minds. Expect to grow weaker, brethren, that you may comfort the weak, and so
may become masters in Israel in the judgment of others; while, in your own
opinion, you are less than the least of all saints.

More than this, I believe that my text is true when a man becomes weak through
love to the particular place in which he is called to labor. Suppose a brother
placed in the midst of a dense, poor population, and he feels the responsibility
of his work, and the misery of souls around him, until it gets such a hold upon
him that he cannot escape from it He tries to think of more cheerful subjects,
but he cannot shake off the nightmare of the people's poverty and sin. It is
with him by day, and it is with him by night; he hears the crying of the
children, and the walling of the women; he hears the sighing of the men, and the
groans of the sick and dying, and he comes to be almost a monomaniac in his
desperate zeal for his own part of the great field of service. Yes, that man may
kill himself with anxiety; but, meanwhile, it: is evident that he is the man
whom God has sent to bless the people. He will go on thinking, and praying, and
planning, until, at last, he will hit on a method which outsiders may judge to
be as odd as the man; but he will carry it out, and the whole district will be
the better for it.

Oh, it is a blessing when God casts a godly man into the middle of a mass of
misery, and keeps him there! It may not be a pleasant thing for him, but it will
bring a sevenfold reward in the end. I am glad that Howard felt that he must go
through all the prisons in Europe. He had a comfortable home of his own, and yet
he must roam through France, and Germany, and Russia, poking his nose into every
pestilential dog hole where prisoners were to be found. He makes himself
familiar with the unimaginable horrors of dungeon life, and suffers fevers born
of the jail filth. He has a choice nose for the worst atmosphere; the fouler it
is, the more needful that he should breathe it, for he has a passion for the
discovery and destruction of prison cruelty. He comes home, and writes a book
upon his pet subject: and then, after a little while, he is off again, and at
last he dies a martyr to the cause he has espoused; yet it was worth while to be
a Howard who could live and could die to rescue his fellowmen. Mr. Howard, it is
because you are so very weak, and suffer so much from prison-on-the-brain, that
you are strong; you will accomplish reforms while others are talking of them. I
daresay there were some who said, "These things must be gradually ameliorated by
the progress of better principles, and we must try new notions by degrees." Yes,
this gradual reform is a prudent idea; but then Mr. Howard is such a weak-minded
man that he goes raking up horrible stories, and insisting upon it that murder
by imprisonment must cease at once. Brethren, may you become weak in like
fashion,–almost out of your minds with restless resolve to save souls! If you
break loose in an absurd way, and set the chill proprieties a-trembling, and the
imbecilities ridiculing, it will cause me great joy. Little do I care if you
become fools for Christ's sake. When our weakness verges upon fanaticism, it may
have all the more power about it. Mr. Plimsoll did nobly when he stood up and
pleaded against coffin-ships; but he was never so strong as when he lost
himself, and broke the rules of the House of Commons in the ardor of his
passion. It was very weak of him, but in that weakness lay his strength. Give us
more of the speech which comes of a burning heart, as lava comes of a volcanic
overflow. When the truth conquers us, we shall conquer by the truth.

Once more, weakness is strength because, often, a man's sense of weakness
arouses the whole of him; whatever there is in the man then comes out, it makes
him intense in every part. Certain small animals are much more to be dreaded in
fight than larger beasts, because they are so active and furious that they bite
so fast. A man might almost as well face a hyena as a rat or a weasel, because
these lesser creatures are all alive, and so intent on the attack, that they
fight with their whole bodies; claws and teeth are all at work, and thus they
become strong through that sense of weakness which causes them to use every atom
of force which they possess. Have you never seen a great man, perhaps a Doctor
of Divinity, concerning whom you have felt how mighty he is? We all acknowledge
his strength; but what does he accomplish? A far smaller man, full of grace and
ardor, and all alive in working for the Lord, achieves much more. The conscious
littleness of the man makes him live intensely unto God.

"When I am weak, then am I strong." Because I cannot do much, therefore I will
do all I can. Because I have little power, therefore I will use all the power I
have. Do not the tradesmen say that "a nimble nine-pence is better than a lazy
half-crown "? I am sure it is so. A sense of weakness may bestir us to a bravery
which else we had not known. Look at our own country, ages ago, when Spain tried
to destroy her. See the Invincible Armada! Huge ships burden the sea, and Papal
warriors are speeding to seize the prey. England must do her best. On the one
side is Spain, mistress of empires, and on the other is a poor little island,
with a brave queen, it is true, but with an army and navy slender to the last
degree. The monster ships are off Plymouth; here they come, like a half-moon, or
like jaws opening to swallow us up. What is happening in Britain? Why, everybody
is preparing for the battle, and every man and every woman on the island will
fight to the death. All the seafaring folk are on the alert. Our sailors in
their diminutive vessels are hovering round the huge galleons, waiting for an
opportunity to strike a blow, and the opportunity comes:

"Look how the Lion of the sea lifts up his ancient crown,

And underneath his deadly paw treads the gay lilies down."

God watches over England. He blows with His wind, and the sea covers the:
Armada, and Spain is smitten, and England is saved. It was a sense of weakness
that aroused the valor of our forefathers, and stirred the saints to cry to God
for help. Go to, ye mighty ones, ye are not strong. Come ye up, ye weak ones, to
the help of the Lord, to the help of the Lord against the mighty, for ye are
"strong in the Lord, and in the power of His might." And this, last of all, is
the reason why we are strong when we are weak, namely, because the sacrifice is
being consummated. When was Christ strongest but when He was weakest? When did
He shake the kingdom of darkness but when He was nailed to the tree? When did He
put away sin for His people but when His heart was pierced? When did He trample
upon death and the old dragon but when He was Himself about to die? His victory
was in the extremity of His weakness, namely, in His death; and it must be the
same with His trembling Church. She has no might; she must suffer, she must be
slandered, and derided, and so the Lord will triumph through her. The conquering
sign is still the cross. Wherefore, brethren, let us be perfectly content to
decrease even unto the end, that our right royal Lord and King may gloriously
increase from day to day. Amen.


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  CHAPTER 87: 08. WHAT WE WOULD BE
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Chapter 8—What We Would Be THIS ASSEMBLY begins to be venerable. For years, we
were a band of young men; but now, our own sons are with us, comrades of our
ministry, and we feel that we are, no longer striplings. We have not yet reached
the sere and yellow leaf, nor have we come to our dotage, or our anecdotage; but
we are tending toward maturity, and are impressed with the conviction that, if
ever we are to do anything for our Lord Jesus, we must do it at once. To us
remains no time for loitering, or even for leisure. To me, at least, eternity
seems so near that I cannot frame an excuse for delay. "Now or never," sounds
sternly in my ears.

RETROSPECT

Coming together, as we do now, after more than twenty years of brotherly
Conferences, and some of us after more than thirty years of ministry, what
recollections surround us! In the crystal glass of memory, we see the past
living and moving. Far be it from me, though racked with pain, to cloud that
glass with the hot breath of my own anxiety; yet I must. say this,–Never do I
look back upon my own past without regret. I am among the most favored of my
Lords' servants, and f sink into the dust while I joyfully confess it. I have no
complaints to make against my God, yet I have nothing else but complaints to
make against myself. It seems to me that, wherein by Divine grace I have
succeeded, I might have succeeded on a far larger scale had I been a better man.
Want of faith on my part may have hampered and hindered my Lord. If I have fed
the saints of God, I might have fulfilled that sacred pastorate far more to my
Lord's praise had I only been more fit to be used by His Spirit. How can I take
a vainglorious complacency in the little which has been accomplished, when
before my eyes I see an immeasurable mass of possibilities which I have missed?
This will be a healthy feeling for the younger brethren, who are flushed with
their first victories. Let them rise to a higher scale of expectancy, lest they
readily become self-satisfied, and thus destroy all hope of a great life.
Believe me, young brother, as our years sober us, we become more and more aware
of our imperfections, and feel less and less inclined to admire our own
performances. To me, a retrospect means a hearty psalm of praise, and a deep
sigh of regret. Unto the Lord be glory forever; but unto me belong shame and
confusion of face. But what is the use of regret unless we can rise by it to a
better future? Sighs, which do not raise us higher, are an ill use of vital
breath. Chasten yourselves, but be not discouraged. Gather up the arrows which
aforetime fell wide of the mark, not to break them in passionate despair, but to
send them to the target with direct aim, and a more concentrated force. Weave
victories out of defeats. Learn success from failure, wisdom from blundering.
Through grace, if we have done well, we will do better. We will more fully
acquaint ourselves with God, that, being more in harmony with Him, our life may
be pitched to a Diviner key. Mayhap, the cure for these ill days may lie near to
our own mending. When our own torches have less of smoke, and more of heavenly
flame, the night may not seem quite so drear.

PROSPECT With regard to the prospect before us I may be supposed to be a prophet
of evil; but I am not. I mourn the terrible defections from the truth which are
now too numerous to be thought of in detail; nevertheless, I am not disquieted,
much less dispirited. That cloud will blow over, as many another has done. I
think the outlook is better than it was. I do not think the devil is any better:
I never expected he would be; but he is older. Brethren, whether that is for the
better or for the worse, I do not know; but, assuredly, the arch-enemy is not
quite such a novelty among us as he was. We are not quite so much afraid of that
particular form of devilry which is raging now, because we begin to perceive its
shape. The unknown appeared to be terrible; but familiarity has removed alarm.
At the first, this "modern thought" looked very like a lion; the roaring thereof
was terrible, though to some ears there was always a suspicion of braying about
it. On closer inspection, the huge king of beasts looked more like a fox, and
now we should honor it if we likened it to a wild cat. We were to have been
devoured of lions, but the monsters are not to be seen. Scientific religion is
empty talk without either science or religion in it. The mountain has brought
forth its mouse, or, at any rate, the grand event is near. Very soon, "advanced
thought" will only be mentioned by servant girls and young Independent
ministers. It has gradually declined till it may now be carried off with the
slops. There is nothing in the whole bag of tricks. At this hour, I see the tide
turning;–not that I care much for that, for the rock on which I build is
unaffected by ebb, or flood of human philosophy. Still, it is interesting to
remark that the current is; not setting in quite the same direction as
heretofore. Young' men, who have tried modern doubt, have seen their
congregations dwindle away beneath its withering power; and they are, therefore,
not quite so enamoured of it as they were. It is time they should make a change;
for Christian people have observed that these advanced men have not been
remarkable for abundant grace, and they have even been led to think that their
loose views on doctrine were all of a piece with looseness as to religion in
general. Want of soundness in the faith is usually occasioned by want of
conversion. Had certain men felt the power of the gospel in their own souls,
they would not so readily have forsaken it to run after fables.

Lovers of the eternal truth, you have nothing to fear! God is with those who are
with Him. He reveals Himself to those who believe His revelation. Our march is
not to and fro, but onward unto victory. "The Egyptians whom ye have seen today,
ye shall see them again no more for ever." Other enemies will arise, even as
Amalekites, Hivites, Jebusites, Perizzites, and all the rest of them, rose up
against Israel; but, in the Name of the Lord, we shall pass on to possess the
promised heritage.

PROPOSAL

Meanwhile, it is for us quietly to labor on. Our daydreams are over: we shall
neither convert the world to righteousness, nor the church to orthodoxy. We
refuse to bear responsibilities which do not belong to us, for our real
responsibilities are more than enough. Certain wise brethren are hot to reform
their denomination. They ride out gallantly. Success be to the champions! They
are generally wiser when they ride home again. I confess great admiration for my
Quixotic brethren, but I wish they had more to show for their valor. I fear that
both church and world are beyond us; we must be content with smaller spheres.
Even our own denomination must go its own way. We: are only responsible so far
as our power goes, and it will be wise to use that power for some object well
within reach. For the rest, let us not worry and weary about things beyond our
line. What if we cannot destroy all the thorns and thistles which curse the
earth; we can, perhaps, cleanse our own little plot If we cannot transform the
desert into a pasture, we may at least make two blades of grass grow where only
one grew before; and that will be something.

Brethren, let us look well to our own steadfastness in the faith, our own holy
walking with God. Some say that such advice is selfish; but I believe that, in
truth, it is not selfishness, but a sane and practical love of others which
leads us to be mindful of our own spiritual state. Desiring to do its level
best, and to use its own self in the highest degree to God's glory, the true
heart seeks to be in all things right with God. He who has learned to swim has
fostered a proper selfishness, for he has thereby acquired the power of helping
the drowning. With the view of blessing others, let us covet earnestly the best
blessings for ourselves.

PERSONAL AMBITION

I want to make the most of myself. I may not even yet know the way to be most
useful, but I would like to know very soon. At least, I can honestly go the
length of saying that, if I felt that I could be more useful outside of the
pulpit than within it, I would hurry out of it at once. If there was a street
corner where I was Divinely assured that, by my blacking of shoes, God could be
more glorified than He is by my bearing witness before the great congregation, I
would welcome the information, and practically obey it. Some men never can do
much for God in the way which they would prefer, for they were newer cut out for
the work. Owls will never rival falcons by daylight; but, then, falcons would be
lost in the enterprise of hunting barns at night for rats and mice, and such
small deer. Each creature is not only good, but "very good" in its own place,
fulfilling its own office: out of that place, it may become a nuisance. Friend,
be true to your own destiny! One man would make a splendid preacher of downright
hard-hitting Saxon; why must he ruin himself by cultivating an ornate style?
Another attempting to be extremely simple would throw himself away, for he is
florid by nature; why should he not follow his bent? Apollos has the gift of
eloquence; why must he copy blunt Cephas? Every man in his own order. It seems
to me; that, nowadays, every man prefers his own disorder. Let each man find out
what God wants him to do, and then let him do it, or die in the attempt. In what
way can I bring my Lord most glory, and be of most service to His Church while I
am here? Solve that question, and pass into the practical.

MORE GRACE

One thing is past all question; we shall bring our Lord most glory if we get
from Him much grace. If I have much faith, so that I can take God at His word;
much love, so that the zeal of His house eats me up; much hope, so that I am
assured of fruit from my labor; much patience, so that I can endure hardness for
Jesus' sake; then I shall greatly honor my Lord and King. Oh, to have much
consecration, my whole nature being absorbed in His service; then, even though
my talents may be slender, I shall make my life to burn and glow with the glory
of the Lord! This way of grace is open to us all. To be saintly is within each
Christian's reach, and this is the surest method of honoring God. Though the
preacher may not collect more than a hundred in a village chapel to hear him
speak, he may be such a man of God that his little church will be choice
seed-corn, each individual worthy to be weighed against gold. The preacher may
not get credit for his work in the statistics which reckon scores and hundreds;
but in that other book, which no secretary could keep, where things are weighed
rather than numbered, the worker's register will greatly honor his Master.

NEED OF GREAT CARE

Brethren, my desire is to do everything for the Lord in first-rate style. We are
all of us eager to do much for the Lord, but there is a more excellent way. With
ringing trowel we strike away and build a wall, and girdle a city in six months:
the aforesaid wall will be down in six days afterwards. It would be better to do
more by doing less. Thoroughness is infinitely preferable to superficial area.
It is well to work for God microscopically; each tiny bit of our work should
bear the closest inspection. The work of the Church had need be done in perfect
fashion; for her flaws are sure to show themselves in exaggerated form before
long. The sins of today are the sorrows of ages. Look at those straths in the
Highlands which remain to this day Roman Catholic. Had they, at the time of the
Reformation, been carefully visited by a Protestant ministry, they could not
have remained for centuries in bondage to old Rome. How slight a deviation from
the right line may involve ages of dreary labor! Our Puritan forefathers raised
their walls, and laid their stones in fair colors, building well the city of
God. Then that greatest of heroes, Oliver Cromwell, looked upon them, and lent
his aid He handled the sword of steel as few have ever done, but his carnal
weapon agreed not with the temple of the Lord. The Lord seemed to say to him,
even as He said unto David, "Thou shalt not build an house for My Name, because
thou hast been a man of war, and hast shed blood." Therefore Puritanism had to
come down, with all its exceeding stateliness of holiness, because it's sons saw
not that the Kingdom of the Lord is not of Church and State, nor of the law of
nations, but purely of the Spirit of the Lord. We, upon whom the ends of the
world are come, must be careful that we do not send the armies of the Lord
wandering for another forty years in the wilderness, when Canaan else had been
so near. The Lord help us to be workmen that need not to be ashamed, rightly
dividing the Word of truth! May we live in the eye of the ages, past and future;
above all, may we live as seeing Him who is invisible!

AROUSAL

Need I affectionately call upon you, my brethren, to stir up the gifts which are
in you? Cultivate your natural and gracious qualifications for the ministry. The
pastor knows far more than when he left College; has he learned all he ought to
have learned in that interval? No doubt many of our brethren–

"Grow wiser than their teachers are,

And better know the Lord."

I am not so sure about those who are the most eager to assert this of
themselves. Real progress may be usually reckoned by the gauge of humility. He
knows most who is most aware that he knows little. We have all great need of
much hard study if our ministry is to be good for anything. We have heard of the
French peasants who sent to the Pope for a cure. "who had finished his
education." They complained that their pastor was always studying, and they
wanted a man who knew all that was necessary, and consequently needed no time
for books and thoughts. What fools they must be in that part of France! We need
exactly the kind of preacher whom they despised. He who has ceased to learn has
ceased to teach. He who no longer sows in the study will no more reap in the
pulpit. My earnest desire is that all of us may really be–

SOUL-WINNERS

I hope it will never get to be your notion that only a certain class of
preachers can be soul-winners. Every preacher should labor to be the means of
saving his hearers. The truest reward of our life work is to bring dead souls to
life. I long to see souls brought to Jesus every time I preach. I should break
my heart if I did not see it to be so. Men are passing into eternity so rapidly
that we must have them saved at once. We indulge no secret hope which can make
it easy to lose present opportunities. From all our congregations a bitter cry
should go up unto God, unless conversions are continually seen. If our preaching
never saves a soul, and is not likely to do so, should we not better glorify God
as peasants, or as tradesmen? What honor can the Lord receive from useless
ministers? The Holy Ghost is not with us, we are not used of God for His
gracious purposes, unless souls are quickened into heavenly life. Brethren, can
we bear to be useless? Can we be barren, and yet content?

Remember that, if we would win souls, we must act accordingly, and lay ourselves
out to that end. Men do not catch fish without intending it, nor save sinners
unless they aim at it. The prayer of a certain minister before his sermon was,
that God would bless souls by his discourse. After hearing that discourse, I
wondered at the prayer. How could the man ask for that which he seemed never
afterwards to have thought of? His discourse unprayed his prayer. He might as
well have poured water on a fire, and have prayed God to make the fire burn
thereby. Unless the Lord had caused the people to misunderstand what the
preacher said, they could not have been converted by his utterances. God works
by means,–by means adapted to His ends; and this being so, how can He bless some
sermons? How, in the name of reason, can souls be converted by sermons that hill
people to sleep; by sermons containing mere frivolities; by sermons which say
plainly, "See how cleverly I put it;" by sermons which insinuate doubt, and cast
suspicion upon every revealed truth? To ask for the Divine blessing on that
which even good men cannot commend, is poor work. That which does; not come from
our inmost soul, and is not to us a message from the Lord's own Spirit, is not
likely to touch other men's souls, and be the voice of the Lord to them.

TEACHERS

Brethren, I long that we may all be "apt to teach." The Church is never overdone
with those whose "lips feed many." It should be our ambition to be "good
stewards of the manifold grace of God." We all know certain able ministers who
are expositors of the Word, and instructors of believers. You always bring
something away when you hear them. They trade in precious things; their
merchandise is of the gold of Ophir. Certain passages of Scripture are quoted
and set in a new light; and certain specialties of Christian experience are
described and explained. We come away from such preaching feeling that we have
been to a good school. Brethren, I desire that we may each one exercise such an
edifying ministry! Oh, that: we may have the experience, the illumination, the
industry needful for so high a calling! Oh, for more richly-instructive sermons!
Brethren, look at many modern sermons! What fire and fury! What flash and dash!
What is it all about? To what purpose is this display? We often meet with
sermons which are like kaleidoscopes, marvelously pretty, but what is there in
them? See, there are several bits of colored glass, and one or two slips of
mirror, and other trifles, and these are put into a tube! How they sparkle! What
marvelous combinations! What fascinating transformations! But what are you
looking at? You have not seen any more after twenty displays than you saw at
first; for indeed there is no more. Some preachers excel in quotations of
poetry; and others excel in apposition and alliteration, or in the quaintness of
the division of their texts. Many are great in domestic sorrows, and death-bed
spectacles, and semi-dramatic picturings. Very telling, very sensational; and,
under gracious direction, useful in its own measure; but when souls are to be
saved, and saved souls are to be fed, more solid matters must take a prominent
place. We must feed the flock of God. We must deal with eternal verities, and
grapple with heart and conscience. We must, in fact, live to educate a race of
saints, in whom the Lord Jesus shall be reflected as in a thousand mirrors.

FATHERS The apostle Paul truly says, "Though ye have ten thousand instructors in
Christ, yet have ye not many fathers." He calls the general run of teachers
pedagogues, and says that we have myriad's of such; but we have not many
"fathers." No man has more than one natural father, and in the strictest sense
we have each one spiritual father, and no more. How singularly true are the
apostle's words at this present hour! Still have we a lack of spiritual fathers.
I would suggest to this Conference of brethren who have been for years in the
ministry, that we have come to that point of age and experience in which each of
us should set before him the image of a father as that to which he should
approach more and more. We are already fathers in the sense of having around us
converts who are our children in the Lord. We have already heard the penitential
cries, and the believing prayers, of those born to God through our preaching.
Many of us, beloved brethren, without boasting, can rejoice that the Lord has;
not left us without witness. Ours has been an imperfect and feeble ministry; but
the Lord has given life to many by our words. The parental relation is one which
requires much of us. A father should be a stable and established man. Something
of solid worth and substantial judgment is looked for in a father. Many a
preacher we could not call "father"; it would seem too ridiculous. The trifler,
the brother of many ways of thinking, and the man who is of an angry spirit, are
out of the list when we read over the roll of fathers. Something of weight,
kindliness, dignity, steadiness, and venerableness, goes to make up our idea of
the father. Great truths are very dear to him, for he has had experience of
their power for many years. When some of the boys tell him that he is behind the
times, he smiles at their superior wisdom. Now and then, he tries to show them
that he is right, though it is hard to make them see it. The boys think the
fathers fools; the fathers do not think that of them,–there is no need. True
fathers are patient; they do not expect to find old heads on young shoulders.
They have the knack of waiting till tomorrow, for time brings with it many
instructions; and while it may demonstrate the true, it may also explode the
false. Father is not blown about by every wind of doctrine, neither does he run
after every new thing which is cried up by the skeptical or by the fanatical. A
father knows what he does know, stands by what he has verified, and is rooted
and grounded in the faith.

But, with all his maturity and firmness, the spiritual father is full of
tenderness, and manifests an intense love for the souls of men. His doctrinal
divinity does not dry up his humanity. He was born on purpose to care for other
people, and his heart cannot rest until it is full of such care. Along our
coast, in certain places, there are no harbors; but, in other spots, there are
bays into which vessels run at once in the time of storm. Some men present.an
open natural harborage for people in distress: you love them instinctively, and
trust them unreservedly; and they, on their part, welcome your confidence, and
lay themselves out for your benefit. They were fashioned by nature with warm
human sympathies, and these have been sanctified by grace, so that it is their
vocation to instruct, to comfort, to succor, and in all ways to help spirits of
a feebler order. These are the kingly men who become nursing fathers of the
church. Paul says of Timothy, "I have no man like-minded, who will naturally
care for your state" He himself had this natural care; but he could not just
then put his hand upon another of like mind to himself, except Timothy. This
natural care may be illustrated by the feeling of birds towards their offspring.
See how diligently they work for them, and how boldly they defend them! A hen
with chicks beneath her wings is bravery itself. She becomes a very griffin for
her little ones. She would fight the Emperor of Russia, ay, and all the great
powers of Europe. The man of God, who feels the force of holy fatherhood, would
do anything and everything, possible and impossible, for the sake of his
spiritual children; he gladly spend,:, and is spent for them. Though the more he
loves the less he may be loved, yet by the force of inward prompting he is
impelled to self-denying labor. Does any brother exclaim, "I should like to fill
a father's place in my church, for then I could rule it"? This is a sorry
motive, and one which will disappoint you. The father of a family usually finds
that his pre-eminence is one of superior self-denial, rather than of
self-assertion. The best of fathers do really rule, but they never raise the
question of "Who is master?" In a well-ordered house, "baby is king." Have you
not seen how everything is set aside for him? The warmest welcome is for that
little stranger, and the movements of the household are guided by his needs. If
you were as great an autocrat as the King of the Cannibal Islands, it would make
no difference,–baby must be attended to. What means this? Why, that the poorest,
weakest, and most easily offended person in the whole church must rule you if
you are a true father! You will study the most wayward, and yield your personal
pleasure for the good of the most faulty. Somebody asked, "Why should we deny
ourselves alcoholic drink because weak-minded persons are overcome by it? That
would be to make the weakest persons the virtual rulers of our conduct, which
would be absurd." Just so; but the absurdity appertains to the family of love.
Our domestic affairs must seem absurd to unsympathetic strangers. Who likes to
tell them to the uninitiated? It would be casting pearls before swine. I would
say,–All hail to the absurdities of holy love: long may they reign! Baby is
king: the weakest rule our hearts. The pace of the whole flock is slackened,
lest we overdrive the lambs. Our ruling is carried out by seeing that none tread
down the weak, and by setting the' example of the greatest self-forgetfulness.
He is not fit to be a father who does not see that this is the imperative law of
love, and is, indeed, the secret: of power. We lay ourselves down for all men to
go over us if thus they may come to Jesus. Our place is to be the servants of
all. The father earns the daily bread, brings it home, and divides it. We blend
father and mother in one, and lay ourselves out to fulfil all needful offices
for those committed to our charge. If you desire to be a father in the church
that you may have his special honor, you see the way to it: it comes of
self-denial, patience, forbearance, love, zeal, and diligence. "Whosoever will
be chief among you, let him be your servant." A father must possess wisdom. But
in this matter many are deceived, for they aspire to it from a wrong motive, and
so become foolish. If you had wisdom, my brother, what would you do with it?
Would you so use it as to make others feel your superiority? If so, you have
little wisdom as yet. A minister's wisdom lies in endeavoring to be wise for
others, not cunning for himself. Some use their wisdom in a very unwise way, and
curse the church which they should bless. And so you would go about the church,
and put everybody right, being so wise yourself! Herein is often great folly. A
man I have heard of said, "I am not at all afraid of thieves breaking into my
house. If I heard a burglar, I should touch this button, and in a moment an
electric current would explode dynamite in the cellar, and that would blow up
the burglar and the whole establishment." You laugh; but we have met with
ministers who have acted in much the same manner. I am sorry to know a brother
who has performed this feat in five or six churches. The moment he thinks that a
member, especially a deacon, has gone wrong, he blows the whole thing to pieces,
and calls it faithfulness. This is not acting the part of a wise father. If we
have wisdom, we shall maintain peace, and shall attempt reforms with gentleness.
Fathers do not kill their children because they are unphilosophical, or unsound
in theology, or somewhat disobedient in conduct.

If we would be fathers, we must aim at a high degree of holiness. The query is
often proposed,–Is it possible for believers to be perfectly holy here on earth?
That question sounds strangely from some lips. I saw a man, the other day, who
had no shoes on his feet, and was only half covered by his rags. Suppose he had
asked me whether I thought it was possible that he could become a millionaire, I
should have answered that he had better first go and earn sixpence for his
night's lodging, and then save up enough to buy a decent suit of clothes. Thus,
those who are eager to dispute about perfection had better see that their lives
are first of all decently consistent with the profession they have made.
Brethren, we can be much more holy than we are. Let us attain first to that
holiness about which there is no controversy. At the time of the Council of
Trent, there was a controversy between the Church of Rome and the Protestants as
to whether it was possible for the laws of God to be kept. The question was
awkwardly put, and when Luther endeavored to show that it was impossible, he
seems to me to have advocated one truth at the cost of another. At any rate, we
dare not set limits to the power of Divine grace, so as to say that a believer
can reach a certain degree of grace, but can go no further. If a perfect life be
possible, let us endeavor to obtain it. If a faith that never staggers can be
ours, let us seek it. If we can walk with God as Enoch did throughout a long
life, let us not rest short of it. We dare not straiten the Lord in this matter;
if we be straitened at all, it is in ourselves. Let us aspire to saintliness of
spirit and character. I am persuaded that the greatest power we can get over our
fellowmen is the power which comes of consecration and holiness. More eyes than
we wot of are fixed upon our daily life at home, and in the church, and in the
world. We claim to be the Lord's ministers, and we must not wonder that we are
watched at every turn; ay, watched when we think that no observer is near. Our
lives should be such as men may safely copy.

You know the weighty responsibility of a father towards his children; such is
ours. I do not think that any of us would dare to say to our people, "Follow me
in all thing? And yet their tendency is to follow the pastor. In this tendency
lies influence for the holy, and a dreadful power for mischief for the careless.
Many beginners take readily to an earthly model; they find it more natural to
copy a godly man, whom they have seen, than to imitate the Lord Jesus, whom they
have not seen. I do not commend them in this; but so it is, and we must be
tender toward this weakness so that it may not become the occasion of evil.
Children first obey their parents, and so learn the law of the Lord, and no
doubt many of the weaker sort learn the way of holiness from their spiritual
guides. A painter, who afterwards becomes a great original, is in his earliest
days a disciple of a certain school of art; it is so in religion. The babe in
grace is taught to walk by an older brother, and afterwards takes his own path.
I believe that many weak ones in our churches are seriously injured, if not
entirely broken down, by following the example of their ministers in matters
wherein they come short of the Lord's mind. How grievous it would be; if any
believers were dwarfed through our conduct! May we not fear that there are some
in our churches today who are not what they might have been had we properly
guided them? No doubt some have been coddled into weakness, and others have been
allowed to grow more in one direction than in others. Do you say, "We cannot
help this; it is no business of ours "? I tell you it is our business. Strangers
may talk in a careless way, but fathers are conscious of great responsibility as
to their children. If a family is not well ordered, a wise father begins to mend
his own ways. If our people do wrong, we fret and blame ourselves. If we were
better, our church-members would be better. It is little use to scold them; our
wiser way is to humble ourselves before God, and find out the reason why our
ministry does not produce better results.

I don't think I can say much more, I am so greatly overcome by pain. I was going
to say that, as an earthly father stands in the place of God to his children, so
do we in a certain measure. We do not aim at it, nor wish for it; but we are
placed, by many weak and ignorant persons, in a position from which we would
gladly escape if we could, for we abhor everything which wears the semblance of
priestcraft. Alas! there are simple souls who forget to look to the Lord's mind
as revealed in the Scriptures, but they look to us as their teachers and guides.
I grant you that there may be an evil superstition in it, but there it is, and
it must not be trifled with. In many instances, however, through their grateful
respect, the members of our congregation gather lessons from what we do as well
as from what we say, and this should make us very careful lest we lead them
astray. Be holy, that others may be holy.

We had need be kind and courteous, for even such a small thing as shaking hands,
or giving a nod, may have an influence. One who is now a member of our church
told me that he had often stood to shake hands with me at the back gate, as I
left the building, long before he had come inside to hear me preach. The mere
fact of a kindly' notice which I gave him on going out had made him think of me,
and inclined him to hear. He assured me that this simple matter was the first
link between him and religion. He was drunken, and wretched, and ungodly; but he
had, by a happy accident, become the friend of a minister of Christ, and this
bond, though slight as a spider's thread, was the beginning of better things.
Never be stiff and proud. "Be pitiful, be courteous." Children expect kindness
from a father; let them not he disappointed. It is ours to be all things to all
men, if by any means we may save some.

Even to those who are without, we must show a tender consideration. Even to
those who reject our gospel, we must display unbounded tenderness. It should
fill us with deep sorrow that men refuse the Savior, and follow the way of
destruction. If they will persist in mining themselves, we must weep for them in
secret places. Having lovingly preached the gospel to them, if they will not
repent, we must break our hearts because we cannot break their hearts. If
Absalom has perished, we must go with David to the chamber over the gate, and
bitterly lament him, crying, "O my son Absalom, my son, my son Absalom! would
God I had died for thee, O Absalom, my son, my son!" Do you ever mourn over your
hearers as one that weepeth for the slain of his people? Can you bear that they
should pass away to judgment unforgiven? Can you endure the thought of their
destruction? I do not know how a preacher can be much blessed of God who does
not feel an agony when he fears that some of his hearers will pass into the next
world impenitent and unbelieving. On the other hand, survey the picture of a
father who sees his child returning from the error of his way. In the New
Testament, you see the portrait divinely drawn. When the prodigal was a great
way off, his father saw him. Oh, to have quick eyes to spy out the awakened! The
father ran to meet him. Oh, to be eager to help the hopeful! He fell upon his
neck, and kissed him. Oh, for a heart overflowing with love, to joy and rejoice
over seeking ones! As that father was, such should we be; ever loving, and ever
on the outlook. Our eyes, and ears, and feet should ever be given to penitents.
Our tears and open arms should be ready for them. The father in Christ is the
man to remember the best robe, and the ring, and the sandals; he remembers those
provisions of grace because he is full of love to the returning one. Love is a
practical theologian, and takes care to deal practically with all the blessings
of the covenant, and all the mysteries of revealed truth. It does not hide away
the robe and ring in a treasury of theology; but brings them forth, and puts
them on.

O my brethren, as you are the sons of God, be also fathers in God! Let this be
the burning passion of your souls. Grow to be leaders and champions. God give
you the honor of maturity, the glory of strength! But courageously expect that
He will then lay upon you the burden which such strength is fitted to bear. We
need you to quit yourselves like men. In these evil days, when the shock of
battle comes, it will have to be sustained by the fathers, or not at all. Our
young and immature brethren are invaluable as light troops, leading the way, and
advancing into the enemy's territory; but the solid squares, which stand firm
against the fury of the charge, must mainly be composed of the Old Guard. You of
experience in the things of God; you experts, who have fought the battles of the
Lord over and over again; you must stand fast, and having done all, you must
still stand. I call upon you fathers to hold the fort till Jesus comes. You must
be steadfast, unmovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord. If you fail,
where are we to look? It will be "as when a standard-bearer fainteth." But lest
you should feel pleased with the fact that you desire this high honor, and fancy
that the mere aspiration will fulfil itself, let me remind you how the Savior
lived. He never settled down in desires and resolves, but girded Himself for
constant service. He said, "My meat is to do the will of Him that sent Me, and
to finish His work." Soul-winning must be meat and drink to us. To do the Lord's
work must be as necessary as food to us. His Father's work is that in which we
also are engaged, and we cannot do better than imitate our Lord. Tell me, then,
how Jesus set about it. Did He set about it by arranging to build a huge
Tabernacle, or by organizing a monster Conference, or by publishing a great
book, or by sounding a trumpet before Him in any other form? Did He aim at
something great, and altogether out of the common line of service? Did He bid
high for popularity, and wear Himself out by an exhausting sensationalism? No;
He called disciples to Him one by one, and instructed each one with patient
care. To take a typical instance of His method, watch Him as He paused in the
heat of the day. He sat upon a well, and talked with a woman,–a woman who was
none of the best. This looked like slow work, and very commonplace action. Yet
we know that it was right and wise. To that single auditor, He did not deliver a
list of clever maxims, like those of Confucius, or profound philosophies, like
those of Socrates; but He talked simply, plainly, and earnestly with her about
her own life, her personal needs, and the living water of grace by which those
needs could be supplied. He won her heart, and through her many more; but He did
it in a way of which many would think little. He was beyond the petty ambitions
of our vainglorious hearts. He cared not for a large congregation; He did not
even ask for a pulpit. He desired to be the spiritual Father of that one
daughter; and, for that purpose, He must needs go through Samaria, and must, in
His utmost: weariness, tell her of the water of life. Brethren, let us lay aside
vanity. Let us grow more simple, natural, and father-like as we mature; and let
us be more and more completely absorbed in our lifework. As the Lord shall help
us, let us lay our all upon the altar, and only breathe for Him. Certain of you
will go abroad, some of you may find a grave on the banks of the Congo. We
cannot all do this; but, brethren, we must all live unto the Lord, and lay down
our lives for the brethren. The Thames and the Clyde must have their consecrated
ones as well as the Congo and the Ganges. London and Bristol must witness to as
true a heroism as Canton and Calcutta. Because we belong to Christ, the zeal of
the Lord's house must eat us up.

I wish I could have spoken to you with all my strength, but it may be that my
weakness may be used of God to greater purpose. My thoughts are few by reason of
pain, which disorders my head; but they are all on fire, for my heart remains
true to my Lord, to His gospel, and to you. May He use every man of us to the
utmost of our capacity for being used, and glorify Himself by our health and our
sickness, our life and our death! Amen.


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  CHAPTER 88: 09. STEWARDS
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Chapter 9—Stewards MY BELOVED BRETHREN,–I might even say with Paul, "My
dearly-beloved and longed-for,"–it gives me intense delight to look into your
faces once again; and yet I feel weighted with a solemn responsibility in having
to direct your thoughts at this time, so as to give the key-note to our solemn
Conference. I ask your continued prayers that I may speak aright, saying the
right thing in the right way.

There is considerable advantage in the freedom of the usual inaugural address.
It may take the methodical form of a sermon, or it may wear looser garments, and
come forth in the undress of a speech. Certain freedoms, which are not usually
accorded to a set sermon, are allowed me in this discursive discourse. You shall
call my talk by what name you choose, when I have done; but it will be a sermon,
for I have a very definite and distinct text in my mind, and I shall keep to it
with at least an average closeness. I may as well announce it, for it will
furnish you with a clue to my intent. You will find the passage in the First
Epistle to the Corinthians, in the first and second verses of the fourth
chapter:–

"Let a man so account of us, as of the ministers of Christ, and stewards of the
mysteries of God. Moreover it is required in stewards, that a man be found
faithful." The apostle was anxious to be rightly accounted of, and well he might
be; for ministers are not often estimated rightly; as a rule, they are either
gloried in, or else despised. At the commencement of our ministry, when our
stories are fresh, and our energies are full; when we blaze and flash, and spend
much time in the firework factory, people are apt to think us wonderful beings;
and then the apostle's word is needed, "Therefore let no man glory in men" (1
Corinthians 3:21). It is not true, as flatterers insinuate, that in our case the
gods have come down in the likeness of men; and we shall be idiots if we think
so. In due time, foolish expectations will be cured by disappointment; and then
we shall hear unwelcome truth, mingled with unrighteous censure. The idol of
yesterday is the butt of to-day. Nine days, nine weeks, nine months, or nine
years; be it more or less, time works disenchantment, and changes our position
in the world's account. The Primrose-day is over, and the nettle months have
come. After the time of the singing of birds has passed away, we come nearer to
the season of fruit; but the children are not half so pleased with us as when
they wandered in our luxuriant meadows, and strung our daisies and buttercups
into crowns and garlands. In our more autumnal years, the people miss our
flowers and greenery. Perhaps we are becoming sensible that it is so. The old
man is solid and slow; whereas the young man rode upon the wings of the wind. It
is clear that some think too much of us, and some think too little of us; it
would be far better if they all accounted of us soberly "as the ministers of
Christ." It would be for the advantage of the Church, for our own benefit, and
for the glory of God, if we were put in our right places, and kept there, being
neither over-rated, nor unduly censured, but viewed in our relation to our Lord,
rather than in our own personalities. "Let a man so account of us, as of the
ministers of Christ."

We are MINISTERS. The word has a very respectable sound. To be a minister, is
the aspiration of many a youth. Perhaps, if the word were otherwise rendered,
their ambition might cool. Ministers are servants: they are not guests, but
waiters; not landlords, but labourers. The word has been rendered
"under-rowers", men who tug at the oars on the lowest bench. It was hard work to
row a galley; those rapid strokes consumed the life-forces of the slaves. There
were three banks of rowers: those on the upper bank had the advantage of fresh
air; those who were beneath them were more closely shut in; but I suppose that
the lowest bank of rowers would be faint with heat, as well as worn out with
sore travail. Brethren, let us be content to wear out our lives even in the
worst position, if by our labour we can speed the passage of our great Caesar,
and help the progress of the trireme of the Church in which He has embarked. We
are willing to be chained to the oar, and to work on through life to make His
barque cleave the waves. We are not captains, nor owners of the galley, but only
the oarsmen of Christ.

Let us remember that we are the servants in our Lord's house. "Whosoever will be
chief among you, let him be your servant." Let us be willing to be door-mats at
our Master's entrance-hall. Let us not seek honour for ourselves, but put honour
upon the weaker vessels by our care for them. In every well-ordered house,–as I
have already reminded you,–it is a matter of fact that "baby is king," because
of his weakness. In our Lord's Church, let the poor, the feeble, the distressed
have the place of honour, and let us who are strong bear their infirmities. He
is highest who makes himself lowest; he is greatest who makes himself less than
the least. "Who is offended, and I burn not?" said the great apostle. If there
be any scandal to be borne, let us rather suffer it than allow it to grieve the
Church of God. As we are, by office, servants in a special sense, let us
cheerfully bear the chief part of the self-denial and travail of the saints. The
text, however, does not call us simply ministers or servants, but it adds, "of
Christ." We are not the servants of men, but of the Lord Jesus. Esteemed sir, if
you think, because you subscribe to my support, that I am bound to do your
bidding, you are under a mistake. Truly, we are "ourselves your servants for
Jesus' sake;" but, in the highest sense, our sole responsibility is to Him whom
we call Master and Lord. We obey superior orders; but we cannot yield to the
dictation of our fellow-servants, however influential they may be. Our service
is glorious, because it is the service of Christ: we feel honoured in being
permitted to wait upon Him whose shoe's latchet we are not worthy to unloose.

We are also said to be "STEWARDS." What are stewards? That is our office. What
is required of stewards? This is our duty. We are not now speaking of anybody
outside, but of you, brethren, and myself; therefore, let us make a personal
application of all that is said.

1. First, a steward is a servant, and no more. Perhaps he does not always
remember this; and it is a very pitiful business when the servant begins to
think that he is "my lord." It is a pity that servants, when honoured by their
master, should be so apt to give themselves airs. How ridiculous Jack-in-office
makes himself! I do not refer now to butlers and footmen, but to ourselves. If
we magnify ourselves, we shall become contemptible; and we shall neither magnify
our office nor our Lord. We are the servants of Christ, and not lords over His
heritage.

Ministers are for churches, and not churches for ministers. In our work among
the churches, we must not dare to view them as estates to be farmed for our own
profit, or gardens to be trimmed to our own taste. Some men talk of a liberal
polity in their church. Let them be liberal with what is their own; but for a
steward of Christ to boast of being liberal with his Master's goods, is quite
another matter. As stewards, we are only upper servants; and may the Lord
maintain in us the spirit of hearty obedience! If we do not carefully keep our
right place, our Master will not fail to chide us, and give our pride a taking
down. How many of our afflictions, failures, and depressions, arise out of our
being unduly lifted up! I feel sure that no man, who is honoured of God in
public, is quite a stranger to that chastening behind the door which keeps proud
flesh from being unduly exalted. How often have I prayed, "Dismiss me not Thy
service, Lord!" For a dismissed steward is a pitiable object among his lord's
servants. He was once great and mighty, riding the high horse; but when he is
out of a place, he is of less account than the smallest cowboy. See how glad he
is to be received, as a grateful guest, into the humble cottages of those who
once looked up to him with a sort of awe when he represented his lordship! Take
heed that you be not exalted above measure, lest you come to nothing.

2. A steward is a servant of a peculiar kind, for he has to superintend the
other servants, and that is a difficult thing to do. An old friend of mine, who
is now with God, once said, "I have always been a shepherd. Forty years I was a
shepherd of sheep, and another forty years I was a shepherd of men, and the last
flock was a deal more sheepish than the first." This witness is true. I think I
have heard that a sheep has as many diseases as there are days in the year; but
I am sure that the other sort of sheep are liable to ten times as many. A
pastor's work is an anxious one. All sorts of difficulties occur with our
fellow-servants; and, alas! unwise stewards make a great many more than there
need be by expecting perfection in others, although they do not possess it
themselves. Our fellow-servants are, after all, wisely selected; for He who put
them into His household knew what He was doing; at any rate, they are His
choice, and not ours. It is not our place to find fault with our Lord's own
election. It is very common with some to revile the Church; but as the Church is
the bride of Christ, it is rather dangerous work to criticize the Lord's
beloved. I feel towards the Church somewhat as David felt towards Saul; I dare
not lift up my hand against the Lord's anointed. Better far will it be for us to
find fault with ourselves rather than with our people, when there is anything
wrong with them.

Still, our church-members are men, and the best of men are but men at the best:
to direct, instruct, console, and aid so many different minds, is no easy task.
He who rules among men, for God, should be a man; and what is more, he should be
a man of God. He should be graciously endowed, a kingly man, head and shoulders
above his fellows. Men will gladly yield to real superiority, but not to
official pretensions. The superior position must be supported by superior
attainments. The steward must know more than the ploughman and the thatcher. He
must be of higher intelligence than the gamekeeper and the carter, and he should
have a more reliable character than Mary and John, who have to take orders from
him. Brethren, as stewards, we must have abundant grace, or we shall not fulfil
the duties of our office, or earn to ourselves a good degree. The other servants
will take their cue from us. A steward, who is dull, inert, and slow, will have
a slow team of servants about him, and the business of his lordship will fare
badly. Those who travel must have noticed that the servants in a hotel are very
much like the landlord; if the landlord is cheery, attentive, and obliging, all
the maids and waiters partake of his geniality; but if he looks sourly at you,
and treats you with indifference, you will find that the whole establishment is
of a disdainful order. A minister soon gets round him people like himself: "like
priest, like people." Oh, that we may always be alive and earnest in the service
of the Lord Jesus, that our people may be alive also! I have read of a Puritan
divine, that he was so full of life that his people said he lived like one who
fed on live things. Oh, for a life sustained by living bread!

We shall not be good stewards in the management of our fellow-servants unless we
are ourselves filled with the grace of God. We must set our fellow-servants an
example of' zeal and tenderness, constancy, hopefulness, energy, and obedience.
We must ourselves practise constant self-denial, and select as our own part of
the work that which is hardest and most humiliating. We are to rise above our
fellows by superior self-forgetfulness. Be it ours to lead the forlorn hopes,
and to bear the heaviest burdens. Archdeacon Hare was giving a lecture at
Trinity College when a cry of "Fire!" was raised. His pupils rushed away, and
formed themselves into a line to pass buckets of water from the river to the
burning building. The tutor saw a consumptive student standing up to his waist
in the water, and cried to him, "What! you in the water, Sterling?" The reply
was, "Somebody must be in it, and why not I as well as another?" Let us say to
ourselves, "Some fellows must be doing the drudgery of the Church, and labouring
in the hardest places, and why should not we take that post?" Those whom the
Lord will promote are those who have no choice of their own, but are ready for
anything, and ready for everything. He who has been fearless in one hour of
peril shall have for his reward the privilege of exhibiting still greater
courage. He who is faithful over a small charge shall be selected for a post of
harder work and sterner trial; this is the promotion to which loyal servants of
our King aspire.

3. Next, remember that stewards are servants under the more immediate command of
the great Master. We should be as the steward who daily goes into his lord's
private room to receive orders. John Ploughman was never in the squire's
parlour, but the steward is often there. If he neglected to consult the squire,
he would soon be doing amiss, and involving himself in heavy responsibility. How
often ought you and I to say, "Lord, show me what Thou wouldst have me to do!"
To cease to look up to God, so as to learn and practise His will, would be to
quit our true position. What shall be done to a steward who never communicates
with his master? Give him his wagers, and let him go. He who does his own will,
and not his master's, is of no value as a steward.

Brethren, we must wait upon God continually. The habit of going to Him for our
orders must be cultivated. How grateful should we be that our Master is always
within call! He guides His servants with His eye; and with His guidance, He also
gives the needful power. He will make our faces to shine before the eyes of our
fellows, if we commune with Him. Our example must encourage others to wait upon
the Lord. As our business is to tell them the mind of God, let us study that
mind very carefully. I trust I do not address a single man who has fallen into
the slovenly habit of going to his work without first communing with his Master;
for such an unhappy person, being out of touch with his Lord, will exercise an
injurious influence over the rest of the household, making them idle, or
indifferent, or dissatisfied, or dispirited. If the steward does not care for
his master's interests; or if he is wilful, and would fain alter or reverse his
lord's orders, if he dared; or if he in any way tampers with the estate, as did
the unjust steward in the parable, then the servants under him will learn
disloyalty. I might indicate how much of this is done in certain churches, but I
refrain. The Master will come speedily, and woe to the steward whose account
will prove him to have been unfaithful!

4. Again, stewards are constantly giving account. Their account is given as they
go along. A businesslike proprietor requires an account of outgoings and
incomings, from day to day. There is great truth in the old proverb that "short
reckonings make long friends." If we make short reckonings with God, we shall be
long friends with Him. I wonder if any of you keep account of your faults and
shortcomings. Perhaps the time will be better spent in constant efforts to serve
your Master, and increase His estate. We ought each one to ask himself, "What am
I doing by my preaching? Is it of the right kind? Am I giving prominence to
those doctrines which my Lord would have me put in the forefront? Am I caring
for souls as He would have me care for them?" It is a good thing thus to review
one's whole life, and enquire, "Do I give sufficient time to private prayer? Do
I study the Scriptures as intensely as I should? I hurry about to many meetings,
but am I in all this fulfilling my Master's orders? May I not be gratifying
myself with the appearance of doing much, whereas I should really be doing more
if I were more attentive to the quality than to the quantity of the work?" Oh,
to go often to the Master, and to be right and clear in our accounts with Him!

5. To come to the main point: a steward is a trustee of his master's goods.
Whatever he has, belongs to his master; and choice things are put into his
custody, not that he may do as he likes with them, but that he may take care of
them. The Lord has entrusted to each one of us certain talents, and these are
not our own. Gifts of knowledge, and thought, and speech, and influence, are not
ours to glory in, but ours in trust for the Lord alone. It is His pound that
gains five pounds.

We ought to increase our capital stock. Are all the young brethren doing that?
Are you increasing in gift and capacity? My brethren, do not neglect yourselves.
I observe that some brethren grow, and others stand still, dwarfed and stunted.
Men, like horses, are very disappointing creatures; good colts drop suddenly
lame, or develop a vice of which they were never before suspected. Alas! too
many young men destroy our hopes; they are extravagant in their expenses, make
an unfortunate marriage, fall into ill humours, wander after novel opinions,
give way to laziness and self-indulgence, or in some other way fail to improve
themselves. Yet the most needful and profitable labour is that which we spend
upon our own mental and spiritual improvement. Whatever you do, take heed unto
yourselves, and to your doctrine. Those who neglect thinking in order that they
may be everlastingly "jawing", are very foolish; they resemble a bailiff who
does nothing on the farm, but talks at great length about what ought to be done.
Dumb dogs cannot bark, but wise dogs are not always barking. To be always giving
out, and never taking in, tendeth to emptiness.

Brethren, we are "stewards of the mysteries of God;" we are "put in trust with
the gospel." Paul speaks of the glorious gospel of the blessed God which was
committed to his trust. I hope none of you have ever had the misfortune to be
made a trustee. It is a thankless office. In executing a trust, there is little
scope for originality; we are bound to carry out the trust with literal
exactness. One person wishes to receive more money, and another desires to alter
a clause in the deed; but the faithful trustee falls back upon the document, and
abides by its provisions. I hear him say, as they worry him, "Dear friends, I
did not make this trust; I am simply the administrator of it, and I am bound to
carry it out." The gospel of the grace of God needs great improvement;–at least,
so I am informed;–but I know that it is no business of mine to improve it, my
part is to act upon it. No doubt many would improve God Himself from off the
face of the earth, if they could. They would improve the Atonement until it
vanished. Great alterations are demanded of us, in the name of "the spirit of
the age." Of course, we are warned that the very notion of punishment for sin is
a barbarous relic of mediaeval ages, and must be given up, and with it the
doctrine of substitution and many other old-fashioned dogmas. We have nothing to
do with these demands; we have only to preach the gospel as we find it. As a
trustee, if my course of action is disputed, I keep to the letter of the bond;
and if any quarrel over it, they must take their complaints to the proper Court,
for I have no power to alter the record. We are simply administrators; and if we
are not allowed to act, we will throw the whole thing into the heavenly
Chancery. The dispute is not between us and modern thought, but between God and
the wisdom of men. "Oh!" they say, "it is barbarous to go on prosing with this
old, old story." We care not how old the story is; since it came from God, we
repeat it in His Name. Call it what you like, it is in the Book from which we
derive our authority. "But you surely have a judgment of your own?" May be we
have, and as much of it as those who oppose us; but our judgment does not invent
a trust, it simply guides us in the carrying of it out. Stewards must keep to
their orders, and trustees must carry out the terms of their trust. My brethren,
we are at this present hour "set for the defence of the gospel." If ever men
were called to this office, we are so called. These are times of drifting: men
have pulled up their anchors, and are driven to and fro with winds and tides of
divers kinds. As for me, I have in this hour of danger not only let down the
great bower anchor, but I have cast four anchors out of the stern. That may be
quite the wrong place; but in these times we need anchoring both fore and aft.
Now am I fixed. Sceptical reasonings might have moved me at one time, but not
now. Do our enemies ask us to lay down our swords, and cease to fight for the
old faith? Like the Greeks said to Xerxes, we answer, "Come and take them." The
other day, the advanced thinkers were going to sweep the orthodox into limbo;
but as yet, we survive their assaults. These boasters do not know the vitality
of Evangelical truth. No, glorious gospel, thou shalt never perish! If we are to
die, we will die fighting. If we shall personally pass away, fresh evangelists
will preach upon our graves. Evangelical truths are like the dragon's teeth
which Cadmus sowed, they breed men all armed for the fray. The gospel lives by
dying. Brethren, at any rate, in this contest, if we are not victorious, we will
at least be faithful.

6. A steward's business is to dispense his master's goods according to their
design. He is to bring forth things new and old; to provide milk for babes and
strong meat for men, giving to each one his portion of meat in due season. At
some tables, I fear the strong men have been waiting a long time for the meat,
and there is small hope of its yet appearing; the milk-and-water is more
plentiful by far. Someone went to hear a certain preacher, last Sunday, and
complained that he did not preach Christ. Another remarked that perhaps it was
not the due season; but, my brethren, the due season for preaching Christ is
every time you preach. God's children are always hungry, and no bread will
satisfy them but that which comes down from Heaven. A wise steward will maintain
the proportion of truth. He will bring forth things new and old; not always
doctrine, not always practice, and not always experience. He will not always
preach conflict, nor always victory; not giving a one-sided view of truth, but a
sort of stereoscopic view, which shall make truth stand out "evidently set
forth" before them. Much of the preparation of spiritual food lies in the
correct proportion of the ingredients. One spoke incorrectly of using in his
sermons three grains of Calvinism and two of Arminianism; meaning, as I
afterwards learned, that he preached both a full gospel and a free gospel: in
that which he intended, I fully agree with him. Let us give a wide range of
experience, not forgetting that higher life which consists in increased
lowliness of mind. To make full proof of our ministry, will require great
discrimination; for a want of balance in preaching has done serious injury to
many a church. The line of wisdom is as fine as a razor's edge, and we shall
need Divine wisdom to keep us to it. We are not always to harp upon one string.
Our Master's servants will murmur if we give them nothing but "rabbits hot and
rabbits cold." We must bring forth, out of the Master's stores, a rich variety
of food fit for the building up of spiritual manhood. Excess in one direction,
and failure in another, may breed much mischief; let us therefore use weight and
measure, and look up for guidance.

Brethren, take care that you use your talents for your Master, and for your
Master only. It is disloyalty to our Lord if we wish to be soul-winners in order
to be thought to be so. It is unfaithfulness to Jesus if we even preach sound
doctrine with the view of being thought sound, or pray earnestly with the desire
that we may be known as praying men. It is for us to pursue our Lord's glory
with a single eye, and with our whole heart. We must use our Lord's gospel, and
our Lord's people, and our Lord's talents, for our Lord, and for Him alone.

7. The steward should also be the guardian of his master's family. Look to the
interests of all who are in Christ Jesus, and let them all be as dear to you as
your own children. Servants, in the olden times, were often so united to the
family, and so interested in their masters' affairs, that they spoke of our
house, our land, our carriage, our horses, and our children. Our Lord would have
us thus identify ourselves with His holy business; and, especially, He would
have us love His chosen. We, beyond all others, should lay down our lives for
the brethren. Because they belong to Christ, we love them for His sake. I trust
we can each one of us heartily say,–

"There's not a lamb in all Thy flock

I would disdain to feed."

Brethren, let us heartily love all whom Jesus loves. Cherish the tried and
suffering. Visit the fatherless and the widow. Care for the faint and the
feeble. Bear with the melancholy and despondent. Be mindful of all parts of the
household, and thus shall you be a good steward.

8. I shall cease from this picture when I have said that the steward represents
his master. When the master is away, everybody comes to the steward for orders.
He had need to behave himself well who represents such a Lord as ours. A steward
should speak much more carefully and wisely when he speaks for his lord than
when he speaks on his own account. Unless he is guarded in his utterances, his
lord may be forced to say to him, "You had better speak for yourself: I cannot
allow you thus to misrepresent me." My beloved brethren and fellow-servants, the
Lord Jesus is compromised by us if we do not keep His way, declare His truth,
and manifest His spirit Men infer the Master from the servant; are they not to
be excused if they so do? Ought not the steward to act after his master's
manner? You cannot dissociate the squire from the steward, the Lord from His
representative. A Puritan was told that he was too precise; but he replied, "I
serve a precise God." We should be gentle, for we represent the gentle Jesus. We
should be zealous, for we represent One who was clad with zeal as with a cloak.
Our best guide, when we are uncertain as to what to do, will be found in the
answer to the question, "What would Jesus do?" When deliberating about going to
a place of amusement, you may end the deliberation by saying, "I will go if my
Master would have gone." If moved to speak with warmth, take heed that it is
only such warmth as your Lord would have exhibited.

If urged to utter your own thoughts rather than revealed truth, follow Jesus,
who spake not His own thoughts, but those of the Father. In this way, you will
be acting as a steward should do. Here lies your wisdom, your comfort, and your
strength. It was a sufficient vindication for a steward, when one accused him of
folly, that he could reply, "Say what you please of what I did, for therein I
followed my master's orders." Caviller, do not blame the steward. The man has
done according to the command of his superior; what else would you have him do?
Our conscience is clear, and our heart is restful, when we feel that we have
taken up our cross, and have followed the footprints of the Crucified One.
Wisdom is justified of her children. If not to-day, yet in the long run, it
shall be seen that obedience is better than originality, and teachableness is
more to be desired than genius. The revelation of Jesus Christ will outlive the
speculation of man. We are content, nay, anxious, not to be regarded as original
thinkers and original doers; we wish to make known the thoughts of God, and
finish the work which He worketh in us mightily. The second part of my address
will be occupied with OUR OBLIGATIONS AS STEWARDS. "It is required in stewards,
that a man be found faithful." It is not required that a man be found brilliant,
or that he be found pleasing to his associates, or even that he be found
successful. All that is required is, that he be found faithful, and, truly, this
is no small matter. It will need the Lord Himself to be both our wisdom and our
strength, or we shall surely fail. Many are the ways by which we may come short
of this requirement, however simple it may seem to be.

1. We may fail to be faithful through acting as if we were chiefs instead of
servants. A difficulty arises in the church, which might readily be settled by
loving forbearance, but we "stand upon our dignity;" and then the servant grows
out of his livery. We can be very high and mighty, if we please; and the smaller
we are, the more easily do we swell out. No cock is greater in fight than a
bantam; and no minister is more ready to contend for his "dignity" than the man
who has no dignity. How foolish we look when we play the grandee! The steward
thinks he has not been treated with proper respect, and he will "let the
servants know who he is." The other day, his master was roughly used by an angry
tenant, and he took no notice, for he had too much sense to be put out by so
small a matter; but his steward passes by nothing, and fires up at everything:
is this as it should be? I think I see the gentle master lay his hand upon his
furious servant's shoulder, and I hear him say, "Can you not bear it? I have
borne far more than this."

Brethren, our Master "endured such contradiction of sinners against Himself,"
and shall we be weary and faint in our minds? How can we be stewards of the
gentle Jesus if we behave ourselves haughtily? Let us never ride the high horse,
nor attempt to be lords over God's heritage; for He will not have it so, and we
cannot be faithful if we give way to pride.

We shall also fail in our duty as stewards if we begin speculating with our
Master's money. We may play "ducks and drakes" with our own, but not with our
Lord's money. We are not bidden to speculate, but to" occupy" till He comes.
Honest trading with His goods, is one thing; but to play a high game, and run
unlawful risks, is quite another. I do not intend to speculate with my Master's
gospel, by dreaming that I can improve it by my own deep thinking, or by soaring
aloft with the philosophers. We will not, even with the idea of saving souls,
speak other than the gospel. If I could create a great excitement by delivering
novel doctrine, I would abhor the thought. To raise a revival by suppressing
truth, is dealing deceitfully; it is a pious fraud, and our Lord wants no profit
which might be supposed to come by such a transaction. It is ours simply and
honestly to trade with our Master's pounds, and to bring to Him such increase as
they gain in fair dealing.

We are stewards, and not masters, and hence we must trade in our Master's Name,
and not in our own. It is not ours to fabricate a religion, but to proclaim one;
and even that proclamation is not to be made by our own authority, but it is
ever to be based on that of our Lord. We are "labourers together with Him." If a
brother sets up in business for himself, he will make a mess of it, and fall
into spiritual bankruptcy before long. His credit will soon run out when his
Master's Name is gone. We can do nothing in our heavenly merchandise without our
Lord. Let us not attempt to act on our own account, but keep our place near our
Chief in all lowliness of mind.

2. We may become false to our trust by acting as men-pleasers. When the steward
studies the good pleasure of the ploughman, or the whims of the servant-maid,
everything must go wrong, for everything is out of place. We are influenced by
one another, and we influence one another. The greatest are unconsciously
affected in some measure by the least. The minister must be overwhelmingly
influenced by the Lord his God, so that other influences may not warp him from
his fidelity. We must resort continually to headquarters, and receive the Word
from the mouth of the Lord Himself, so that we may be kept straight and true;
otherwise, we shall soon be biassed, although we may not be aware of it. There
must be no holding back to please one person, no rushing forward to satisfy
another, no moving an inch even to gratify the whole community. We must not harp
upon a certain string to win the approval of this party, neither must we be
silent upon an important doctrine to avoid offending that clique. What have we
to do with idols, dead or alive? O brethren, if you go in for pleasing
everybody, you have indeed set yourselves a task! The toils of Sisyphus and the
labours of Hercules are nothing to this! We must not flatter men; we must speak
plain words, and words which conscience will approve. If we please men, we shall
displease our Lord; so that success in our self-imposed task would be fatal to
our eternal interests. In trying to please men, we shall not even succeed in
pleasing ourselves. To please our Lord, though it may seem very difficult, is an
easier task than pleasing men. O steward, have thine eye alone upon thy Master!

3. We shall not be found faithful stewards if we are idlers and triflers. Do you
ever meet with lazy ministers? I have heard of them; but when mine eye sees
them, my heart abhors them. If you plan to be lazy, there are plenty of
avocations in which you will not be wanted; but, above all, you are not wanted
in the Christian ministry. The man who finds the ministry an easy life will also
find that it will bring a hard death. If we are not labourers, we are not true
stewards; for we are to be examples of diligence to the King's household. I like
Adam Clarke's precept: "Kill yourselves with work, and then pray yourselves
alive again." We shall never do our duty either to God or man if we are
sluggards.

Yet some, who are always busy, may still be unfaithful, if all that they do is
done in a jaunty, trifling manner. If we play at preaching, we have chosen an
awful game. To shuffle texts like cards, and make literary essays out of themes
which move all Heaven and hell, is shameful. We must be serious as death in this
solemn work. There are boys and girls who are always giggling, but who never
laugh; and they are the very image of certain ever-jesting preachers. I like an
honest laugh; true humour can be sanctified, and those who can stir men to smile
can also move them to weep. But even this power has limits which the foolish
soon exceed. It is not, however, of the earnest eccentric that I now speak. The
men I mean are sardonic and sarcastic. An earnest brother makes a mistake in
grammar, and this they observe with a sneer; another devout believer errs in a
classical allusion, this also affords them pleasure. The earnestness and the
devotion go for nothing; or, rather, these are the secret reasons for the
contempt of these superfine and superficial critics. The gospel is nothing to
them; cleverness is their idol. As for themselves, these gentlemen are mainly
concerned to find out what will bring them most honour in the philosophical
school to which they belong. They have neither convictions nor beliefs, but only
tastes and opinions, and the whole matter is a sport from first to last. I pray
you, above all things, to keep clear of the scorner's chair and the trifler's
camp-stool. Be seriously in earnest. Live like men who have something to live
for; and preach like men to whom preaching is the highest exercise of their
being. Our work is the most important under Heaven, or else it is sheer
imposture. If you are not earnest in carrying out your Lord's instructions, He
will give His vineyard to another; for He will not put up with those who turn
His service into trifling.

4. When we misuse our Master's property, we are false to our trust. We are
entrusted with a certain amount of talent, and strength, and influence, and we
have to use this trust-money with a single purpose. Our purpose is to promote
the Master's honour and glory. We are to seek God's glory, and nothing else. By
all means, let every man use his best influence on the right side in politics;
but no minister has liberty to use his position in the church to promote party
ends. I do not censure workers for temperance; but even this admirable movement
must not push out the gospel: I trust it never does. I hold that no minister has
a right to use his ability or office to cater for the mere amusement of the
multitude. The Master has sent us to win souls: all is within the compass of our
commission which tends towards that end; but that is chiefly our work which
drives directly and distinctly at that end. The danger lies, at this time, in
setting up theatricals, semi-theatricals, concerts, and so forth. Until I see
that the Lord Jesus Christ has set up a theatre, or planned a miracle-play, I
shall not think of emulating the stage or competing with the music-hall. If I
mind my own business, by preaching the gospel, I shall have enough to do. One
object is enough for most men: one such as ours is enough for any minister,
however many his talents, however versatile his mind. Do not misapply your
Master's goods, lest you be found guilty of embezzlement. If your consecration
is true, all your gifts are your Lord's, and it will be a sort of felony to use
them for any other than your Lord. You are not to make a fortune for yourself; I
do not think you will be likely to do that in the Baptist ministry. In no other
way are you to have a second aim or object. "Jesus only" must be the motive and
motto of your life-course. It is the duty of a steward to be devoted to the
interests of his master; and if he forgets this for any other object, however
laudable that object may be, he is not faithful. We cannot afford to let our
lives run in two channels; we have not enough life-force for two objects. We
need to be whole-hearted. We must learn to say, "One thing; I do." In every item
and particular of life, the mark of consecration must be seen, and we must never
allow it to be illegible. There will come a day in which all details will be
gone into at the final audit; and it behoves us, as stewards, to have an eye to
our Lord's scrutiny in every item of our lives.

5. If we would be faithful as stewards, we must not neglect any one of the
family, nor neglect any portion of the estate. I wonder whether we practise a
personal observation of our hearers. Our beloved friend, Mr. Archibald Brown, is
right when he says that London needs not only house-to-house visitation, but
room-to-room visitation. We must in the case of our people go further, and
practise man-to-man visitation. By personal intercourse alone, can certain
persons be reached. If I had a number of bottles before me, and were to play
upon them with a fire-engine, how much of the water would be lost; if I want to
make sure of filling them, I must take them up one by one, and carefully pour
the liquid into them. We must watch over our sheep one by one. This is to be
done not only by personal talk, but by personal prayer.

Dr. Guthrie relates that he called upon a sick man who greatly refreshed his
soul, for he told him that he was wont to accompany his minister in his visits.
"While I lie here, I shall follow you in your visitation. I keep on remembering
house after house in my prayer, and I pray for the man, and his wife, and his
children, and all who dwell with him." Thus, without moving a step, the sick
saint visited Macfarlane, and Douglas, and Duncan, and all the others whom his
pastor called to see. We ought thus to beat the bounds of our parish, and go
round and round our congregations, forgetting none, despairing of none, bearing
all upon our hearts before the Lord. Especially let us think of the poor, the
crotchety, the desponding. Let our care, like the hurdles of a sheepfold,
enclose all the flock.

Brethren, let us hunt up destitute localities, and see that no district is left
without the means of grace. This applies not only to London, but also to
villages, hamlets, and little groups of cottages. Heathenism hides away among
the lone places, as well as in the crowded slums of our mammoth cities. May
every piece of ground be rained upon by gospel influences!

6. Another thing must not be overlooked; in order to faithfulness,, we must
never connive at evil. This injunction will be warmly commended by certain
brethren whose only notion of pruning a tree is to cut it down! A gardener comes
to a gentleman's house, and when he is told that the shrubs are a little
overgrown, he answers, "I will see to them." In a few days, you walk round the
garden. He has seen to them with a vengeance; he has done the garden, and done
for it! Some persons cannot learn the balance of virtues; they cannot kill a
mouse except by burning down the barn. Did I hear you say, "I was faithful, I
never connived at evil"? So far, so good; but may it not happen that, by a bad
temper, you yourself produced more evil than that which you destroyed? "Keep
that child quiet," says the mother to the nurse, and the nurse immediately
throws it out of the window. She has obeyed her mistress, and effectually
quieted the child; but small will be her praise. So you fly into a passion, and
you "give it" to the people, because they are not all they ought to be: are you
all you ought to be? Do you say, "I will let them know that I am master here"?
Is that so? Are you master? But you are, perhaps, moved to answer me by saying,
"Do not you, yourself, hold a high position in your own church?" I do; but how
have I gained it? I gave no power but that which gentleness and love have
brought me. How have I used my influence? Have I sought pre-eminence? Ask those
who are round about me. But I forbear, and return to what I was saying: we must
not allow sin to go unrebuked. Yield in all things personal, but be firm where
truth and holiness are concerned. We must be faithful, lest we incur the sin and
penalty of Eli. Be honest to the rich and influential; be firm with the wavering
and unsteady; for the blood of these will be required at our hand. Brothers, you
will need all the wisdom and grace you can get in order to fulfil your duties as
pastors. There is an adaptation to rule men which would seem to be quite absent
from certain preachers, and the place of it is supplied by an adaptation to set
a house on fire, for they scatter firebrands and burning coals wherever they go.
Be ye not like unto them. Strive not, and yet wink not at sin.

7. Some neglect their obligations as Christ's stewards by forgetting that the
Master is coming. "He will not come yet," whisper some; "there are so many
prophecies to be fulfilled; and it is even possible that He will not come at
all, in the vulgar sense of the term. There is no particular need for us to make
haste." Ah, my brethren! it is the unfaithful servant who says, "My Lord
delayeth His coming." This belief allows him to put off labour and travail. The
servant will not clean the room by daily duty, because the Master is away; and
the servant of Christ thinks that he can have a great clear up, in the form of a
revival, before his Lord arrives. If we would each feel that each day may be our
last day, we should be more intense in our work. While preaching the gospel, we
may some day be interrupted by the blast of the trumpet, and the cry, "Behold,
the Bridegroom cometh; go ye out to meet Him." This expectation will tend to
quicken our pace. The time is short; our Lord is at the door; we must work with
all our might. We must not be eye-servants except in this sense that we labour
in the Lord's presence since He is so near. I am impressed with the rapid flight
of time, the swift approach of the last great audit. These Annual Conferences
return so speedily: to some of us, it seems only a day or two since last year's
gathering, the last of them hastens on. I shall soon be giving in the account of
my stewardship; or, if I should survive for a while, others of you may be
summoned to meet your Lord; you will soon go home to your Lord if your Lord does
not soon come to you. We must work on from hour to hour with our eye upon the
audit, that we may not be ashamed of the record which will be found in the
volume of the book.

We ought to pray much about this faithfulness to our stewardship, for the
penalty of unfaithfulness is terrible. In the Doges' Palace at Venice, we have
seen the portraits of those potentates ranged in long succession round a great
hall; one square is noteworthy, for it is a blank. If you do not look at any one
of the portraits with attention, you will be sure to fix your eye upon that
blank, and ask, "What meaneth this?" There are the Doges in all their splendour,
and there is this vacant place. Marinus Falierus dishonoured his office, and the
great council of the city ordered his effigies to be blackened over. Shall this
be the portion of any steward here? Shall we be immortal in disgrace? Shall
everlasting shame and contempt be measured out to us as traitors to our
Redeemer? Remember the word of the Lord Jesus, when He says of the unfaithful
servant, that his Lord shall "cut him asunder, and appoint him his portion with
the hypocrites: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth." Can any of you
fathom that abyss of horror? The reward of all faithful stewards is exceeding
great: let us aspire to it. The Lord will make the man who was faithful in a few
things to be ruler over many things. That is an extraordinary passage where our
Saviour says, "Blessed are those servants, whom the Lord when He cometh shall
find watching: verily I say unto you, that He shall gird Himself, and make them
to sit down to meat, and will come forth and serve them." It is wonderful that
our Lord has already served us; but how can we comprehend that He will serve us
again? Think of Jesus rising up from His throne to wait upon us! "Behold!" He
cries, "here comes a man who served Me faithfully on earth; make way for him, ye
angels, and principalities, and powers! This is the man whom the King delighteth
to honour." And, to our surprise, the King girds Himself, and waits upon us. We
are ready to cry, "Not so, my Lord." But He must, and will, keep His Word. This
unspeakable honour He will pay to His true servants. Happy man, to have been the
poorest and most despised of ministers, to be now served by the King of kings!
Oh, to be of the number of those who follow the Lamb whithersoever He goeth!
Brethren, can ye abide in your steadfastness? Can ye drink of His cup, and be
baptized with His baptism? Remember that the flesh is weak. The trials of the
present age are peculiarly subtle and severe. Cry to the Strong for strength,
and yield yourselves to His almighty love.

Beloved brethren, we are bound to go forward, cost us what it may, for we dare
not go back; we have no armour for our backs. We believe ourselves to be called
to this ministry, and we cannot be false to the call. We are sometimes charged
with saying terrible things about hell. We will not justify every expression we
may have used, but we have never yet described misery so deep as that which will
await an unfaithful minister. Ah, my brethren, the future of the lost surpasses
all conception, if we view it by the light of the expressions used by the Lord
Jesus Christ Himself! The almost grotesque figures of Dante, and the horrors
depicted by the mediaeval preachers, do not exceed the truth taught by our Lord
when He spoke of the worm which dieth not, and the fire which is not quenched.
To be cast into outer darkness, to crave in vain for a drop of cold water, or to
be cut asunder, are unrivalled horrors. Alas, that men will run the risk of
these! A thousand times, alas! that any minister should do so; that any mortal
man should climb the pinnacle of the temple, and from thence cast himself down
to hell. If I must be a lost soul, let me be lost as a thief, a blasphemer, or a
murderer, rather than as an unfaithful steward to the Lord Jesus Christ. This is
to be a Judas, a son of perdition, indeed.

Remember, if any of you are unfaithful, you win for yourselves a superfluity of
condemnation. You were not forced to be ministers. You were not compelled to
enter upon this sacred office. By your own choice you are here. In your youth,
you aspired to this holy service, and thought yourselves happy in attaining your
desire. Brethren, if we meant to be untrue to Jesus, there was no necessity to
have climbed this sacred rock in order to multiply the horrors of our final
fall. We could have perished quite sufficiently in the ordinary ways of sin.
What need to qualify ourselves for a greater damnation? This will be a dreadful
result if this is all that comes of our College studies, and our burning of the
midnight oil in acquiring knowledge. My heart and my flesh tremble while I
contemplate the possibility of any one of us being found guilty of treachery to
our charge, and treason to our King. May the good Lord so abide with us that, at
the last, we may be clear of the blood of all men! It will be seven heavens in
one to hear our Master say, "Well done, good and faithful servant."


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  CHAPTER 89: 10.THE EVILS OF THE PRESENT TIME, AND OUR OBJECT, NECESSITIES, AND ENCOURAGEMENTS
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Chapter 10—The Evils of the Present Time, and Our Object, Necessities, and
Encouragements

IT IS NOT POSSIBLE for us to converse together, during such a time of intense
excitement, without alluding, or at least seeming to allude, to matters which
are just now the subjects of severe controversy. It will be thought that things
spoken by me this day are aimed at individuals who may not be in my mind at all.
I am awkwardly circumstanced, and I might, therefore, speak with great reserve;
but such is not my habit: as a rule, I blurt out my thoughts, for I have nothing
to conceal. I have no intent to wound anyone, but I cannot help it if I do. I do
not say this by way of apology, for I am now past all need of apology, and I
have become a chartered libertine in the speaking of my mind, since I have found
it utterly impossible to please, let me say or do what I will. One becomes
somewhat indifferent when dealing with those whom every word offends. I notice
that, when I have measured my words, and weighed my sentences most carefully, I
have then offended most; while some of my stronger utterances have passed
unnoticed. Therefore, I am comparatively careless as to how my expressions may
be received, and only anxious that they may be in themselves just and true.
Certainly, my criticisms have cost me more pain than they have inflicted. At the
first, I said that he who ventured on the task which was laid upon me would get
no honour from it: the prophecy has proved to be true, and I am content to have
it so.

I have now nothing to gain, and I have nothing to fear. I can never endure worse
misrepresentation than has already befallen me. It is not my intention to say
anything upon the burning question which distinctly refers to the Baptist Union;
and if I go beyond that intent, it will be the current of the hour which bears
me away, and no resolve of my own. I make these remarks by way of introduction,
that your minds may be led out of the clamour of the fight into the hush of
quiet thought.

I would also add a word of caution to heated minds. Can we not draw a
distinction between men and their opinions? An old Scotch wife once quarrelled
with her minister. I think the difference arose out of some business
transaction; perhaps the poor preacher was slow in his payments, or she had not
been up to the mark in the goods supplied to him; but, anyhow, she felt bitterly
towards him. Yet she came constantly to hear him preach; and when he asked her
how she could abuse him as she did, and yet always attend his ministry, she
answered, "Man, my quarrel is with you, not with the gospel." Our case is
exactly opposite to hers. Our quarrel is not with the men, but with that other
gospel, which is not another, with which they trouble us. Away with
personalities, but let us earnestly contend for the faith once for all delivered
to the saints. It may not be easy to keep clear the distinction between the men
and their opinions; but, at any rate, let us labour to do so. Let us grind the
falsehood to powder, but desire from our inmost souls the good of those who are
deluded by it. I have heard of a stone being broken to atoms on the breast of a
man, yet he who wielded the hammer hurt not the man in the least degree. We
wrestle not with flesh and blood, but with spiritual wickedness. We fight
neither with small nor great, save only with the deadly error which seeks to be
king in Israel.

I desire so to speak to you, that you may be girded for the battle against all
sin and false doctrine, and be prepared to follow your Divine Lord in all His
sacred warfare. May you go back to your several spheres of service feeling that
you have wasted no time in coming up to this Conference, but that you have been
inspirited and stimulated by communion with each other and your Lord. God help
me so to speak as to give a healthy tone to our fellowship!

I want to speak to the times. We are exhorted to be "abreast of the age": I will
look into its breast, and see whether it has there a sound mind, or an evil
heart of unbelief. My subject is– THE EVILS OF THE PRESENT TIME.

Nobody can question that there are evils which are constant throughout the ages;
and, on the other hand, there are certain intermittent fevers which rage only at
intervals. There are evils of all seasons: evils of winter, evils of summer,
evils of autumn, evils of this springtide. Certain evils abound at this
particular period, with which we were not so familiar twenty years ago. We meet
now with error, and with sin, in forms which they did not commonly assume in the
early years of our ministry. Truth is one and the same in all eras, but
falsehood changes its shape, and comes and goes like the fashions of dress. To
evil things also there is a season, and a time for every doctrine which is not
from Heaven.

I suppose you have met, in your pastoral work, with the great evil of
questioning fundamental truth. Brethren have always differed on minor points,
and it has not been unusual for us to meet each other, and discuss matters of
doctrine upon the basis of Holy Scripture. All were agreed that, whatever
Scripture said, should be decisive; and we only wished to ascertain what the
Lord had revealed. But another form of discussion has now arisen: men question
the Scriptures themselves. A deacon of one of our churches said, the other day,
concerning a certain doctrine, "Even if the Bible said so, I would not believe
it." This is a new thing in our Israel. To some, the teaching of Scripture is
not of final authority: their inner consciousness, their culture, or some other
unknown quantity, is their fixed point, if they have a fixed point anywhere. The
fount of inspiration is not now within the Book, and with the Holy Spirit, but
within the man's own intelligence. We have no longer, "Thus saith the Lord;"
but, "Thus saith modern thought."

We used to debate upon particular and general redemption, but now men question
whether there is any redemption at all worthy of the name. We used to converse
upon which aspect of the atonement should be made most prominent, but in the
vicarious sacrifice we all believed. Alas! we have fallen upon days in which
substitution is denied, and the doctrine of the putting-away of sin by the blood
of our Lord Jesus is spoken of in opprobrious terms. We described justification
by faith under various figures in days gone by; but now men are among us who set
it quite aside. The other day, a certain preacher informed us that, even if a
stoner should truly repent and believe on his dying bed, he would yet have to
suffer for a while in the next world. Thus salvation by faith is made to give
place to a sort of purgatory. This is not to differ about the faith, but
altogether to renounce it. It is not in our denomination alone or chiefly that
these evils exist, but they are everywhere. I know not what our brethren mean
when they deny the general prevalence of unbelief. Are they wilfully deaf and
blind? Do they live on the dark side of the moon? You must have noticed, in the
newspapers, apologies for Mohammedanism and Buddhism, in which these religions
are praised to the disparagement of Christianity: this is a sign of the times.
Scribes are taking up their pens to write upon themes which would not have been
touched by the secular papers years ago; and they are only touched now because
there is an unbelief abroad which creates a market for anti-Christian
literature. Those against whom we fight to-day are striking at the life of our
religion. They are not cutting off its horns, but tearing out its heart. When I
note the clamour for "progress in theology," and mark the changing nature of
modern opinion, I am reminded of the story of a prudent churchwarden who
trembled for the spire of the parish church. A vane was to be placed on high;
and when he saw it upon the ground, it struck him as being far too large to be
safely fixed upon the spire. I suppose it was the image of Peter's cock; and
when the good man looked upon it, he did not weep, but he trembled. "Surely," he
said, "when the North wind blows, it will tear down the vane, and the steeple,
too." He who had to fix the vane endeavoured to cheer him by the fact that, when
the wind was blowing, the cock would turn round, so that the full force of the
gale would not come upon it. That was a comfortable consideration, and it
brought a grand idea into the churchwarden's mind. Those four letters, N., E.,
S., W., were of considerable size, and would offer a serious opposition to the
wind: could not these also be made to revolve? Certainly this might mitigate
tile danger; but of what use would the vane be? Even so, they are trying, in
certain quarters, to make the cardinal points of truth go round with the wind.
To this, we object. Let the weathercocks spin round as much as they please, but
we must have fixed points,of faith. Unless we have infallibility somewhere,
faith is impossible. The true faith teaches us facts which cannot be questioned.
Where is faith to build if there be no rock, and nothing left us but shifting
sand? As for us, we find infallibility in the Scriptures of the Old and New
Testament, and our one desire is to have them opened up to our minds by the Holy
Spirit. Those who choose to do so may invent a changing gospel; but we believe
in "Jesus Christ the same yesterday, and to-day, and for ever."

We are tried, at this time, by the way in which many attack the truth by
misrepresenting it, and wickedly distorting it. They designedly harp upon some
one doctrine as though it were all we believed; or, at least, the chief point of
our teaching. They know that we hold much more of truth, and that we do not make
this one point prominent; but this they willingly forget, that they may make up
a case against us. It is easy to paint all a man's features, and yet to
caricature him by putting one feature out of proportion to the rest: this is
what our opponents do. To give an instance: the doctrine of eternal punishment
has been scarcely raised by me in this controversy; but the "modern thought"
advocates continue to hold it up on all occasions, all the while turning the
wrong side of it outwards. The terror of "the wrath to come" is brought to the
front, as if this was our main teaching, and as if its dread forewarning was
peculiar to the orthodox doctrine. Can they assure us that there is nothing
terrible connected with their own beliefs as to the future of the wicked? If one
who holds either of the new views will state his belief clearly, it will be
fairly open to much the same criticism as that by which we are castigated. We,
at least, do not teach that sinners, who die penitent and believing, will need
to undergo long purgatorial pains before they enter Paradise. Our hope is larger
than that hideous dogma. Do any of these gentlemen teach that sin does not
entail terrible consequences? If they dare not say as much, why do they turn
their spurious humanity in our direction, and grow indignant at us? They will
claim at other times that, upon the point of future judgment, the difference is
a matter of degree; but it is not ingenuous on their part to forget this fact
when they are labouring to make us the objects of the world's obloquy. This,
however, does not matter much to us, for we do not flinch from truth because it
is terrible; but it shows the style of men who oppose us.

It is the same with other doctrines which we hold; they are constantly being
misrepresented, or, at least, misinterpreted. If our opponents would state the
case fairly, we should not mind it; but this would not serve their purpose. One
said, the other day, "I hate that text which says, 'Jacob have I loved, but Esau
have I hated.'" "Why?" said a friend; "what is the difficulty to your mind?" The
reply was, "I cannot see why God should hate Esau." "Nay," said our friend, "I
am not at all surprised that God hated Esau, but I am greatly amazed that God
loved Jacob." That is indeed a marvel of grace; the other is one of the
common-places of justice. Truth thus has its coat turned inside out, and then is
dragged up and down the street in scorn. They make a straw man, and carry him
about as a guy, hoping afterwards to burn him. This is fine sport for children,
but great folly in men.

While we do preach "the terror of the Lord," I may say of myself, and of you
also, that "we persuade men" in all tenderness. We do not worry them to Christ;
but, with much gentleness and patience, we endeavour to draw them with love, and
urge them on with tearful anxiety. We are under trembling apprehensions of the
wrath to come, and therefore we are in downright earnest. We have no pleasure in
their death. Do our enemies dare to think that we have? We grieve to think of
their dying in their sins. It is ungenerous to represent us as cruel because we
are honest in our interpretation of the threatenings of Scripture.

Yet misunderstanding and misrepresentation form an evil which we have to deal
with constantly. I have no doubt that you find it in your churches, weakening
your testimony, shaking the unstable, and causing unbelief in many minds. Our
gospel is adapted to meet this difficulty. Let us not distrust it; but, at the
same time, let us not shut our eyes to the fact that this form of evil is rife
among us, and must be met in the Name of the God of truth.

Another great evil is the want of decision for the truth among truly good men;
those who are our brethren in the faith of our Lord Jesus, but who do not seem
to have made up their minds as to separation from error. Good, easy men, they
are all for peace! "Sitting on the fence" seems to be a popular position among
professors just now. After next Monday's Union Meeting, several brethren may
have made up their minds; but, until then, they will sit uneasily upon the
fence. I have, with commendable forethought, endeavoured to drive a number of
tenterhooks and other useful nails into the top of that fence, to assist them in
retaining their hold; but I fear they are not deeply grateful to me. Theirs is a
position which I never was able to occupy myself, and therefore I have no very
profound sympathy with them. One or two learned divines are trying their utmost
to get down on both sides of the fence; but it is a perilous experiment. Some
are trying to get down on the winning side, and others would prefer to keep
their judicious position world without end. Neutrals, in the end, have the
respect of neither party; and, assuredly, they are the difficulty in every
controversy.

There will always be trouble in the churches so long as men are afraid to
denounce sin and error. A negro preacher, in a certain village, said that among,
his flock he carefully abstained from preaching against the sin of stealing
chickens, because it seemed so much to damp brotherly fellowship! Many a
preacher touches the matter of strong drink very tenderly because certain of his
supporters are in "the trade." Is there not a great deal of this suppression of
unpalatable, truth? Are not many unfaithful as to the sins around them? They are
"all things to all men," but it is not that they may "save some." I have heard
it whispered that it is in order that they may save a sum to the exchequer of
the church. Are not important persons too much consulted? Is not position more
valued than piety? Is there enough of downright faithfulness to truth and to
Christ at all hazards? Brethren, we want grace to say, "I can be poor; I can be
ridiculed; I can be abused; but I cannot be false to my Lord."

I make no personal reference, but I see the spirit of compromise concerning
holiness and sin, truth and error, far too prevalent. The spirit of compromise
comes not of the Spirit of God, but of the spirit of the world. It is always
wisest and best to exhibit clear decision upon fundamental points; we must draw
the line distinctly, and then stand to it firmly. Do not alter your course
because of winds and currents. Do not try to make things pleasant all round. Do
not be like the fellow, in one of the American towns, who saw a traveller
leaning against a lamp-post, weary and worn with his journey. The traveller
enquired of him how far it was to such a place, and was told that it was ten
miles. The weary traveller sighed, and said, "I shall never hold out. I shall
faint on the road." "Ah!" said his sympathizing informant, "I did not know you
were quite so far gone, I will knock off three miles, and make it seven for
you." Of course, this operation in words did not alter the fact, nor really
reduce the ten to seven. Yet this is the method of some weakly, amiable souls;
they tone down truth, forgetting that their tone does not affect the fact. This
obligation is too severe; and, therefore, it is suggested that it may be
somewhat relaxed. This doctrine is too stern; so make it wear a milder aspect.
This manner of pleasing everybody at any cost is the style of the period. If
sin, and human depravity, and so forth, are strongly spoken of in the old
theology, run off to the new, and soften matters. If the punishment of the
impenitent too much alarms men, treat it lightly, and spirit it away; who wants
to win converts by fear? Yes, yes; "make it seven." But what avail your soft
words? The distance is all the same for your lying; and when the deceived one
finds it to be so, he will pour no blessings upon your heads. May the Lord save
us from the doom of deceivers of souls! May we be watchmen who will be clear of
the blood of all men! Be decided yourselves; and then, like men who themselves
stand fast, you will be able to help others whose feet are slipping.

Another great evil of the times is the insatiable craving for amusements. That
men should have rest from labour, and that they should enjoy such amusements as
refresh both body and mind, nobody wishes to deny. Within suitable bounds,
recreation is necessary and profitable; but it never was the business of the
Christian Church to supply the world with amusements. Did Christ found His
Church that it might offer to the public tableaux vivants, and living waxworks?
A Dissenting congregation, to my own knowledge, commenced a series of special
services with a social meeting, and the evening was spent in various silly
dissipations; and among other things the assembled friends played at "Musical
Chairs"! I do not know whether you understand what that childish game means.
Think of ministers of the gospel and officers of a church playing at "Musical
Chairs"! There is a bill extant which states that, next week, there is to be a
"Punch and Judy" show in the same place of worship (so-called)! This is to go on
side by side with the preaching of Thy bleeding sacrifice, O Christ of God! No,
brethren, let me correct myself; the preaching of Christ usually ceases when
these frivolities come in. These things are so opposed in spirit, that one or
the other will have to be dropped; and we know which it will be.

What is to be next done in our chapels? To what length of tomfoolery will
ministers of the gospel yet go? Amusements beneath the contempt of idiots have
been tolerated in our schoolrooms. It has not come to that yet with us,
personally; but, brethren, we ourselves have to battle hard against it, for the
people are all agog for these vanities, and there are so many societies and
institutions more or less remotely connected with our churches that it is
difficult for us to keep them all. from wandering. Brethren, we are not here to
play away our time, but to win souls for Jesus and eternal bliss. By the
solemnities of death, and judgment, and eternity, I beseech you, keep yourselves
clear of the follies, the inanities of the day. Remark with interest how "the
wisdom of this world" and the follies of it seem to be boon companions, and turn
from them both with equal loathing.

Another of our difficulties lies in the lack of intense piety in many of the
churches. Numbers of our brethren and sisters to-day are living, in a high
degree, to the glory of God. I thank God that there is now as much of holy
activity and hearty consecration as in any former period in the history of the
Christian Church. Among us are men and women whose names will go down to
posterity as examples of devotion. God has not left Himself without witness. But
do you not notice how superficial is the religion of the mass of professors? How
many servants might live in so-called Christian families without perceiving any
difference between these houses and those of worldlings? Is not family prayer
neglected in many instances? Have we not members who are never seen at a
prayer-meeting? When enquiry is made, do you not find that the richer sort could
not attend because the dinner-hour is at the same time as the gathering for
prayer? No doubt they will be most careful to worship the god they favour most.
In other cases, you find that busy men, who could not come out to pray, were
quite able to attend a concert. Public dinners and sing-songs are more important
ceremonials with many than the offering of prayer to God. Do we not meet with
church-officers who say openly that they do not care for such old-fashioned
things as prayer-meetings? This is a wretched sign of declension, and it is
frequently to be seen. Our churches may well cause heartache to their pastors;
but, for the most part, in such cases the pastors themselves have so much
backslidden that they care nothing about it. In reference to ministers, many
church-members are indifferent as to the personal piety of the preacher; what
they want is talent or cleverness. What the man preaches does not matter now; he
must draw a crowd, or please the elite, and that is enough. Cleverness is the
main thing. One would think they were looking for a conjuror rather than a
pastor. Whether he preaches truth or error, the man is held in admiration so
long as he can talk glibly, and keep up a reputation as a speaker. If we had
truer piety in members and deacons, pretenders would soon take their wares to
other markets. Alas! I fear there has been great laxity in the admission of
members, and the quality of our churches has become defiled and debased by "the
mixed multitude," among whom all manner of evil finds a congenial
dwelling-place. Unhappy leader, who has an Achan in his own camp! Better that
Demas should forsake us, than that he should abide with us, and import the world
into the church. How many ministers are weak for warfare with sin because they
are not supported by a godly people, and their hands are not held up by praying
brethren! Not to make my jeremiad too long, I will mention only one more sad
evil of the times; that is, the stolidity of the people outside with regard to
the gospel. Compared with what it used to be, it is hard to win attention to the
Word of God. I used to think that we had only to preach the gospel, and the
people would throng to hear it. I fear I must correct my belief under this head.
If the gospel does not attract men, nothing will; I mean, nothing which can do
them good. Personally, I have no reason to doubt the attractiveness of the old,
old gospel; but I am assured that some of my brethren, who faithfully preach the
gospel of Christ, do not find the people flocking about them. We all feel that a
hardening process is going on among the masses. In this vast city, we have
street after street where the people are living utterly regardless of the
worship of God. Those who attend church or chapel are marked men; and if you
were to enquire for them, they would be pointed out to you as remarkable
individuals. A curious circumstance came under my own notice lately; it seems
that men may come to hear a preacher on a week-evening with less suspicion than
on the Sunday. One who had attended a week-night service was asked to come on
the Sabbath, but he replied, "Oh, no; I have not gone so far as that yet!"
Attendance at a place of worship on the Sunday has in London become, to many
people, a profession of religion. Merely to hear Spurgeon on a Thursday, is a
different matter! It is a fact that thousands of persons live close to our
notable sanctuaries, and never dream of entering them. Even curiosity seems
dulled.

Why is this? Whence this distaste for the ordinary services of the sanctuary? I
believe that the answer, in some measure, lies in a direction little suspected.
There has been a growing pandering to sensationalism; and, as this wretched
appetite increases in fury the more it is gratified, it is at last found to be
impossible to meet its demands. Those who have introduced all sorts of
attractions into their services have themselves to blame if people forsake their
more sober teachings, and demand more and more of the noisy and the singular.
Like dram-drinking, the thirst for excitement grows. At first, the fiery spirit
may be watered down; but the next draught of it must be stronger, and soon it is
required to be overproof. The customary gin-drinker wants something stronger
than the pure spirit, deadly though that draught may be. One said, as she tossed
off her glass, "Do you call that gin? Why, I know a place where, for threepence,
I can get a drink that will burn your very soul out!" Yes, gin leads on to
vitriol; and the sensational leads to the outrageous, if not to the blasphemous.
I would condemn no one, but I confess that I feel deeply grieved at some of the
inventions of modern mission work.

Apart from this intoxicating sensationalism, there is a sort of heaviness in the
air. Do you not feel it? We are getting into the condition into which Germany
fell not long ago. To this day, when talking with a German who is about joining
our church, I usually find that he has lived in a country town. The devout
German villager still attends public worship, but in the large towns a practical
atheism is supreme. Why is this? The ministers have done it. They preached the
people out of their faith in the Scriptures; they taught them to be doubters.
The most mischievous servant of Satan that I know of is the minister of the
gospel, who not only doubts the truth in his own soul, but propagates doubt in
the minds of others by his criticisms, innuendoes, and triflings with words.
Some ministers believe nothing except that nothing can be believed. Such a man's
conscience is withered. In some modern ministers, the faculty wherewith to
believe is extinct; they have played with words till they cannot be true if they
try. Against this evil I have protested with my whole soul. People say, "Why did
you not speak against these things twenty-five years ago?" I answer, "These
evils were scarcely apparent then." Things are not now as in our early ministry.
There has been a sudden growth of the toadstools of error. I never heard of
Universalism then, nor of post-mortem salvation, nor of probation in the next
state. Until very lately, I have not heard of ministers holding up the blood of
Jesus to scorn. I will not, however, repeat the sad facts which have of late
come to my knowledge, and pierced my heart. The times are out of joint. The
world may well be careless, for the Church in many places is full of unbelief. I
trust the present hurricane of evil may soon pass over; but anyone who has his
wits about him will sorrowfully admit that the good ship of the Church is now
tossed about with contrary winds, and needs that her Lord should come, and say
to the winds and the waves, "Peace, be still." So far, I have borne before you
"the burden of the Lord." In these evil times, we have still–

ONE ABIDING OBJECT.

Whatever the season may be, the farmer has still his land to till. In summer and
in winter his work may vary, but his object is the same. It is the same with the
servants of our Lord Jesus. Whatever others may do, we have lifted our hand unto
the Lord, and we cannot go back. We are still guided by that one purpose which
brought us first into the sacred ministry we dare not look back from the plough,
nor turn aside from the furrow.

How do you, at this time, look at your life's mission? What is that mission?
What are you at? I think I hear you answer, "Our chief end is to glorify, God."
We do not regard it as our first business to convert sinners, nor to edify
saints; but to glorify God. If we have preached God's truth, and on any one
occasion no souls have been saved thereby, we are still "unto God a sweet savour
of Christ," as well in those that perish as in those that are saved. The
preaching of Jesus Christ is the burning of sweet odours before the throne of
God, and to the Lord it is evermore an acceptable oblation. The sacrifice of
Jesus is that which makes the world bearable to a holy God, and the preaching of
that sacrifice is a savour of rest unto Him. This is a kind of lactometer by
which we can test the quality of any doctrine,–"Does it glorify God?" If it does
not glorify God, it is not genuine gospel, and it will not benefit us or our
hearers.

It is for us to keep our one object, come what may. The fisherman goes forth
with his nets upon a calm, bright, summer's day. "Now, boatman, take thy guitar.
Sit upon the bench, and delight us with sweet music." He answers, "I am not a
musician, but a fisherman." A storm-cloud darkens the sky and the rain and sleet
drive down. "Now, boatman, quit the deck. Make all trim above, and shelter
thyself below." He smiles, and answers, "I am no yachtsman out on a
pleasure-trip, but I am here to fish; and fish I will." Over go the nets! Our
sacred fishing may be better carried on in a storm than in a calm. When the
waters sleep, the fish seem to sleep also, or they are hidden in silent deeps
far out of our reach. A dead calm is our enemy, a storm may prove our helper.
Controversy may arouse thought, and through thought may come the Divine change.
In any case, we must win souls. Whatever comes of it, we are bound to catch men
for Jesus. Repentance and faith must be insisted on; the new birth, with its
loathing of sin and trust in Jesus, must be ever set before our people. For this
end were we born, and for this purpose were we sent into the world, that we
might bear witness to grand soul-saving truths, that by the knowledge of these
things God may be glorified among men.

Besides this, we have an intense desire to build up the Church; and it strikes
me that, for this object, it is of perpetual necessity that we continue to
preach always the same gospel. Is there to be no progress? Yes, within the lines
of revealed truth; but there must be no departure from fixed principles. A boy
at school commences with his first book in arithmetic; in due time, he needs
another; but suppose that the second book put into his hand contradicted the
first, where would that men now know better than to say that twice two are four!
What progress could he make? A consistent ministry, carried out through many
years preaching of the same truth, must, with God's blessing, produce a result
upon a congregation. A noble building is possible when the walls rise course
upon course upon a fixed foundation; but what result can those produce who
constantly change their teaching? What can they do who are "ever learning, and
never able to come to a knowledge of the truth"? True progress is out of the
question when everything is moving, road as well as carriage. There is a story
told of a man who married his fourth wife, who had brought him money. The like
had been the case with each of her predecessors. A friend said to him, "You seem
to make a good thing of your wives, whether they live or die." "Alas!" answered
the much-married man, "what with the expense of marrying them, and the expense
of burying them, there is not much profit about them after all." I should think
it is much the same with the new creeds with which men fall in love one after
the other. What with the trouble of learning the new doctrine, and the trouble
of very soon burying it to make room for another, there is not much profit.
Weaving comes to nothing if it be constantly pulled out again.

If we would, as wise master-builders, really build up the Church, we must be
careful as to our foundation at the first; and upon that foundation we must keep
on building to the end. As far as I am concerned, the things which I taught at
the first are those wherein I abide until this day. If I had chosen a new
object, I might have selected new means for promoting it; but those truths which
were for the glory of God thirty years ago, still produce the same result. We
work to the same end, and trust in the same power, wherefore we change not our
teaching.

Brethren, let me take you further, and speak upon– OUR URGENT NECESSITIES.

If we are to pursue our holy calling with success, we need to be better men.
Brethren, I do not depreciate you; far from it. But, personally, I feel that, as
the times grow sterner, I must cry to God for more grace, that I may be more
able to cope with them. You can always cut a hard thing with something still
harder. The granite Alps can be pierced by the diamond. Oh, for grace to be
equal to the worst case which can arise! Whatever we already possess of
capability or fitness is the Lord's gift, and He is able to grant us far more.
He that gave us life can give it to us "more abundantly." The capacities of a
man, when God takes him in hand, are not to be estimated by the man, but by God
Himself. It was prettily put, at the meeting last night, by one of the brethren,
when speaking of the cloud "like a man's hand"; he said that it was the Lord's
work, but a man's hand was in it. The blessing comes from the Lord alone, but
its sign is often the little cloud, like a man's hand. Oh, to have our hands
ready for the Lord's work; neither folded in indolence, nor hanging down in
despair, but lifted up in holy pleading and full consecration. Brethren, let it
be a main business with us to be ourselves more holy, more gracious, and
therefore better fitted for our work. It doth not yet appear what we can be. Oh,
for high aspirations!

Let us not judge ourselves by others, and say, with deadening self-complacency,
"We are getting on well as compared with our brethren. There are not many
additions to our churches, but we are as successful as others." O brothers, if
some are still further behind in the course, that does not increase our hope of
winning the race! While I was ill, a friend endeavoured to comfort me by
remarking that many suffered far more than I did. He looked unutterable things
when I replied, "None but a fiend could derive comfort from the greater agonies
of others." Shall we, if we have but little of God's blessing, be thankful that
others have still less? Did you tell me that John Johnston's potatoes are
smaller than mine? I am not going to have my potatoes judged by John Johnston's;
my standard as a gardener is not the worst specimen, but the best. Let us
measure ourselves by our Master, and not by our fellow-servants: then pride will
be impossible, but hopefulness will be natural. We are capable of much greater
things; let us attempt them. It is time for us to live, for we are growing old.
This done, let us get clearer views of what we believe. A drunken John Brown
gets to his own house at four o'clock in the morning, and says to the servant at
the door, "Where does John Brown live?" "O sir, don't talk like that," says the
servant, "you know that you are John Brown yourself." "Well," says he, "I know
that; but I want to know where John Brown lives." There is an inebriation of
"modern thought" which maunders much in that manner. John Brown of the New
School does not know where John Brown lives. Where he lived yesterday, he knows;
but where he lives to-day, it would be hard to tell. Many are spiritual gipsies.
They camp behind any hedge, but they abide nowhere, their theology consists of a
few sticks and bits of canvas. It is easily upset, but then it is as easily set
up. Well may they sing,–

"We've no abiding city here"!.

They prefer the chase after truth to truth itself; it is dear that such a chase
has not much of reality in it, for the man is pleased that his prey should
perpetually escape him. In olden times, the prophet was a seer; but, nowadays, a
prophet is one who is too cultured to see anything. A man who protests that he
has too much light to be sure that he sees anything is the favourite of certain
intellectual hearers. David said, "I believed, therefore have I spoken;" but he
was peculiar: our "thoughtful men" now speak because they doubt, and not because
they believe. The next thing necessary for the present time is that we should
have more faith. We need to believe more intensely in God, so as to trust Him
more practically and more unquestioningly. The things which we believe must
become more real to us. I fear we often use words without feeling their true
meaning. This is terrible. It is a sort of wilful murder to expel the soul from
pious phrases, and still to use them. Let us be honest about the things of God;
let us mean all that we say, and say only what we mean. It is a shocking thing
for a man to talk all manner of Evangelical, gracious, and sanctifying things,
and yet to mean nothing by them. I fear our pulpits are not free from such
word-mongers. Let us not hold forth shadows before the people. Let them, at any
rate, be no shadows to us, but downright facts. You have heard of the old Scotch
lady who was making her will. She was leaving £500 to this person, and £1,000 to
another, till at length the lawyer remarked, "Have you as much money as this?"
"May be not," said the old soul, "but it will show them my liberal intentions."
It is to be feared that many preach Evangelical doctrine, not because they
believe it, but that they may please the Evangelical. This will never do. Let us
never lie open to such a suspicion. Let the doctrines we declare be as dear to
us as our life, and as real as our own flesh and blood. We believe all Scripture
to be true. When the Bible says that a man is lost, we believe that the loss is
real and tremendous. Heaven and hell are realities with us, even though to
others they may be dreams. To us Christ is a real Christ; and the Holy Ghost
within a man brings real life from the dead. If we do not preach realities, I
pray God we may be driven out of the ministry, in which we are only treasuring
up wrath against the day of wrath.

We need also more love to souls. We shall never save more till we love more.
There is a good story told by our brother Archibald Brown; I will not attempt to
tell it in his presence; but it was something like this:–A man was accidentally
buried by a fall of earth, and many were greatly energetic to dig the poor
fellow out. One fellow stood by, scarcely as much concerned about the matter as
many others were, until a woman rushed out of the crowd, and laid hold on him,
and said in his ear, "It's your brother Bill that's in there!" Those few words
wrought a marvellous change in the man; his coat was off in an instant, and he
was down in the sewer working like a Trojan. If we would save our hearers from
the wrath to come, we must realize that they are our brothers. We must have
sympathy with them, and anxiety about them; in a word, passion and compassion.
May God grant these to us!

There must be also a more thorough spirit of self-sacrifice. I must speak
tenderly here, because I am among brethren whose life is one of perpetual
sacrifice in a pecuniary sense. With scarcely enough to keep body and soul
together, they work on without complaint year after year. If they could gain a
hundred times their present income in any other calling, they would not quit the
pulpit and the pastorate. The work of Christ is more to them than their
necessary food. Thank God, this Conference is well supplied with men who count
all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus their
Lord. But, my brethren, sacrifice is needed every day, that we may keep up the
abundance of our service. Here also we have many who excel. They are not
loiterers, but labourers. He who has an easy time of it, in his ministry here,
will have a hard time of it in the account to be rendered by-and-by. I fear the
idea of the ministry with some men is as much on the down-grade as their
doctrine is. Their gentlemanly indifference reminds me of the British workman,
who observed, "I have such a good master that I do not know how to do too much
for him, but I'll take precious good care I don't." Into that spirit may we
never enter! Let us live intensely for our Lord!

But, beyond surrendering ease, we must be prepared to give up everything else:
our name, our repute, our friendships, our connections, must all go without
reserve, if Christ's cause needs them. Sooner than deny the truth, we must
forego every meed of honour, every particle of deserved esteem, every rag of
repute. You have heard almost too often the classic story of Curtius leaping
into the gulf in the Forum at Rome. There is a chasm in the Forum at this hour.
Who will devote himself for his people and his God? Curtius does not stipulate
that he shall be wholly engulfed except the pennon upon his lance, which shall
remain above ground as his memorial. No, he takes the leap, and finds immortal
renown in being completely swallowed up. In the battle for the truth, let your
personal comfort and reputation go to the winds. Let not the sacrifice be
thought worthy of two thoughts. The weakness of many men is that they think so
long that they do nothing. The blood of the martyrs is scarce among us. It will
destroy our ministries if we begin thinking of the cost of honesty. Shall we
have before our eyes the fear of a large subscriber, and become afraid of
offending him by our fidelity? By that very thought, we have already offended
God. Brethren, let us fear no loss, because we have nothing to lose, seeing that
all we possess is Christ's already.

"There, take an inventory of all I have, To the last penny; 'tis the King's." My
Lord, for Thee I will rejoice to be "the off'-scouring of all things," that I
may be found faithful to Thee and to Thy truth, even to the end.

I will give you a little advice, which may be suitable for such a time as this.
I would recommend you to go over the fundamental truths with your hearers very
carefully. The bulk of the people do not know the first principles of the
gospel. We assume too much when we take it for granted that our hearers, all of
them, understand the gospel. Some of the old-fashioned dame-school teachers had
a curious way of treating their scholars. They asked Mary to read a passage from
a book, but Mary had not yet mastered her letters, and therefore she could not
read as she was bidden to do. She was called a naughty child, and put into a
corner, and told to study her book. She could do nothing at it, for she did not
know the letters! If we have not taught our people their letters, how can we
expect them to understand the truths that we preach? Let us go over the
foundation truths again and again. The simplest doctrines would be great
novelties in some pulpits I could mention. A king once asked a courtier what
made a certain French preacher so famous. "Your majesty," said the nobleman, "he
preaches the gospel, and that is the scarcest thing in France." How true of many
English pulpits to-day! Go over the elementary truths with your people. Make
them know the first principles of the faith. It will not weary your hearers, it
will bless them, and many of them will be delighted. Repeat the fundamentals,
too; often, if you can. In the days of old-fashioned farming, they dropped three
beans into the hole. And why? One was for the worm, another for the crow and
number three perchance would grow. Let us be liberal with the seed, for the evil
powers are liberal with worms, and crows, and thorns. Let others go forth to
shine; you are sowers, and must "go forth to sow." Repeat yourselves if
necessary. Paul wrote to the Philippians, "To write the same things to you, to
me indeed is not grievous, but for you it is safe." In the next place, labour
distinctly for the immediate salvation of your hearers. Take aim. At Waterloo,
they say that, for every man who was killed, his full weight in lead had to be
fired. We must improve upon this, and use arms of precision. We must get at the
people each time we address them. It is wise to make definite characters the
point of attack. We must look to the application of each sermon. I have known a
true doctor, in a very critical case, act the part of nurse as well as surgeon,
and personally see his liniments and poultices applied to his patient. This
personal care gives surgery its best chance. We have great need to be very
specific in applying truth to our hearers. If a doctor should prescribe a bitter
medicine for children, to be taken every three hours, and then should leave it
to the youngsters to take it themselves, I fear the doses taken would be small
and few. Even so is it with unpalatable truth; we must not only set it forth in
general terms, but we must measure it out in doses to each individual. Under the
guidance of the Holy Spirit, this must be our daily work. We want our hearers
saved, and saved at once; and towards this design we must drive with all our
power.

Let us inculcate with all our might the practice of holiness. Holiness is the
visible side of salvation. I thought it no ill sign when the preaching of
holiness was pushed even to an extreme. I trembled at the fanaticism, but I
thanked God for the earnestness out of which it grew. Let us seek the utmost
degree of holiness. The doctrines of grace should be accompanied by ethics of
the purest kind. We have been clear upon the fact that good works are not the
cause of salvation; let us be equally clear upon the truth that they are the
necessary fruit of it. What is the use of our churches if they are not holy?
What is the use of ourselves if we are not holy? Holiness is practical
orthodoxy, and it should walk hand-in-hand with doctrinal orthodoxy. We must not
only have a hightoned morality, but a consecrated morality, quickened by the
Spirit of God;–and that is holiness. To this end, I would exhort you to be
careful about the admission of members into the church. Doubtless there are some
in our ranks who ought not to be there. This is to their own hurt, to the
dishonour of the Lord Jesus, and to the injury of the church itself. Unconverted
member's lower the whole tone of the church. How low that tone has now become,
let spiritual men judge for themselves. If the members were converted, they
would make short work of many of the ministers; but the people are like their
priests. Many are the letters of sympathy which my protests upon this matter
have drawn forth. It is clear that lax doctrine and lax living are pretty
frequently associated. A weeping Hannah writes me concerning her husband who has
been for years a lay preacher, but who now spends his evenings far into night at
the billiard-table, for which he acquired a taste when he went in for new
theology and religious entertainments. Many have, gone from the prayer-meeting
to the amateur theatricals of the Mutual Improvement Society, and thence to the
playhouse itself. This seems to be natural, if not inevitable. Oh, that we had a
purer membership to work with! Do what we may, Judas will come in; but let us
not invite him: let us not make it easy for a betrayer of Christ to be
comfortable with us. To mix up the world with the church, is a crime; it brings
with it an awful curse, and acts upon godliness as a blast and a mildew. Let the
door of the church be opened to all sincere souls, but closed against all whose
hearts are in the world. It is not even for the worldling's good that he should
hold the form of godliness while he is a stranger to its power. As you love your
Lord, and value men's souls guard well the entrance of the church. As to
yourselves, I would recommend entire separation from those who would be likely
to injure your spiritual life. I would no more associate with one who denied the
faith than with a drunkard or a thief. I would guard my spirituals as jealously
as my morals. A loyal man is not at home in the company of traitors. There are
associations with the ungodly into which we must needs go, unless we get out of
the world altogether; but there are others which are optional, and here we
should dare to be scrupulous. A godly minister once said of a certain preacher,
"I would not permit such a man to enter my pulpit. I am as jealous of my pulpit
as of my bed." I do not think he was too rigid. We should guard ourselves
against compromising the truth of God by association with those who do not hold
it, especially at such a time as this.

Next, we must bind ourselves more closely together, and seek to render help to
each other, and to all who are of the same mind in the Lord. Denominational
divisions sink in the presence of the truth of God. To my mind, the grand
distinction to be now observed is found in Evangelical doctrine, of which our
Lord's substitutionary sacrifice is the centre and the soul. Where we see
faithful brethren struggling, we ought to lay ourselves out to help them, for
they are sure to be the objects of inveterate opposition. Lovers of the old
faith should stand shoulder to shoulder, to remove the injustice of the past,
and frustrate the opposition of the future. The struggle before us is severe;
let us, at any rate, economize our strength by union.

Lastly, let me leave with you–

WORDS OF ENCOURAGEMENT. The times are bad, but they have been bad before. You
have to fight with Apollyon, but many have met this arch-enemy before your day.
Gird up the loins of your mind, and stand fast, for the Lord is greater than the
times. The days are evil, but evil days are followed by good days. History
repeats itself, and this is one of the points in which history is very
persistent. Let me read you a cheering passage from Witherspoon:–"Nothing is
impossible to the power of God. I add, that the most remarkable times of the
revival of religion, in this part of the United Kingdom, immediately succeeded
times of the greatest apostasy, when 'truth' seemed to be 'fallen in the street,
and equity could not enter.' This was the case immediately before the year 1638.
Corruption in doctrine, looseness in practice, and slavish submission in
politics, had overspread the Church of Scotland; and yet, in a little time, she
appeared in greater purity, and in greater dignity, than ever she had done
before, or, perhaps, than ever she has done since that period. Let no Christian,
therefore, give way to desponding thoughts. We plead the cause that shall at
last prevail. Religion shall rise from its ruins; and its oppressed state at
present should not only excite us to pray, but encourage us to hope for its
speedy revival."

Make the most of prayer. I have received much encouragement of late, from
friends in many different quarters, by the assurance that our conflict for the
gospel is continually mentioned in their prayers. The praying heart of God's
people is with us. Prayer is the master-weapon. We should be greatly wise if we
used it more, and did so with a more specific purpose. In New England, a certain
church had elected a young man named Mr. Stoddard to be its pastor. After a
while, the people found out that their new preacher was not a real Christian.
What did they do? Did they find fault, and quarrel? No, they were wiser folks.
One Sabbath night, when his day's work was over, the young minister saw the
people flocking to the meeting-house. He was surprised at their coming in such
numbers to a service at which he was not himself to preside. "Why are they
meeting?" he asked. "Sir," said one, "they are coming together to pray that
their minister may be converted." Young Stoddard went within doors, sought his
chamber, prayed for himself, and found eternal life. Before the hour of prayer
was over, he was converted, and went down to the meeting to tell the glad
tidings. Was not that a glorious work of grace? Might we not win more victories
if we more constantly used this weapon of all-prayer? All hell is vanquished
when the believer bows his knee in importunate supplication. Beloved brethren,
let us pray. We cannot all argue, but we can all pray; we cannot all be leaders,
but we can all be pleaders; we cannot all be mighty in rhetoric, but we can all
be prevalent in prayer. I would sooner see you eloquent with God than with men.
Prayer links us with the Eternal, the Omnipotent, the Infinite; and hence it is
our chief resort. Resolve to serve the Lord, and to be faithful to His cause,
for then you may boldly appeal to Him for succour. Be sure that you are with
God, and then you may be sure that God is with you.


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  CHAPTER 90: 11. THE PREACHER’S POWER, AND THE CONDITIONS OF OBTAINING IT
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Chapter 11—The Preacher's Power, and

the Conditions of Obtaining It

BRETHREN, we want to do our work rightly and effectively, AND WE CANNOT DO IT
WITHOUT POWER. Of course, no work of any kind is accomplished in this world
without a certain expenditure of force, and the force employed differs according
to the matter in hand. The sort of power of which we feel the need will be
determined by our view of our work; and the amount of power that we shall long
for will also very much depend upon our idea of how that work should be done. I
speak as unto wise men, who know their object, and know also whence their
strength must come. I speak also to men who mean to use their office as in the
sight of God; but yet I think it desirable to stir up your pure minds, by way of
remembrance, and put you and myself in mind of the grand design for which we
need power.

We could be ministers, as some men are ministers, without any particular power,
either natural, or acquired. Merely to perform services (to use an ugly word)
"perfunctorily" does not require special endowments. Any speaking machine might
do as well. There are ministers whose sermons, and whose whole services, are so
much a matter of routine, and so utterly lifeless; that if power from on high
were to come upon them, it would altogether bewilder them. Nobody would know
them to be the same persons; the change would seem too great. The same things
are said, in the same tone and manner, year after year. I have heard of a
preacher, whom one of his people likened to a steeple, which had but two bells
in it, for, he said, "It is always, 'Ding dong, ding dong, ding dong, ding
dong.'" "Oh!" said his friend, "you ought to be abundantly grateful that you
have as much variety as that, for our man has only one bell, and his note is for
ever, 'Ding, ding, ding, ding.'" When this is the case among Nonconformists, it
ruins the congregations, for it is death to every possibility of collecting
people to hear; and still more is it murder to all hope of their being improved
if they do hear. I should think it is by no means difficult, with a liturgy, to
be read without much alteration all the year round, to become a fine example of
either the Ding dong, or the Ding, ding; but with us, whose devotion is of a
free sort, there is less excuse for monotony, and if we fall into the fault, the
result will be more disastrous. It is possible, even without a liturgy, to pray
in a very set and formal style; indeed, it is so possible as to be frequent, and
then the long prayer becomes a severe infliction upon an audience, and the
shorter prayers are not much better. When I have thought of the preaching of
certain good men, I have wondered, not that the congregation was so small, but
that it was so large. The people who listen to them ought to excel in the virtue
of patience, for they have grand opportunities for exercising it.

I have frequently said of myself that I would not go across the road to hear
myself preach; but I will venture to say of certain brethren that I would even
go across the road in the other direction not to hear them preach. Some sermons
and prayers lend a colour of support to the theory of Dr. William Hammond, that
the brain is not absolutely essential to life. Brethren, I trust that not even
one of you will be content with mechanical services devoid both of mental and
spiritual force. You will, none of you, covet earnestly the least gifts and the
dullest mannerisms, for you can obtain them without the exertion of the will.
You desire to do your Master's work as it ought to be done, and therefore you
long for excellent gifts, and still more excellent graces. You wish that people
may attend to your discourse, because there is something in it worthy of their
attention. You labour to discharge your ministry, not with the lifeless method
of an automaton, but with the freshness and power which will render your
ministry largely effectual for its sacred purposes.

I am bound to say, also, that our object certainly is not to please our clients,
nor to preach to the times, nor to be in touch with modern progress, nor to
gratify the cultured few. Our lifework cannot be answered by the utmost
acceptance on earth; our record is on high, or it will be written in the sand.
There is no need whatever that you and I should be chaplains of the modern
spirit, for it is well supplied with busy advocates. Surely Ahab does not need
Micaiah to prophesy smooth things to him, for there are already four hundred
prophets of the groves who are flattering him with one consent. We are reminded
of the protesting Scotch divine, in evil days, who was exhorted by the Synod to
preach to the times. He asked, "Do you, brethren, preach to the times?" They
boasted that they did. "Well, then," said he, "if there are so many of you who
preach for the times, you may well allow one poor brother to preach for
eternity." We leave, without regret, the gospel of the hour to the men of the
hour. With such eminently cultured persons for ever hurrying on with their new
doctrines, the world may be content to let our little company keep to the
old-fashioned faith, which we still believe to have been once for all delivered
to the saints. Those superior persons, who are so wonderfully advanced, may be
annoyed that we cannot consort with them; but, nevertheless, so it is that it is
not now, and never will be, any design of ours to be in harmony with the spirit
of the age, or in the least to conciliate the demon of doubt which rules the
present moment.

Brethren, we shall not adjust our Bible to the age; but before we have done with
it, by God's grace, we shall adjust the age to the Bible. We shall not fall into
the error of that absent-minded doctor who had to cook for himself an egg; and,
therefore, depositing his watch in the saucepan, he stood steadfastly looking at
the egg. The change to be wrought is not for the Divine chronometer, but for the
poor egg of human thought. We make no mistake here; we shall not watch our
congregation to take our cue from it, but we shall keep our eye on the
infallible Word, and preach according to its instructions. Out Master sits on
high, and not in the chairs of the scribes and doctors, who regulate the
theories of the century. We cannot take our key-note from the wealthier people,
nor from the leading officers, nor even from the former minister.

How often have we heard an excuse for heresy made out of the desire to impress
"thoughtful young men"! Young men, whether thoughtful or otherwise, are best
impressed by the gospel, and it is folly to dream that any preaching which
leaves out the truth is suitable to men, either old or young. We shall not quit
the Word to please the young men, nor even the young women. This truckling to
young men is a mere pretence; young men are no more fond of false doctrine than
are the middle-aged; and if they are, there is so much the more necessity to
teach them better. Young men are more impressed by the old gospel than by
ephemeral speculations. If any of you wish to preach a gospel that will be
pleasing to the times, preach it in the power of the devil, and I have no doubt
that he will willingly do his best for you. It is not to such servants of men
that I desire to speak just now. I trust that, if ever any of you should err
from the faith, and take up with the new theology, you will be too honest to
pray for power from God with which to preach that mischievous delusion if you
should do so, you will be guilty of constructive blasphemy. No, brethren, it is
not our object to please men, but our design is far nobler. To begin with, it is
our great desire to bear witness to the truth. I believe –and the conviction
grows upon me,–that even to know the truth, is the gift of the grace of God; and
that to love the truth, is the work of the Holy Spirit. I am speaking now, not
about a natural knowledge, or a natural love to Divine things, if such there be;
but of an experimental know ledge of Christ, and a spiritual love to Him: these
are as much the gift of God in the preacher, as the work of conversion will be
the work of God in his hearers. We desire so thoroughly to know, and so heartily
to love the truth, as to declare the whole counsel of God, and to speak it as we
ought to speak it. This is no small labour. To proclaim the whole system of
truth, and to deal out each part in due proportion, is by no means a simple
matter. To bring out each doctrine according to the analogy of faith, and set
each truth in its proper place, is no easy task. It is easy to make a caricature
of the beautiful face of truth by omitting one doctrine and exaggerating
another. We may dishonour the most lovely countenance by giving to its most
striking feature an importance which puts it out of proportion with the rest;
for beauty greatly consists in balance and harmony. To know the truth as it
should be known, to love it as it should be loved, and then to proclaim it in
the right spirit, and in its proper proportions, is no small work for such
feeble creatures as we are. In this grand, yet delicate labour, we have to
persevere year after year. What power can enable us to do this? While so many
complain of the monotony of the old gospel, and feel a perpetual itching for
something new, this disease may even infect our own hearts. This is an evil to
be fought against with our whole being. When we feel dull and stale, we must not
imagine that the truth of God is so; nay, rather, by returning more closely to
the Word of the Lord, we must renew our freshness. To continue always steadfast
in the faith, so that our latest testimony shall be identical in substance with
our first testimony, only deeper, mellower, more assured, and more intense,–this
is such a labour that for it we must have the power of God. Do you not feel
this? I pray you, feel it more and more. O brethren, if you propose to be true
witnesses for God, your proposal is a very glorious one, and it will tend to
make you feel the truth of what I am about to say, namely, that a more than
human power must guide you, and make you sufficient for the difficult
enterprise! Your object is, however, so to bear your personal witness that
others may be convinced thereby of the truth of what is so sure to your own
soul. In this there are difficulties not a few, for our hearers are not anxious
to believe the revelation of God; some of them are desirous not to do so. In the
reign of Queen Elizabeth, an order went forth that everybody should go to the
parish church, at least once on the Sunday. Of course, the bulk of the people
were still Romish, and it went much against the grain for them to attend the
Reformed service. I have read that, when Romanists did go to the service
prescribed by law, many of them put wool into their ears, that they might not
hear. In a moral sense, this practice is still in vogue. Certain parts of the
truth men will hear, but other portions are disagreeable to them, and their ears
are dull of hearing. You know–for you believe in the original sin of men, (about
the only thing original there is in many)–how Satan has most effectually blinded
the minds of the ungodly, so that, speak we as wisely as we may, and as
persuasively as we can, nothing but a miracle can convince men dead in sin of
the truth of God. Nothing less than a miracle of grace can lead a man to receive
what is so altogether opposite to his nature.

I shall not attempt to teach a tiger the virtues of vegetarianism; but I shall
as hopefully attempt that task as I would try to convince an unregenerate man of
the truths revealed by God concerning sin, and righteousness, and judgment to
come. These spiritual truths are repugnant to carnal men, and the carnal mind
cannot receive the things of God. Gospel truth is diametrically opposed to
fallen nature; and if I have not a power much stronger than that which lies in
moral suasion, or in my own explanations and arguments, I have undertaken a task
in which I am sure of defeat. Well said the writer of one of our hymns, when he
spake of the Holy Spirit,–

"'Tis Thine the passions to recall,

And upward bid them rise;

And make the scales of error fall

From reason's darkened eyes."

Except the Lord endow us with power from on high, our labour must be in vain,
and our hopes must end in disappointment. This is but the threshold of our
labour: our inmost longing is to call out a people who shall be the Lord's
separated heritage. A new theory has lately been started, which sets forth as
its ideal a certain imaginary kingdom of God, unspiritual, unscriptural, and
unreal. The old-fashioned way of seeking the lost sheep, one by one, is too
slow: it takes too much time, and thought, and prayer, and it does not leave
space enough for politics, gymnastics, and sing-song. We are urged to rake in
the nations wholesale into this imaginary kingdom by sanitary regulations,
social arrangements, scientific accommodations, and legislative enactments.
Please the people with the word "democratic", and then amuse them into morality.
This is the last new "fad." According to this fancy, our Lord's Kingdom is,
after all, to be of this world; and, without conversion, or the new birth, the
whole population is to melt into an earthly theocracy. Howbeit, it is not so.

It seems to me that the Lord will follow up the lines of the Old Testament
economy still, and separate to Himself a people who shall be in the midst of the
world as the Lord's kings and priests,–a peculiar people, zealous for good
works. I see, in the New Covenant, not less, but even more, of the election of
grace, whereby a people is called out, and consecrated to the Lord. Through the
chosen ones, myriads shall be born unto God; but, besides these, I know of no
other kingdom. Brethren., the election of grace, which is so often denounced, is
a fact which men need not speak against, since they do not themselves desire to
be elected. I never can make out why a man should cavil at another's being
chosen when he does not himself wish to be chosen. If he wishes that he were
chosen to repentance, if he desires holiness, if he longs to be the Lord's, and
if that desire be true, he is chosen already. But seeing that he does not desire
anything of the kind, why does he rail at others who have received this
blessing? Ask an ungodly man whether he will take up the humble, often-abused,
and persecuted position of a lowly follower of Christ, and he scorns, the idea.
If it were possible for him to get into that position for a time, how gladly
would he shuffle out of it! He likes to be "in the swim," and to side with the
majority; but to be a live fish, and to force his way up the stream, is not
according to his desire. He prefers a worldly religion, with abundant provision
for the flesh. Religious worldliness suits him very well; but to be out-and-out
for Jesus, called out from the world, and consecrated to obedience, is not his
ambition. Do you not see, in this, your need of an extraordinary power? To call
men out to a real separation from the world, and a true union with Christ, apart
from the power of God, is an utterly futile effort. Go, and whistle eagles into
an English sky, or beckon dolphins to the dry land, or lure leviathan till thou
canst play with him as with a bird, and then attempt this greater task. They
will not come, they have no wish to come; and even so our Lord and Master warned
the Jews when He said, "Ye will not come unto Me that ye might have life." They
will read the Bible: "Ye search the Scriptures, for in them ye think ye have
eternal life;" but they will not come to the Lord Himself; that is too spiritual
a matter for their tastes. No, the command, "Repent ye, and believe the gospel,"
is too hard, too sharp, too humbling for them. Is not this enough to appal you?
Dare you go forward unless your Lord shall gird you with heavenly power?

Stop: we have only yet begun. They are called out; but there is something
further to be done through the instrumentality of our ministry: our hearers have
to be born again, and made new creatures in Christ Jesus, or else our preaching
has done nothing for them. Ah, dear friends, we get into deep waters when we
come to this great mystery! Does any unregenerate man know the meaning of being
born again? Ask the learned doctors whether they know anything about it, and
they will try to conceal their ignorance beneath a sneer. Ask them if they think
there is anything in it, and they will perhaps reply, "Yes, there must be such a
phenomenon, for many respectable and even scientific people have professed to be
the subjects of it." Still, they smile, and express their wonder that it is so.
The confession of many a candid scientist is that it may be so, but he is not
himself able to comprehend it. Why, then, do they not hold their tongues? If
they have not experienced the new birth, that fact is no proof that others have
not. Why do they sneer as if they were our superiors? The regenerate in this
matter are necessarily their superiors. A person who has only one eye is a king
among blind men; let not the blind affect to despise him. If any of us have
personally experienced the new birth, even though we may be ignorant of many
other things, we are in this point better instructed than those who have never
felt the Divine change.

But, just in proportion as you know what it is to be born again, you will feel
that herein is a task indeed. How sublime a position for you to become, under
God, the spiritual parents of men! You could not create a fly, much less could
you create a new heart and a right spirit. To fashion a world, has less
difficulty in it than to create a new life in an ungodly man; for, in the
creation of the world, there was nothing in the way of God; but, in the creation
of the new heart, there is the old nature opposing the Spirit. The negative has
to be removed as well as the positive produced. Stand and look that matter over,
and see if you are at all able, in and of yourself, to work the conversion, or
regeneration of a single child in your Sunday-school. My brethren, we are at the
end of ourselves here.. If we aim at the new birth of our hearers, we must fall
prostrate before the Lord in conscious impotence, and we must not go again to
our pulpits till we have heard our Lord say, "My grace is sufficient for thee:
for My strength is made perfect in weakness."

Supposing that to be done, remember that those who are brought to God are to be
kept and preserved to the end; and your longing is that your ministry should be
the means of keeping them from stumbling, and holding them fast in the way of
righteousness even to the end. Do you propose to do that of yourself? How
presumptuous! Why, look at the temptations which pollute this city; and I
suppose that the seductions of evil are much the same in smaller towns, and in
the villages, though differing in form. Their name is legion, for they are many.
Look at the temptations which assail our youth in the literature of the hour!
Have you even a slender acquaintance with popular literature? Do you wonder that
weak minds are made to stumble? The wonder is that any are preserved. Yet this
is only one of the many death-bearing agencies.

How great is the leakage in our churches! The most faithful minister has to
complain of the loss of many who appeared to run well, but have been hindered,
so that they do not obey the truth. The great heap that we have gathered upon
the threshing-floor is sadly diminished when He comes whose fan is in His hand.
But we do propose, nevertheless, to be the means, in the hands of God, of
leading the sheep of Christ into green pastures, and continuing to lead them,
until they feed on the hilltops of Heaven with the great Shepherd Himself in
their midst. But what a task we have undertaken! How shall we present them to
Christ as pure virgins? How can we keep them from the pollution of the
all-surrounding Sodom? How shall we, at the last, be able to say, "Here am I,
and the children Thou hast given me"? Brethren, we cannot do it at all; but the
Lord can do it, through us, by the energy of His grace.

If you have half a-dozen converts, how greatly you will praise God, if you pass,
with that half-a-dozen at your side, safely through the gate of pearl! Certain
of us know many thousands whom we have, instrumentally, brought to the Saviour;
but unless we have a power infinitely greater than our own, how shall we
shepherd them to the end? We may announce them as our converts, we may associate
with them as workers, and feel thankful for them as fellow-heirs; and yet bitter
may be our disappointment, when all comes to all, and they turn aside unto
perdition. How grievous to be, to all appearance, rich in usefulness, and on a
sudden to find that our converts are like money put into a bag that is full of
holes, and that our treasured converts fall out, because they were not truly
gathered to the Lord Jesus after all!

"Who is sufficient for these things?" We are weak, exceedingly weak, every one
of us. If there is any brother here who is weaker than the rest, and knows that
he is so, let him not be at all cast down about that, for you see, brethren, the
best man here, if he knows what he is, knows that he is out of his depth in his
sacred calling. Well, if you are out of your depth, it does not matter whether
the sea is forty feet or a full mile deep. If the sea is only a fathom deep, you
will drown if you be not upborne; and if it be altogether unfathomable, you
cannot be more than drowned. The weakest man here is not, in this business,
really any weaker than the strongest man, since the whole affair is quite beyond
us, and we must work miracles by Divine power, or else be total failures. We
have all set up in the Divine profession of working by omnipotence; or, rather,
of yielding ourselves up to omnipotence that it may work by us. If, therefore,
omnipotence be not within hail, and if the miracle-working power is not within
us, then the sooner we go home, and plough the fields, or open shop, or cast up
accounts, the better. Wherefore should we undertake what we have not the power
to perform? Supernatural work needs supernatural power; and if you have it not,
do not, pray you, attempt to do the work alone, lest, like Samson, when his
locks were shorn, you should become the jest of the Philistines. This
supernatural force is the power of the Holy Ghost, the power of Jehovah Himself.
It is a wonderful thing that God should condescend to work His marvels of grace
through men. It is strange that, instead of speaking, and saying with His own
lips, "Let there be light," He speaks the illuminating word by our lips! Instead
of fashioning a new heaven and a new earth, whereto dwelleth righteousness, by
the mere fiat of His power, He couples Himself with our weakness, and so
performs His purpose! Do you not marvel that He should treasure His gospel in
these poor earthen vessels, and accomplish the miracles, which I have very
briefly described, by messengers who are themselves so utterly unable to help
Him in the essential parts of His heavenly work? Turn your wonder into
adoration, and blend with your adoration a fervent cry for Divine power. O Lord,
work by us to the praise of Thy glory!

We now purpose to consider the way in which we are to obtain the power we so
much desire. WE NEED TO FEEL IT WITHIN OURSELVES WHEN WE ARE RECEIVING OUR
MESAGES. In order to have power in public, we must receive power in private. I
trust that no brother here would venture to address his people without getting a
message fresh from his Lord. If you deliver a stale story of your own
concocting, or if you speak without a fresh anointing from the Holy One, your
ministry will come to nothing. Words spoken on your own account, without
reference to your Lord, will fall to the ground. When the footman goes to the
door to answer a caller, he asks his master what he has to say, and he repeats
what his master tells him. You and I are waiting-servants in the house of God,
and we are to report what our God would have us speak. The Lord gives the
soul-saving message, and clothes it with power; He gives it to a certain order
of people, and under certain conditions.

Among those conditions I notice, first, a simplicity of heart. The Lord pours
most into those who are most empty of self. Those who have least of their own
shall have the most of God's. The Lord cares little what the vessel is, whether
golden or earthen, so long as it is clean, and disengaged from other uses. He
sees whether there is anything in the cup; and if so, he throws it all out. Only
then is the cup prepared to receive the living water. If there was something in
it before, it would adulterate the pure water of life; or if what was there
before was very pure, it would, at least, occupy some of the room which the Lord
seeks for His own grace. The Lord therefore empties us, that we may be clear
from prejudice, self-sufficiency, and foregone conclusions as to what His truth
ought to be. He would have us like children, who believe what their father tells
them. We must lay aside all pretence of wisdom. Some men are too self-sufficient
for God to use. If God were to bless them largely, they would talk in Wolsey's
style of "Ego et rex meus" (I and my king); but the Lord will have none of it.
That straight-backed, upstart letter "I" must bow itself down into its
lower-case shape, and just look like a little pot-hook (i) of a thing, and be
nothing more. Oh, to be rid of self! Oh, to quit every pretence of wisdom!

Many preachers are very superior persons; and so, when they get God's message,
they correct it, and interpolate their own ideas; they dream that the old gospel
cannot be quite suitable to these enlightened days, when "everything is done by
steam, and men are killed by powder." They not only interpolate, but they omit,
because they judge that certain truths have become obsolete by the lapse of
time. In this way, what with additions and subtractions, little is left of the
pure Word of God. The apostles are generally the first to be sent adrift. Poor
Paul! Poor Paul! He has come in for very hard lines just lately; as if the
Spirit of God did not speak through Paul with as much authority as when He spake
through the Lord Jesus. Note well how our Lord deigns to put Himself on a level
with His apostles when He says," The Word which ye hear is not Mine, but the
Father's which sent Me;" and in His great intercessory prayer He prayed for
those who would believe on Him through the apostles' word, as much as to say
that, if they would not believe on Him through the word of the apostles, they
would not believe at all. John, speaking of himself and his fellow-apostles, has
said by the Holy Ghost, "He that knoweth God heareth us; he that is not of God
heareth not us. Hereby know we the spirit of truth, and the spirit of error."
This is the test of believers at the present time; the rejection of the apostles
condemns the modern school.

Brethren, may the Lord give us great humility of mind! It ought not to be an
extraordinary thing for us to accept what God says. It ought not to take much
humility for such poor creatures as we are to sit at the feet of Jesus. We ought
to look upon it as an elevation of mind for our spirit to lie prostrate before
infinite wisdom. Assuredly, this is needful to the reception of power from God.

I have noticed, too, that if God's power comes to a man with a message, he not
only has child-likeness of mind, but he has also singleness of eye. Such a man,
trying to hear what God the Lord shall speak, is all ear. He honestly and
eagerly desires to know what God's mind is, and he applies all his faculties to
the reception of the Divine communication. As he drinks in the sacred message,
with a complete surrender of soul, he is resolved to give it out with the entire
concentration of his mental and spiritual powers, and with a single eye to the
glory of God. Unless you have but one eye, and that one eye sees Christ and His
glory in the salvation of men, God will not use you. The man whose eyes cannot
look straight on, must not be admitted as a priest unto the living God.

There are certain defects which cut a man off from the Divine employ, and
anything like a sinister motive is one of them. If you aim at making money,
winning ease, securing approbation, or obtaining position, or even if you aim at
the exhibition of rhetorical talent, you will not be fit for the Master's use.
God would not have us entangled with subordinate designs. You do not keep a
servant to go to the door that people may say, "What a fine girl she is, and how
charmingly she dresses!" You may smile if it is so, and put up with it:; but
your sole wish is to have your message promptly and faithfully delivered. How
contemptible it is when a minister so acts as to give the idea of childish
display! He stands up to deliver his Lord's message, but his hope is that people
will say, "What a nice young man! How properly' he speaks, and how prettily he
quotes Browning!" Self-display is death to power. God cannot greatly bless men
with such small ideas. It is beneath the dignity of the Godhead for the Lord
largely to use an instrument so altogether unadapted for His sublime purposes.

Beloved, I notice that God imparts His messages to those who have a complete
subordination to Him. I will tell you what has often crossed my mind when I have
talked with certain brethren, or have read their lucubrations; I have wondered
which was the Master, and which was the servant,–the man or God. I have been
sorry for the errors of these brethren, but I have been far more distressed by
the spirit shown in those errors. It is evident that they have renounced that
holy reverence for Scripture which is indicated by such an expression as this,
"that trembleth at My Word." They rather trifle than tremble. The Word is not
their teacher, but they are its critics. With many, the Word of the Lord is no
longer enthroned in the place of honour, but it is treated as a football, to be
kicked about as they please; and the apostles, especially, are treated as if
Paul, and James, and John, were Jack, Tom, and Harry, with whom modern wise men
are on terms of something more than equality. They pass the Books of Scripture
under their rod, and judge the Spirit of God Himself. The Lord cannot work by a
creature that is in revolt against Him. We must manifest the spirit of
reverence, or we shall not be as little children, nor enter the Kingdom of
Heaven. When some men come to die, the religion which they have themselves
thought out and invented will yield them no more confidence than the religion of
the Roman Catholic sculptor who, on his death-bed, was visited by his priest.
The priest said, "You are now departing out of this life;" and, holding up a
beautiful crucifix, he cried, "Behold your God, who died for you" "Alas!" said
the sculptor, "I made it." There was no comfort for him in the work of his own
hands; and there will be no comfort in a religion of one's own devising. That
which was created in the brain cannot yield comfort to the heart. The man will
sorrowfully say, "Yes, that is my own idea; but what does God say?" Brethren, I
believe in that which I could not have invented. I believe that which I cannot
understand. I believe that which compels me to adore, and I thank God for a rock
that is higher than I am. If it were not higher than I am, it would be no
shelter for me.

"But still," says one, "we must be earnest students of the literature of the
period, and of the science of the age." Yes; I did not say you were not to be
so; but keep them in subordination to the Word of God. When the Israelites took
captives in battle, it sometimes happened that, among the prisoners, there was a
woman whom the captor might desire to marry, and the Lord did not forbid the
alliance; but have you ever noticed the command for her to shave her head, and
pare her nails? This must be done most carefully with all the literature of this
period, whether it be secular or religious, whether it deals with fact or with
fiction. The shaving will need to be very close, and the paring to be very
careful. Even when these operations are performed, a wise man will still see
reason to question whether the subject of them had not, after all, be better let
alone. There is an instructive precept of the ceremonial law which shuts out
some things from ever being used in the service: of the Lord. I quote it with
trembling: "Thou shalt not bring the hire of a harlot, or the price of a dog,
into the house of the Lord thy God." I question whether, in quoting certain
poets and authors, we may not be contravening this statute. When men's lives
have been foul, and their principles atheistic, there should be great hesitation
as to quoting their language. The blasphemer of the living God is hardly to be
mentioned in the Lord's house, however fine may have been the product of his
rebellious heart. At any rate, all that is of man, even the best of men, must be
altogether subordinate to the Word of the Lord.

I have mentioned simplicity of character, singleness of eye, and subordination
of mind; and next to these, I notice, also, that, if God will speak to us, there
must be a deep seriousness of heart. Let me remind you again of that text which
I mentioned a minute ago: "To this man will I look, even to him that trembleth
at My Word." When George Fox was called a Quaker, because he trembled at the
Name of God, the title was an honour to him. The man was so God-possessed that
he quaked, as well he might. Habakkuk describes the same feeling as having been
his own, and this is no unusual experience with the true child of God. In fact,
God never comes to us without causing us to tremble. The old Romish legend is
that the tree that bore the Saviour was the aspen, whose leaves continually
quiver; and he that bears Christ within him, and feels the weight of the Divine
glory, must be filled with awe. Our brother Williams just now said that he
feared and trembled for all the goodness that God had made to pass before
him-this is my feeling, and yours also. We are so weak, and these Divine
inspirations are so weighty, that we are subdued into awe, and there is no room
for levity.

Brethren, avoid anything like trifling over sermon-making. Someone says, "Well,
I take very little time over my sermon." Make no boast of that; it may be your
sin. Listen! If a man had been put apprentice to cabinet-making, and had worked
at it for a lifetime, it may be that he would have a great deal of skill and a
store of prepared material, so that he could turn out a choice piece of
workmanship in a short time; but you must not, therefore, think that you could
do the same, and that cabinet-making is mere child's play. A certain minister
may quickly compose a sermon, but you must remember that this is the result of
the labour of many years. Even he who, according to common parlance, speaks
quite extemporaneously, does not really do so; he delivers what he has in
previous years stored up. The mind is full of corn, and, therefore, when you put
a sack in the proper place it is filled with flour in a short time. Do not
regard preparation for the pulpit as a trifling thing; and do not rush upon your
holy duties without devout preparation for the hallowed service. Make your
waiting upon God a necessity of your calling, and at the same time the highest
privilege of it. Count it your joy and honour to have an interview with your
Master. Get your message fresh from God. Even manna stinks if you keep it beyond
its time; therefore, get it fresh from Heaven, and then it will have a celestial
relish.

One thing more upon this head. This power, which we so greatly need in getting
our message, will only come where there is a sympathy with God. Brethren, do you
know what it is to be in tender sympathy with God? Perhaps no man among us knows
what perfect sympathy with God means; yet we must, at least, be, in such accord
with God as to feel that He could not do or say anything which we would
question. We could not doubt any truth which He could reveal; neither, in our
heart of hearts, would we quarrel with anything which His will could appoint. If
anything in us is not in perfect agreement with the Lord, we regard it as evil,
and groan to be set free from it. If anything in us contends against God, we
contend against it, for we are one with God in intent and desire. We hear much,
nowadays, of sympathy with man; and, in a measure, we agree with it. Sympathy
with the fallen, the suffering, the lost, is good; but my sympathies are also
with the Lord my God. His Name is dishonoured; His glory is trailed in the mire.
It is His dear, bleeding Son who is used worst of all. Oh, to think that He
should love so well, and yet be refused! That such beauty as His should be
unacknowledged, such redemption rejected, such mercy scorned! What are men,
after all, compared with God? If they are like myself, it were a pity that they
were ever made! As for God, does He not fill all things with goodness as well as
with being? To me, Calvinism means the placing of the eternal God at the head of
all things. I look at everything through its relation to God's glory. I see God
first, and man far down in the list. We think too much of God to please this
age; but we are not ashamed. Man has a will, and oh, how they cry it up! One
said, the other day,–and there is some truth in it, too,–"I attribute a kind of
omnipotence to the will of man." But, sirs, has not God a will, too? What do you
attribute to that will? Have you nothing to say about its omnipotence? Is God to
have no choice, no purpose, no sovereignty over His own gifts? Brethren, if we
live in sympathy with God, we delight to hear Him say, "I am God, and there is
none else."

I can hardly tell you how high a value I set upon this enthusiasm for God. We
must be in harmony with all His designs of love towards men, whilst in secret we
receive His message. To become apparently warm in the pulpit, is, not of much
account unless we are much more intense when alone with God. Heart-fire is true
fire. A housewife, who perseveres in the old method of making her own bread,
does not want a great blaze at the mouth of the oven. "Oh, no!" she says, "I
want to get my faggots far back, and get all the heat into the oven itself, and
then it becomes of use to me." Sermons are never baked by the fire and flash at
the mouth; they must be prepared through the heating of the inmost soul. That
precious Word, that Divine shewbread, must be baked in the centre of our nature
by the heat that is put there by the indwelling Spirit. The Lord loves to use a
man who is in perfect sympathy with Him. I would not say anything unbecoming,
but I believe that the Lord finds pleasure in the sympathy of His children. When
you have been very heavy of heart, even to weeping, if your little child has
said, "Dear father, don't cry," or has asked, "What are you crying for, father?"
and then has broken out into sobbing himself, have you not been comforted by
him? Poor dear, he does not understand what it is all about; but you say, "Bless
you, my dear child;" and you kiss him, and feel comfort in him. So doth the Lord
take up His poor weeping minister into His bosom, and hear him cry, "Lord, they
will not come to Thee; Lord, they will not believe Thee. They are running after
evil, instead of to Thee. Lord, if I gave them a play, or a peepshow, they would
come in crowds; but if I preach Thy dear Son, they will not hear me." The great
God enters into your sorrows, and finds a sweet content in your heart's love.
God is not a man; but as man was made in the image of God, we learn something of
Him from ourselves. He loves to clasp a sympathizing one to His heart, and then
to say, "Go, My child, and work in My Name; for I can trust My gospel in thy
hands." Be with God, and God will be with you. Espouse His cause, and He will
espouse yours. There can be no question about this.

Follow me, my brethren, while I speak upon THE POWER THAT IS NEEDED WHEN WE ARE
DELIVERING THE MESAGES ITSELF.

If there is to be a Divine result from God's Word, the Holy Ghost must go forth
with it. As surely as God went before the children of Israel when He divided the
Red Sea, as surely as He led them through the wilderness by the pillar of cloud
and fire, so surely must the Lord's powerful presence go with His Word if there
is to be any blessing from it. How, then, are we to get that priceless
benediction? Great natural forces are in the world, and when engineers wish to
employ those forces, they go to work in a certain manner suitable thereto. They
cannot create power by mechanism; but they can utilize it, and economize it. For
instance, the wheel and pulley do not produce power; but, by diminishing
friction, they prevent the waste of power, and this is a great matter. We, also,
can be great gainers by using methods to minimize friction with this present
evil world, with which we unavoidably come into contact. Your own experience
will teach you the wisdom of this. Look earnestly to that holy separateness of
spirit which shall preserve you from the distracting and down-dragging
tendencies of things seen. Happily, there is another kind of friction which has
great power in developing latent force. Just as a certain form of electricity is
produced by friction, so can we obtain power by coming in contact with God, and
by means of the spiritual effect of truth as it operates upon a willing and
obedient heart. To be touched by the finger of God, yea, to come into contact
with even the hem of our Master's garment, is to obtain heavenly energy; and if
we have much of it, we shall be charged with sacred strength in a mysterious but
very palpable way. Be much with God in holy dialogue, letting Him speak to you
by His Word while you speak back to Him by your prayers and praises. So far, you
will obtain force. The greatest generator of force which is available to man is
heat. I suppose that nothing produces so much power for human purposes as fire;
and even so, the burning and consuming element in the spiritual world is a great
factor in the development of spiritual strength. We must be in downright
earnest, and must feel the burnings of a zeal which consumes us, or we shall
have little force. We must decrease; we must be burning if we would be shining
lights. We cannot save our lives and save others; there must be a destruction of
self for the salvation of men.

Many other things suggest themselves to me on this point; but I waive them all,
to come distinctly to the one most real and most sufficient power, namely, the
Holy Ghost, to whom be glory evermore! In order to have the Holy Spirit with us,
there must be a very close adhesion to the truth of God, with clearness,
boldness, and fidelity in the utterance of it. Do not dream that, to have a
formal creed, or a something which is said not to be a creed, but "a
declaration", or some other style of confession,–I know not how to mention the
nondescript invention,–is enough. Without intensely hearty belief of truth,
these precious documents are wretched affairs. Declarations of the kind I refer
to may be compared to flags, which may be useful if carried by brave
standard-bearers; or they may be tawdry ornaments, used for meaner ends. A
teacher was once instructing a class in patriotism and nationality. He happened
to see the national flag hanging up upon the wall, and he asked a child, "Now,
my boy, what is that flag?" "It is the English flag, sir." "And what is the, use
of it?" The truthful boy replied, "It is used to cover the dirty place in the
wall behind it." I need not interpret the parable. Let modern ecclesiastical
history point the moral. Do not let it be true of any of you, that a
loudly-professed orthodoxy is a mere coverlet for error, which is secretly held.
No, dear brethren, stick to the truth, because the truth sticks to you. Wherever
it leads you, follow it; down into the valley, or aloft upon the hills. Follow
close at its heels, and only fear to be left behind in its course. When the road
is miry, never fear that you will ever be hurt by the splashes of truth. The
truth of God is the best of all guests; entertain it, as Abraham did the angels.
Spare not the best you have for its maintenance; for it leaves a rich blessing
with those who deny themselves for it. But do not entertain any of the
inventions of man; for these will betray you, as Judas betrayed Christ with a
kiss. Do not be dismayed by the caricatures of truth which are manufactured by
malicious minds. Nowadays, it is the policy of men to misrepresent gospel
doctrines. They remind me of Voltaire, of whom it is said that he could take any
book that he read, and make whatever he liked out of it, and then hold it up to
ridicule Remember the Roman practice in persecuting times; they wrapped the
Christians in skins of bears, and then set dogs to tear them to pieces. They
treat us the same, morally, if we hold by unpopular truth. I have seen myself in
several skins lately; I can only say they were no skins of mine. I return them
to those who arrayed me in them. If our declarations of truth are fairly and
honestly stated, and then argued against,–well and good; but when they are
misrepresented, and tortured to mean what we never meant them to mean, then we
are not careful to reply. When this happens to you, count it no strange thing.
Reckon that, because they cannot overcome 'the truth itself, they fashion an
image of it stuffed with straw, and then burn it with childish exultation. Let
them enjoy their game as they may.

Brethren, I do not believe that God will set His seal to a ministry which does
not aim at being strictly in accordance with the mind of the Spirit. In
proportion as a ministry is truthful, other things being equal, God can bless
it. Would you have the Holy Ghost set His seal to a lie? Would you have Him
bless what He has not revealed, and confirm with signs following that which is
not truth? I am more and more persuaded that, if we mean to have God with us, we
must keep to the truth. It is an almost invariable rule that, when men go aside
from the old faith, they are seldom successful in soul-winning. I could appeal
to all observers whether it is not so, whether men, powerful in other ways, do
not become barren and unfruitful as to the salvation of others when they become
doubters rather than believers. If you enquire into the worm which has devoured
the root of their usefulness, you will find that it is a want of faith upon some
great, cardinal principle,–a want of faith winch may not be displayed in their
public ministry, but lurks within, poisoning their thoughts. You must be with
the Holy Ghost if you are to have the Holy Ghost with you.

Beloved, have a genuine faith in the Word of God, and in its power to save. Do
not go up into the pulpit preaching the truth, and saying, "I hope some good
will come of it" but confidently believe that it will not return void, but must
work the eternal purpose of God. Do not speak as if the gospel might have some
power, or might have none. God sends you to be a miracle-worker; therefore, say
to the spiritually lame, "In the Name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, rise up and
walk," and men will rise up and walk; but if you say, "I hope, dear man, that
Jesus Christ may be able to make you rise up and walk," your Lord will frown
upon your dishonouring words. You have lowered Him, you have brought Him down to
the level of your unbelief and He cannot do many mighty works by you. Speak
boldly; for if you speak by the Holy Spirit, you cannot speak in vain.

Oh, that we could make our people feel that we believe what we are saying! I
have heard of a little girl, who said to her father, who was a minister, and who
had been telling her a story, "Pa, is that real or is it preaching?" I cannot
object to your smiling at my anecdote; but it is a thing to weep over, that
preaching should be suspected of unreality. People hear our testimony, and ask
"Is it a matter of fact, or is it the proper thing to be said?" If they saw a
statement in a newspaper, they would believe it; but when they see it in a
sermon, they say, "It is a pious opinion." This suspicion is born of want of
fidelity in ministers. I saw, just now, outside the shop of a marine-store
dealer, a placard which runs thus: "Fifty tons of bones wanted." "Yes," I said
to myself, "mostly backbones." Fifty tons of them! I could indicate a place
where they could take fifty tons, and not be overstocked. As for us, let us be
able to say, "I believed, therefore have I spoken." Let us have a genuine faith
in everything that God has revealed. Have faith, not only in its truth, but in
its power; faith in the absolute certainty that, if it be preached, it will
produce glorious results.

Closely adhering to the truth by a dogged faith, we are in the condition in
which God is likely to bless us. But then, there must be, in the preaching, a
concentration of heart upon the business in which we are engaged. We shall never
do well in our sacred calling if half our energy goes to something else. The man
who is doing half-a-dozen things generally fails in them all. Of course he does.
We have not enough water in our streamlet to drive more than one mill; if we let
it run over one wheel, that one wheel will turn to purpose; but if we divide the
water, it will do nothing. God's message deserves every fragment of my ability;
and when I deliver it, I ought to be "all there," every bit of me; none of me
should go astray or lie asleep. Some men, when they get into the pulpit, are not
there. One said to me, in conversation, "I do not know how it is, but I feel so
different when I shut that pulpit-door." I answered, "Have the door taken off."
That might not, however, produce the effect; it would have been better if it
could have been said of him as of Noah, "the Lord shut him in." Do not some
show, by their manner of preaching, that their heart is not in it? They have
come to preach, and they will get through what they have to say; but their
deepest thoughts and liveliest emotions would come out better at a political
meeting. They have not all their wits about them when preaching. They remind me
of the legend of the two learned doctors down in the fen country, who thought
that they would have a day's shooting of wild ducks. They were extremely
learned, but they were not at home in common pursuits. They came to a piece of
water, into which it was necessary for them to wade to get at the ducks; and one
said to the other, "I have not put on my water-boots." The other replied, "I
have forgotten my boots, too; but never mind." They both waded in, for they were
keen sportsmen. They reached a sufficient nearness for shooting the ducks. Then
one whispered, "Now, brother, fire at them." The brother replied, "I've
forgotten my gun; haven't you brought yours?" "No," said the other, "I did not
think of it." There were fine sportsmen for you! Their deep thoughts had made
them unpractical: their Hebrew roots had displaced their common sense. Have you
never seen such preachers? They are "not there ": their minds are in the
profound abysses of critical unbelief. The Holy Ghost will not bless men of this
sort. He spake by an ass once, but that ass showed its sense by never speaking
any more. I know creatures of a similar kind that are not half so wise.

Now, dear friends, see what I am driving at. I hope that I shall not miss it. It
is plain to every thoughtful mind that, if we are not altogether in our work, we
cannot expect a blessing. God the Holy Ghost does not work by a torso, or a
bust; He uses our whole manhood. See a tradesman in one of our poorer districts,
on a Saturday night, outside his shop. He walks up and down, and cries, "Buy,
buy," with vehemence; he salutes every passer-by; he presses his commodities; he
seems to be everywhere at once; he compels men to come in; he urges each one to
be a purchaser. So, also, must we serve the Lord with all diligence, if we hope
for success in our sacred calling.

If we would have the Lord with us in the delivery of our message, we must be in
dead earnest, and full of living zeal Do you not think that many sermons are
"prepared" until the juice is crushed out of them, and zeal could not remain in
such dry husks? Sermons which are studied for days, written down, read, re-read,
corrected, and further corrected and emended, are in great danger of being too
much cut and dried. You will never get a crop if you plant boiled potatoes. You
can boil a sermon to a turn, so that no life remaineth in it. I like, in a
discourse, to hear the wild-bird notes of true nature and pure grace; these have
a charm unknown to the artificial and elaborate address. The music which we hear
of a morning, in the spring, has a freshness in it which your tame birds cannot
reach; it is full of rapture, and alive with variety and feeling. It is a treat
to hear a really good local preacher tell out his experience of how he came to
Christ; and relate it in his own hearty, unaffected way. Nature beats art all to
nothing. A simple, hearty testimony is like grapes cut fresh from the vine: who
would lay a bunch of raisins by the side of them? Give us sermons, and save us
from essays! Do you not all know the superfine preacher? You ought to listen to
him, for he is clever; you ought to be attentive to his words, for every
sentence of that paper cost him hours of toilsome composition; but somehow it
falls flat, and there is an offensive smell of stale oil. I speak advisedly when
I say that some speakers want locking out of their studies, and turning out to
visit their people. A very good preacher once said to me, "I feel discouraged;
for, the other Sunday, I did not feel at all well, and I preached a sermon
without much study; in fact, it was such a talk as I should give if I sat up in
bed in the middle of the night, and in my shirt-sleeves told out the way of
salvation. Why, sir, my people came to me, and said, "What a delightful sermon!
We have so enjoyed it!" I felt disgusted with them. When I have given them a
sermon that took a full week, and perhaps more, to prepare, they have not
thought anything of it; but this unstudied address quite won their hearts." I
replied to him, "If I were you, I would accept their judgment, and give them
another sermon of the same sort." So long as the life of the sermon is
strengthened by preparation, you may prepare to the utmost; but if the soul
evaporates in the process, what is the good of such injurious toil? It is a kind
of murder which you have wrought upon the sermon which you have dried to death.
I do not believe that God the Holy Ghost cares one single atom about your
classical composition. I do not think that the Lord takes any delight in your
rhetoric, or in your poetry, or even in that marvellous peroration which
concludes the discourse, after the manner of the final display at old Vauxhall
Gardens, when a profusion of all manner of fireworks dosed the scene. Not even
by that magnificent finale does the Lord work the salvation of sinners. If there
is fire, life, and truth in the sermon, then the quickening Spirit will work by
it, but not else. Be earnest, and you need not be elegant. The Holy Spirit will
help us in our message, if there is an entire dependence upon Him. Of course,
you all accept this truth at once; but do you entirely depend upon the Holy
Spirit? Can you, dare you, do that? I would not urge any man to go into the
pulpit, and talk out whatever first came into his head, under the pretence of
depending upon the Holy Spirit; but, still, there are methods of preparation
which denote the utter absence of any trust in the Holy Spirit's help in the
pulpit. There is no practical difficulty in reconciling our own earnest
endeavours with humble dependence upon God; but it is very hard to make this
appear logical, when we are merely discussing a theory. It is the old difficulty
of reconciling faith and works. I heard of a good man who had family prayer, and
commended his house and household to the care of God during the night-watches.
When burglaries became numerous in the neighbourhood, he said to a friend,
"After you have asked the Lord to protect your house, what do you do?" His
friend answered that he did nothing more than usual. "Well," said the first, "we
have put bolts, top and bottom, upon all the doors, and we have a lock and also
a chain; beside that, we have the best patent fastenings on all the windows."
"All that is well enough," said his friend; "is not that enough?" "No," said he;
"when we go to bed, my wife and I have two bolts on the door of the bedroom, and
a lock and chain on the door. I have also got a spear-head fixed on a pole, and
my wife has an electric apparatus which will ring a bell, and give an alarm
outside." His friend smiled, and said, "And all that is faith in God, is it?"
The good man replied, "Faith without works is dead." "Yes," said the other, "but
I should think that faith with so many works would be likely to be smothered."

There is a medium in all things. I should not pray God to take care of me, and
then leave my front door unfastened and my window open. So I should not pray for
the Holy Spirit, and then go into the pulpit without having carefully thought
upon my text. Still, if I had prepared thoughts and expressions so minutely that
I never varied from my set form, I should think that my faith was, to say the
least, encumbered with more works than would allow her much liberty of action. I
do not see where the opportunity is given to the Spirit of God to help us in
preaching, if every jot and tittle is settled beforehand. Do let your trust in
God be free to move hand and foot. While you are preaching, believe that God the
Holy Spirit can give you, in the selfsame hour what you shall speak; and can
make you say what you had not previously thought of; yes, and make this
newly-given utterance to be the very arrowhead of the discourse, which shall
strike deeper into the heart than anything you had prepared. Do not reduce your
dependence upon the Holy Ghost to a mere phrase; make it more and more a fact.

Above all, dear friends, if you want the blessing of God, keep up constant
communion with God. We get into fellowship with God at this Conference; do not
let us get out of communion with God when we go home. When may a Christian
safely be out of communion with God? Never. If we always walk with God, and act
towards Him as children towards a loving father, so that the spirit of adoption
is always in us, and the spirit of love always flows forth from us, we shall
preach with power, and God will bless our ministry: for then we shall know and
utter the mind of God.

I must add here that, if we are to enjoy the power of God, we must manifest
great holiness of life. I would not ask any brother to profess that he has a
higher life than other believers; for, if he did so we might suspect that he had
no very eminent degree of humility. I would not invite any brother to talk about
having more holiness than his brother-ministers; for, if he did so, we might
fear that he hung out the outward sign because the inward grace was absent. But
we must have holiness to a high degree. Unholy living! How can God bless it? I
heard of one who, on the Sabbath morning, said to his people, "I was at the play
last night, and I saw So-and-so ;" and he used what he saw as an illustration of
his subject. It saddened me to hear the story: may the like never be done again!
But, alas! acts of worldly conformity are not only tolerated nowadays; they are,
in some quarters, commended as signs of a large mind. If a man can enjoy the
theatre, it is his own concern but when he invites me to hear him preach, I
decline to accept his invitation.

Even worldlings look with scorn upon loose habits in a preacher. I know a
certain clergyman who is fond of cards. Speaking to a man-servant, a friend
said, "Where do you go on Sunday? I suppose you attend the church;"–the place
being very near. "No," said the man, "I never go and hear that gentleman." "Why
not?" "Well," he said, "you know he is very much taken up with card-playing."
"'Yes," said my friend, "but you play cards yourself." This was the answer,
"Yes, I play cards; but I would not trust my soul with a man who does it. I want
a better man than myself to be my spiritual guide." The remark is open to many
criticisms, but there is about it a ring of common sense. That is how the world
regards matters. Now, if even men of the world judge trifling preachers to be
unfit for their work, depend upon it the Holy Ghost has not a better opinion of
them, and He must be sorely vexed with unspiritual, unholy intruders into the
sacred office. If we can lie, if we can be unkind to our families, if we do not
pay our debts, if we are notorious for levity, and little given to devotion, how
can we expect a blessing? "Be ye clean, that bear the vessels of the Lord." As I
have said before, He does not mind what the vessel is, even though it be but of
earth or of wood; but it must be clean. It is not fit for the Master's use if it
is not clean. Oh, that God would keep us pure, and then take us in His own hand
for His own purposes!

Once more, if we are to be robed in the power of the Lord, we must feel an
intense longing for the glory of God, and the salvation of the sons of men. Even
when we are most successful, we must long for more success. If God has given us
many souls, we must pine for a thousand times as many. Satisfaction with results
will be the knell of progress. No man is good who thinks that he cannot be
better. He has no holiness who thinks that he is holy enough, and he is not
useful who thinks that he is useful enough. Desire to honour God grows as we
grow. Can you not sympathize with Mr. Welch, a Suffolk minister, who was noticed
to sit and weep; and one said to him, "My dear Mr. Welch, why are you weeping?"
"Well," he replied, "I cannot tell you;" but when they pressed him very hard, he
answered, "I am weeping because I cannot love Christ more." That was worth
weeping for, was it not? That man was noted everywhere for his intense love to
his Master; and, therefore, he wept because he could not love Him more. The
holiest minister is the man who cries, "O wretched man that: I am! who shall
deliver me from the body of this death?" No common Christian sighs in that
fashion. Sin becomes exquisitely painful only to the exquisitely pure. That
wound of sin, which would not be a pin's prick to coarser minds, seems a
dagger's wound to him. If we have great love to Jesus, and great compassion for
perishing men, we shall not be puffed up with large success; but we shall sigh
and cry over the thousands who are not converted

Love for souls will operate in many ways upon our ministry. Among other things,
it will make us very plain in our speech. We shall say to ourselves, "No: I must
not use that hard word, for that poor woman in the aisle would not understand
me. I must not point out that recondite difficulty, for yonder trembling soul
might be staggered by it, and might not be relieved by my explanation." I heard
a sentence, the other day, which stuck to me because of its finery rather than
its weight of meaning. An admirable divine remarked, "When duty is embodied in a
concrete personality, it is eminently simplified." You all understand the
expression; but I do not think that the congregation to which it was addressed
had more than a hazy idea of what it meant. It is our old friend, "Example is
better than precept." It is a fine thing to construct sounding sentences, but it
is only an amusement; it ministers nothing to our great end. Some would impress
us by their depth of thought, when it is merely a love of big words. To hide
plain things in dark sentences, is sport rather than service for God. If you
love men better, you will love phrases less. How used your mother to talk to you
when you were a child? There! do not tell me. Don't print it. It would never do
for the public ear. The things that she used to say to you were childish, and
earlier still, babyish. Why did she thus speak, for she was a very sensible
woman? Because she loved you. There is a sort of tutoyage, as the French call
it, in which love delights.

Love's manner of addressing men disregards all the dignities and the fineries of
language, and only cares to impart its meaning, and infuse the blessing. To
spread our heart right over another heart, is better than adorning it with the
paint and varnish of brilliant speech. If you greatly love, you are the kind of
man that knows how to feel for men, and with them. Some men do not know how to
handle a heart at all. They are like a stranger at the fish-market, who will so
touch certain fish that they at once erect their spines, and pierce the hand
that touches them. A fishwife is never hurt in that way, for she knows where to
take them. There is a right way of handling men and women, and the art is
acquired through intense love. How do the mothers of England learn to bring up
their children? Is there an academy for maternal tuition? Have we founded a
guild of motherhood? No; love is the great teacher, and it makes the young
mother quick of understanding for her babe's good. Get much love to Christ, and
much love to immortal souls, and it is wonderful how wisely you will adapt your
teaching to the needs of those around you.

I will mention a few things more which are necessary to the full display of the
power which regenerates sinners, and builds up saints. Much care should be
bestowed upon our surroundings. Brethren, do not think that if you go, next
Lord's-day, to a place you have never visited before, you will find it as easy
to preach there as it is at home among a loving, praying people. Are you not
conscious, when going into some assemblies, that they are cold as ice-wells? You
say to yourself, "How can I preach here?" You do not quite, know why, but you
are not happy. There is no quickening atmosphere, no refreshing dew, no heavenly
wind. Like your Lord, you cannot do anything because of the unbelief around you.
When you begin to preach, it is like speaking inside a steam-boiler. No living
hearts respond to your heart. They are a sleepy company, or a critical society;
you can see it, and feel it. How they fix their eyes on you, and concentrate
their spectacles! You perceive that they are in what a countryman called "a
judgmatical frame of mind." No good will come of your warm-hearted address.

I have had great success in soul-winning, when preaching in different parts of
the country; but I have never taken any credit for it, for I feel that I preach
under great advantages; the people come with an intense desire to hear, and with
an expectation of getting a blessing; and hence every word has its due weight.
When a congregation expects nothing, it generally finds nothing even in the best
of preachers; but when they are prepared to make much of what they hear, they
usually get what they come for. If a man goes fishing for frogs, he catches
them; if he fishes for fish, he will catch them, if he goes to the right stream.
Our work is, no doubt, greatly affected, for good or evil, by the condition of
the congregation, the condition of the church, and the condition of the deacons.

Some churches are in such a state that they are enough to baffle any ministry. A
brother-minister told me of a Congregational chapel in which there has not been
a prayer-meeting for the last fifteen years; and I did not wonder when he added
that the Congregation had nearly died out, and the minister was removing. It was
time he should. What a blessing he will not be somewhere else! "But," said he,
"I cannot say much about this state of things; for, in my own church, I cannot
get the people to pray. The bulk of them have not been in the habit of taking
public part in the prayers, and it seems impossible to get them to do so. What
shall I do?" "Well," I replied, "it may help you if you call in your
church-officers on Sunday mornings, before the service, and ask them to pray for
you, as my deacons and elders do for me. My officers know what a trembling
creature I am; and when I ask them to seek strength for me, they do so with
loving hearts." Don't you think that such exercises tend to train men in the art
of public prayer? Besides, men are likely to hear better when they have prayed
for the preacher. Oh, to get around us a band of men whose hearts the Lord has
touched! If we have a holy people about us, we shall be the better able to
preach. Tell me not of a marble pulpit; this is a golden pulpit. A holy people,
who are living what you preach, make the best platform for a pleader for Christ.
Christ went up into the mountain, and taught the crowd; and when you have a
company of godly people around you, you do, as it were, go up into the mountain,
and speak with the people from a favoured elevation. We need a holy people; but,
alas! there is too often an Achan in the camp. Achan is more generally harboured
than he used to be, because goodly Babylonish garments and wedges of silver are
much in request, and weak faith feels that it cannot do without these spoils.
Carnal policy whispers, "What shall we do with the chapel debt if the wealthy
deacon leaves, and his silver goes with him? We should miss the respectability
which his wife's goodly Babylonish garment bestows upon the place. We have very
few wealthy people, and we must strain a point to keep them." Yes, that is the
way in which the accursed thing is allowed to debase our churches, and defeat
our ministries. When this pest is in the air, you may preach your tongue out,
but you will not win souls. One man may have more power for mischief than fifty
preachers have power for good. May the Lord give you a holy, pleading people,
whom He can bless! For large blessing, we must have union among our people. God
the Holy Spirit does not bless a collection of quarrelling professors. Those who
are always contending, not for the truth, but for petty differences, and family
jealousies, are not likely to bring to the church the dove-like Spirit. Want of
unity always involves want of power. I know that some churches are greatly at
fault in this direction; but certain ministers never have a harmonious people,
although they change frequently; and I am afraid it is because they are not very
loving themselves. Unless we are ourselves in good temper, we cannot expect to
keep the people in good temper. As pastors, we must bear a great deal; and when
we think we have borne as much as possible, and cannot bear any more, we must go
over it again, and bear the same things again. Strong in the love which
"endureth all things, hopeth all things," we must quietly resolve not to take
offence; and, before long, harmony will be created where discord reigned, and
then we may expect a blessing.

We must plead with God that our people may be all earnest for the spread of the
truth and the conversion of sinners. How blessed is that minister who has
earnest men around him! You know what one cold-hearted man can do, if he gets at
you on Sunday morning with a lump of ice, and freezes you with the information
that Mrs. Smith and all her family are offended, and their pew is vacant. You
did not want to know of that lady's protest just before entering the pulpit, and
it does not help you. Another dear brother tells you, with great grief, (he is
so overcome that it is a pity his voice does not fail him altogether,) that one
of the best helpers is very much hurt at your not calling to see him last
Friday, when you were a hundred miles away preaching for a struggling church.
You ought to have called upon him at any inconvenience, so the brother will tell
you, and he does his duty with a heart "as cool as a cucumber."

It may even happen that, when you come down from the mount where you have been
with God, and preached with your soul on fire, that you come right down into a
cold bath of commonplace remark, which lets you see that some of your hearers
are out of sympathy both with your subject and yourself. Such a thing is a great
hindrance, not only to your spirit, but to the Spirit of God; for the Holy One
notices all this unkind and unspiritual behaviour. Brethren, what a work we have
to do! What a work we have to do! Unless the Spirit of God comes to sanctify
these surroundings, how can it ever be done? I am sure you feel the necessity of
having a truly praying people. Be much in prayer yourself, and this will be more
effectual than scolding your people for not praying. Set the example. Draw
streams of prayer out of the really gracious people by getting them to pray
whenever they come to see you, and by praying with them yourself whenever you
call upon them. Not only when they, are ill, but when they are well, ask them to
join in prayer with you. When a man is upstairs in bed, and cannot do any hurt,
you pray for him. When he is downstairs, and can do no end of mischief, you do
not pray for him. Is this wise and prudent? Oh, for a pleading people! The
praying legion is the victorious legion. One of our most urgent necessities is
fervent, importunate prayer.

Brethren, in addition to cooperation in service, we need that our friends should
be looking out for souls. Whenever a stranger comes into the chapel, somebody
should speak to him. Whenever a person is a little impressed, an earnest brother
should follow up the stroke. Whenever a heart is troubled, some genial voice
should whisper words of comfort. If these things were so, our ministry would be
quadrupled in effort, and the result would be fourfold. May all our chapels be
cooperative stores for zeal and earnestness, wherein not one man only, but every
man is at work for Christ!

I have done when I say just this. Let each man bethink him of the responsibility
that rests upon him. I should not like to handle the doctrine of responsibility
with the view of proving that it squares with the doctrine of predestination. It
does do so, assuredly. I believe in predestination without cutting and trimming
it; and I believe in responsibility without adulterating and weakening it.
Before you, the man of God places a quiver full of arrows, and he bids you shoot
the arrow of the Lord's deliverance. Bestir yourself, and draw the bow! I
beseech you, remember that every time you shoot there shall be victory for
Israel. Will you stop at the third shooting? The man of God will feel angry and
grieved if you are thus straitened, and he will say, "Thou shouldest have
smitten five or six times, and then Syria would have been utterly destroyed." Do
we not fail in our preachings, in our very ideal of what we are going to do, and
in the design we set before us for accomplishment? Having laboured a little, are
we not very satisfied? Shake off such base content! Let us shoot many times.
Brethren, be filled with a great ambition; not for yourselves, but for your
Lord. Elevate your ideal! Have no more firing at the bush. You may, in this
case, shoot at the sun himself; for you will be sure to shoot higher, if you do
so, than if some grovelling object were your aim. Believe for great things of a
great God.

Remember, whether you do so or not, great are your responsibilities. There never
was a more restless time than now. What is being done to-day will affect the
next centuries, unless the Lord should very speedily come. I believe that, if we
walk uprightly and decidedly before God at this time, we shall make the future
of England bright with the gospel; but trimming now, and debasing doctrine now,
will affect children yet unborn, generation after generation. Posterity must be
considered. I do not look so much at what is to happen to-day, for these things
relate to eternity. For my part, I am quite willing to be eaten of dogs for the
next fifty years; but the more distant future shall vindicate me. I have dealt
honestly before the living God. My brother, do the same. Who knows but what thou
art come to the kingdom for such a time as this? If thou hast grit in thee, quit
thyself like a man. If thou hast God in thee, then thou mayest yet do marvels.
But if not, bent, doubled up, proven to be useless, thou shalt lie on that foul
dunghill which is made up of cowards' failures and misspent lives. God save both
thee and me from that disgrace!

I would enhance our sense of responsibility by the remembrance of the death-beds
of our people. Unless we are faithful to them, it will be a painful sight to be
present when they come to die. Suppose that any one of our hearers should
stretch out his bony hand, and say, "I am lost, and you never warned me; you
always gave me some idea that it might be a little way roundabout, but I should
get right all the same; and I chose the roundabout way of 'the larger hope,'
instead of the Divine hope that is set before us in the gospel." I would rather
never have been born than have anybody speak thus to me when he shall come to
die. My brother said to me, the other day, what Charles Wesley said to John
Wesley, "Brother, our people die well!" I answered, "Assuredly they do!" I have
never been to the sick-bed of any one of our people without feeling strengthened
in faith. In the sight of their glorious confidence, I could sooner battle with
the whole earth, and kick it before me like a football, than have a doubt in my
mind about the gospel of our Lord. They die gloriously. I saw, last week, a dear
sister, with cancer just under her eye. How did I find her? Was she lamenting
her hard fate? By no means; she was happy, calm, joyful, in bright expectation
of seeing the face of the King in His beauty. I talked with a tradesman, who
fell asleep not long ago, and I said, "You seem to have no fears." "No," he
said, "how can I have any? You have not taught us what will make us fear. How
can I be afraid to die, since I have fed these thirty years on the strong meat
of the Kingdom of God? I know whom I have believed." I had a heavenly time with
him. I cannot use a lower word. He exhibited a holy mirth in the expectation of
a speedy removal to the better world.

Now, dear brethren, suffer one last word. You and I will ourselves soon die,
unless our Master comes; and blessed will it be for us if, when we lie in the
silent room, and the nights grow weary, and our strength ebbs out, we can stay
ourselves upon the pillows, and say, "O Lord, I have known Thee from my youth,
and hitherto have I declared Thy wondrous works; and now that I am about to
depart, forsake me not." Thrice happy shall we be if we can say, in the last
article, "I have not shunned to declare the whole counsel of God."

Brethren, I resolve, God helping me, to be among those that shall walk with our
Lord in white, for they are worthy. "These are they," it is said, "who have not
defiled themselves,"–entered into no contracts and confederacies that would have
stained their consciences, and polluted their hearts. These are they who have
walked apart for His dear sake, obeying this word, "Come out from among them,
and be ye separate, saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing; and I will
receive you, and will be a Father unto you, and ye shall be My sons and.
daughters, saith the Lord Almighty." A special enjoyment of adoption is given to
the conscience that is true to the separated path, and is; never degraded by
compromise. God help you to be faithful in this matter! I believe that, in
fidelity, will be your power. "You may well make a little slit in your
conscience," said one to a Puritan, "for other people make great rents in
theirs." But the godly man thought not so; and I would remind you of that solemn
word, "I the Lord thy God am a jealous God." This jealousy burns like coals of
fire, and it is cruel as the grave; for God is so sternly jealous of those He
loves much, that He will not bear in them that which He will endure in others.
The greater His love, the more fierce His jealousy if in any way His chosen
depart from Him.

I shall be gone from you ere long. You will meet, and say to one another, "The
President has departed. What are we going to do?" I charge you, be faithful to
the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ, and the doctrine of His grace. Be ye
faithful unto death, and your crowns will not be wanting. But, oh! let none of
us die out like dim candles, ending a powerless ministry in everlasting
blackness. The Lord Himself bless you! Amen.


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  CHAPTER 91: 12. THE MINISTER IN THESE TIMES
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Chapter 12—The Minister in These Times

BELOVED BRETHREN, I desire, on this occasion, to say something that shall be
suitable for the times. I have never, according to the current phrase, preached
to the times, but yet I would speak for the times, believing that a timely word
now may bless all times to come. The times impress me in so many ways, and in
such various modes, that I must take up a roving commission, and touch briefly
upon a wide range of matters, instead of confining myself to one subject. Accept
from me "here a little, and there a little," instead of much upon one subject.

First, let us reflect upon OUR LORD'S POSITION TOWARDS US. Here we have many
points which must be boldly maintained in our preaching. Be assured that we
cannot be right in the rest, unless we think rightly of HIM. In forming your
system of astronomy, where do you put the sun? If you are not clear on that
cardinal matter, your scheme will be a failure. If you have not found out the
true "tabernacle for the sun," I am not very particular as to where you put Mars
or Jupiter. Where is Christ in your theological system? How does He stand in
your thoughts? Whereabouts is Jesus in reference to yourself, and your work, and
your fellowmen?

Many are the aspects under which we must regard our Divine Lord, but I must
always give the greatest prominence to His saving character as Christ our
Sacrifice and Sin-bearer. If ever there was a time when we should be clear,
pronounced, and vehement upon this point, it is now. Now the banner of the cross
must lead the way. We cannot afford to put the atonement upon the shelf as a
truth to be taken for granted, and left among the curiosities of unpractical
belief. We cannot now afford to use orthodox words and phrases upon this subject
as one might repeat the language of a liturgy; we must livingly and intensely
believe the truth ourselves, and we must enforce it with the full energy of our
being. The vital truth of our Lord's expiation must be preached often, clearly,
and with emphasis; and, if it be not so, we have not correctly learned Christ,
neither shall we successfully teach Him. To attempt to preach Christ without His
cross, is to betray Him with a kiss.

I observe that certain persons claim to believe in the atonement, but they will
not say what they mean by it. May not this mean that really they have no clear
knowledge of it; and, possibly, no real faith in it? Every man has a theory of
what he knows; at least, he can give a statement of what he understands. We have
heard of the men of Athens, and of their altar erected "to the unknown God": in
England, we have philosophical people who believe in an unknown atonement. We
conceive that, in this way, they "ignorantly worship." Robertson, of Brighton,
was orthodox compared with many in this advanced age; but one said of him that
he taught that our Lord did something or other, which in some way or other was
more or less connected with our salvation. Flimsy as that was, it is better than
the doctrine of this hour. Some now think it absurd to believe that what was
done at Calvary, nineteen centuries ago, can have any relation to the sins of
today. Others, who speak not quite so wildly, yet deny that our sins could be
laid on the Lord Jesus, and that His righteousness could be imputed to us; this,
they say, would be immoral. The ethical side of the atonement is frequently
held, and beautifully and strikingly shown to the people; but we are not
satisfied with this one-sided view of the great subject. Whatever may be the
shadow of the atonement,–by which we mean its ethical influence,–we believe that
there was a substance in the atonement; and if that substance be removed, the
shadow is gone also.

We have no home-made theory; but our solemn witness is, that He "His own self
bare our sins in His own body on the tree." Even if it be called immoral, as
some have impudently asserted, we yet believe that God "hath made Him to be sin
for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him."
"The chastisement of our peace was upon Him," for "the Lord hath laid on Him the
iniquity of us all" It would do us all good to look through the texts, in the
Old and New Testaments, which refer to this fundamental truth; they are many,
and definite. If we use language in its natural sense, we cannot get away from
the assured belief that the Scripture teaches us to come to God through Jesus
Christ, believing that He took our sin upon Himself, and suffered on its
account, that He might render to God's moral government a recompense for the
dishonor which man's rebellion had put upon it. Through His blood, there is
forgiveness; and by reason of His vicarious satisfaction, guilt is put away, and
the believer is "accepted in the Beloved."

Those who set aside the atonement as a satisfaction for sin, also murder the
doctrine of justification by faith. They must do so. There is a common element
which is the essence of both doctrines; so that, if you deny the one, you
destroy the other. Modern thought is nothing but an attempt to bring back the
legal system of salvation by works. Our battle is the same as that which Luther
fought at the Reformation. If you go to the very ground and root of it, grace is
taken away, and human merit is substituted. The gracious act of God in pardoning
sin is excluded, and human effort is made all in all, both for past sin and
future hope. Every man is now to set up as his own savior, and the atonement is
shelved as a pious fraud. I will not foul my mouth with the unworthy phrases
which have been used in reference to the substitutionary work of our Lord Jesus
Christ; but it is a sore grief of heart to note how these evil things are
tolerated by men whom we respect.

We shall not cease, dear brethren, in our ministry, most definitely and
decidedly to preach the atoning sacrifice; and I will tell you why I shall be
sure to do so. I have not personally a shadow of a hope of salvation from any
other quarter: I am lost if Jesus be not my Substitute. I have been driven up
into a corner by a pressing sense of my own personal sin, and have been made to
despair of ever doing or being such that God can accept me in myself. I must
have a righteousness, perfect and Divine; yet it is beyond my own power to
create. I find it in Christ: I read that it will become mine by faith, and by
faith I take it. My conscience tells me that I must render to God's justice a
recompense for the dishonor that I have done to His law, and I cannot find
anything which bears the semblance of such a recompense till I look to Christ
Jesus. Do I not remember when I first looked to Him, and was lightened? Do I not
remember how often I have gone as a sinner to my Savior's feet, and looked anew
at His wounds, and believed over again unto eternal life, feeling the old joy
repeated by the deed? Brethren, I cannot preach anything else, for I know
nothing else. New dogmas may or may not be true; but of the truth of this
doctrine, I am sure.

If anybody here is preaching the atonement, but does not like it, I dare not
advise him to cease preaching it, but the words tremble on my lips. I am firmly
persuaded that the unwilling or cold-hearted preacher of any doctrine is its
worst enemy. It comes to this, in the long run, that the wounds of truth in the
house of its false friends are worse than those given it by foes. If you do not
love the cross in your heart's core, you had better let it alone. I can truly
say that I preach the atonement con amore, with all my heart. Some seem to think
that we poor souls, who are of the Puritanic school, are "cabin'd, cribb'd,
confined" by harsh dogmas, from which we would gladly escape. They imagine that
we have to check every rising aspiration of our nobler selves, so as to preserve
the tyranny of a certain iron system. John Calvin is supposed to ride us like a
nightmare, and we lead dogs' lives under his lash. Brethren, it is far
otherwise. Little do these slanderers know of our happiness and peace. If they
feel more joy in preaching than we do, their felicity is great; but, from their
tone and style, I should greatly question it. Observers will have noticed that
the joyous element has gone out of many pulpits. The preacher does not enjoy his
own subject, and seldom speaks of having been in the Spirit while he was
discoursing. He likes twenty minutes' preaching a great deal better than forty;
and he is peculiarly apt to merge his two week-night services into one. Nobody
enjoys modern doctrine, for there is nothing to enjoy. The people have to do
their best with that soup of which our friend spoke last night so admirably,–the
soup made from a borrowed bone, which had been lent out for a similar purpose on
six previous days, so that the flavor of meat no longer remained upon it. No, my
brothers; let our opponents dismiss from their minds all pity for our enslaved
condition under the old gospel. We are the free men, whom the Lord makes free,
and all are slaves besides. I would like to rise from my bed, during the last
five minutes of my life, to bear witness to the Divine sacrifice and the
sin-atoning blood. I would then repeat those words which speak the truth of
substitution most positively, even should I shock my hearers; for how could I
regret that, as in Heaven my first words would be to ascribe my salvation to my
Master's blood, my last act on earth was to shock His enemies by a testimony to
the same fact?

Next, we hold that Christ Jesus is the sole Mediator and High Priest. And this
makes us look with indignation upon the claims of superstition. We have in
England still, what we thought, in our younger days, had become extinct, namely,
the gospel of priestcraft,–the priestcraft of old Rome, without its
venerableness of age. There are men among us who claim to be priests in a sense
other than that in which all believers are priests unto God. According to this
dream, our Lord Jesus is not, in Himself, an all-sufficient Mediator; that is to
say, He may go a certain distance Godward; but, manward, between sinful man and
the Lord Christ, there is a gap which can only be filled by a participator in a
fancied apostolical succession. Of course, the sacraments, duly administered,
are described as certain conduits of grace. Still we hear the words, "Baptism,
wherein I was made a member of Christ, a child of God, and an inheritor of the
Kingdom of Heaven." In priestly hands, bread and wine undergo a miraculous
change, very near akin to Popish transubstantiation. Sacraments are magnified,
because they are administered by priests, and thus they are but a footstool upon
which the priest can mount a little higher. The church, the altar, the priest,
these are cried up beyond measure; yet these are not our Lord Jesus, but rivals
to His priesthood. We hear it asserted, and our poor are continually taught it,
that anyone who undertakes to teach the gospel, though he can prove his doctrine
from the Bible, and may have an evident blessing resting on his ministry, is to
be denounced as a schismatic, unless he has received episcopal laying on of
hands. To break bread together as believers in the Lord Jesus, is not allowable
to ordinary Christians; and if they dare to do so, they are guilty of schism,–an
awful crime, which would seem to be several degrees worse than adultery or
murder. You might be forgiven, and it might even be difficult to keep you from
the sacraments, though guilty of fornication; but schism, if persevered in, puts
you beyond hope.

Brethren, let us bear most earnest protests against this revived superstition.
Let us tolerate nothing between the soul and Christ. It may be that, in London,
this priestly assumption does not come so closely and vexatiously under your
notice; but many brethren in this room have to see it before their eyes every
day, and to feel its iron hand laid upon their poorer people. Wherever they go,
they find claims put forth which uplift a certain class of men into Brahmins,
whose blessing is indispensable. Sinners may not come to Christ directly, on
their own account; the way to salvation is set forth as being by the appointed
priest. Earnestly protest against this error. Even when it is accompanied by a
measure of gospel teaching, it is deadly.

We must be zealous to have no measure of complicity in this superstition. My
brethren, be not priests yourselves. It is very possible to give yourselves the
airs of hierarchs, even though you are avowedly nothing more than Nonconformist
pastors. There is a style of dress,–the affectation of it is not praiseworthy.
There is a style of language,–the imitation of it is not commendable. There is
an assumption of superiority, looking down upon the common people as mere laity;
this piece of pompousness is ridiculous. Avoid the way of certain clerics who
seem intent on making their people feel that a minister is a dignified
individual, and that the rest of the members of the church should hardly venture
to differ from him. Say what we like about all believers in Christ being a
generation of priests, we still find vain fellows among us who would be thought
of as possessors of a mystic specialty. Our office, as pastors, deserves to be
respected, and will be if properly carried out; but I have observed that some
who are very anxious to magnify their office, really try to magnify themselves.
Yet, as the official has gone up, the man has gone down. One has wondered how so
small a man has obtained so great an office. I heard, yesterday, a question to
which I have not yet found a satisfactory answer; it was this: "Which is worse,
the man who can preach and won't preach, or the man who cannot preach and will
preach?" We have, I fear, some of the latter sort among us; but if they suppose
that the mere fact of their being chosen to a pastorate has endowed them with
peculiar powers, they deceive themselves.

Let me say, very softly and whisperingly, that there are little things among
ourselves which must be carefully looked after, or we shall have a leaven of
Ritualism and priesthood working in our measures of meal. In our revival
services, it might be as well to vary our procedure. Sometimes shut up that
inquiry-room. I have my fears about that institution if it be used in
permanence, and as an inevitable part of the services. It may be a very wise
thing to invite persons, who are under concern of soul, to come apart from the
rest of the congregation, and have conversation with godly people; but if you
should ever see that a notion is fashioning itself that there is something to be
got in the private room which is not to be had at once in the assembly, or that
God is more at that penitent form than elsewhere, aim a blow at that notion at
once. We must not come back by a rapid march to the old way of altars and
confessionals, and have Romish trumpery restored in a coarser form. If we make
men think that conversation with ourselves or with our helpers is essential to
their faith in Christ, we are taking the direct line for priestcraft. In the
gospel, the sinner and the Savior are to come together, with none between. Speak
upon this point very clearly, "You, sinner, sitting where you are, believing on
the Lord Jesus Christ, shall have eternal life. Do not stop till you pass into
an inquiry-room. Do not think it essential to confer with me. Do not suppose
that I have the keys of the Kingdom of Heaven, or that these godly men and women
associated with me can tell you any other gospel than this, 'He that believeth
on the Son hath everlasting life.'" In the next place, let us see to it that we
set forth our Lord Jesus Christ as the infallible Teacher, through His inspired
Word. I do not understand that loyalty to Christ which is accompanied by
indifference to His words. How can we reverence His person, if His own words and
those of His apostles are treated with disrespect? Unless we receive Christ's
words, we cannot receive Christ; and unless we receive His apostles' words, we
do not receive Christ; for John saith, "He that knoweth God heareth us; he that
is not of God heareth not us. Hereby know we the spirit of truth, and the spirit
of error." We must love and reverence all the teaching of our Lord; and we build
our houses on the sand if we do not. It is as important to know Christ as the
truth, as it is to know Christ as the way and the life. Some excellent brethren
seem to think more of the life than of the truth; for when I warn them that the
enemy has poisoned the children's bread, they answer, "Dear brother, we are
sorry to hear it; and, to counteract the evil, we will open the window, and give
the children fresh air." Yes, open the window, and give them fresh air, by all
means. You cannot do a better thing, in view of many purposes; but, at the same
time, this ought you to have done, and not to have left the other undone. Arrest
the poisoners, and open the windows, too. While men go on preaching false
doctrine, you may talk as much as you will about deepening their spiritual life,
but you will fail in it. While you do one good thing, do not neglect another.
Instead of saying that the life is more important, or the truth is more
important, or the way is more important, let us be united in the firm belief
that they are each one equally important, and that one cannot be well sustained
and thoroughly carried out without the rest.

Some quit the teaching of Christ out of sheer wantonness, and childish love of
novelty. To younger brethren, false doctrine comes as an infantile disease, a
sort of inevitable spiritual measles. I wish them well through with the
disorder, and I trust it will leave nothing bad behind it. With deep anxiety, I
have watched over minds infected with this raging epidemic; and I have rejoiced
as I have seen the rash of unbelief come out beautifully, and have heard the
patient say, "Thank God, I shall never go back to that any more." Still, it is a
pity that so many should find it needful to traverse the foul way which has
bemired others. They remind me of a certain worldly lady, to whom her minister,
remarking her great gaiety, said, "Solomon has said, 'Vanity of vanities; all is
vanity.'" "Yes," she replied, "I know what Solomon has said; but he found it out
by his own personal experience, and I should like to do the same." She was no
Solomon, assuredly; for they who have wisdom will profit by the experience of
others. If you have seen others go abroad for wool, and come home shorn,
prudence would suggest that you need not go also.

Some fall into doubt through an inward crookedness. Certain men start new
doctrines because "something is rotten in the state of Denmark," and out of
rottenness fungoid growths must come. You may have read Pliny's "Natural
History." If you have not read it, you need not do so, for the history is not
generally natural, but fabulous. Pliny tells us that, when the elephant goes to
a pool of water, and sees himself in it, he is moved with such disgust at his
own ugliness, that he straightway stirs the water, and makes it muddy, that he
may not see himself. Such an elephant never lived; but I have seen men who have
been very comparable to it. Holy Scripture has not agreed with them,–so much the
worse for Holy Scripture! Such-and- such doctrines do not suit their tastes, so
they must be misrepresented, or denied. An unregenerate heart lies at the bottom
of "modern thought." Men are down-grade in doctrine because they were never put
on the up-grade by the renewal of their minds.

Some, I doubt not, have tinkered up Christ's teachings, and Christ's gospel,
from a desire to do more good. Things are allowed to be said and done at
revivals which nobody could defend. Do you notice, at the present moment, the
way the gospel is put? I am uttering no criticism upon anyone in particular, but
I continually read the exhortation, "Give your heart to Christ." The exhortation
is good, but do not suffer it to cover over the gospel word: "Believe on the
Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved." In the Sunday-school, the teaching
often is, "Dear children, love Jesus." Now, this is not the gospel. The love of
Jesus comes as a fruit, but the gospel is, "Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ,
and thou shalt be saved." If we think that we shall do more good by substituting
another exhortation for the gospel command, we shall find ourselves landed in
serious difficulties. If, for a moment, our improvements seem to produce a
larger result than the old gospel, it will be the growth of mushrooms, it may
even be the growth of toadstools; but it is not the growth of trees of the Lord.
Let us keep close to Christ as our infallible Teacher in these days of peril,
and be exceedingly jealous of the truth, else we may be duped, as Pompeii
tricked certain cities that would not admit his troops. He said, "I don't ask
you to allow my armies to be billeted upon you; but here are a few sick and
wounded men, for whom I ask that you will allow them to rest among you." When
the invalids were within the walls, they opened the gates, and the inhabitants
were easily subdued. Keep out the little errors for which sympathy is asked; or,
if not, your citadel will be captured before you are aware of the attack. Stand
fast in the faith once for all delivered to the saints, and let no man spoil you
by philosophy and vain deceit.

Next, brethren, we must growingly insist that Christ is the one Law-giver and
only Ruler in the Church. We have systems of religion among us in which the
whole organization is an invention; it could not have been discovered in the
Bible, but has been brought to it to have a text hung round its neck as a label.
We have, for our neighbors, religionists who would hardly attempt to prove that
their system was ever sanctioned by our Lord and His apostles. This has been the
case for so long a period that we have been obliged to tolerate all kinds of
things; but to tolerate is not the same thing as to approve and imitate. We
should, in our own churches, keep to apostolic precedent, and follow the rule of
Christ in all things. No venerable name is sufficient authority for going aside
from Holy Scripture. "To the law and to the testimony;" if a doctrine or a
ceremony is not there, it is nowhere for you and for me. Our sole authority is
the Word of the Lord.

Worse still will it be if we dare to make omissions in the known rules of
Christ. I am sorry that there are disputes in the Church as to baptism and the
Lord's supper; but it is not a moot point in the Church of Christ whether
baptism and the Lord's supper are to be practiced at all. How, then, can these
ordinances be set aside by those who admit that they are Scriptural? I heard of
one saying, "If Jesus were here now, He would see the evil that has come from
those two institutions, and He would set them aside." We cannot endure such a
sentence. Surely, we are not revisers of the teachings and doings of our Lord.
Have you not, in your congregations, good people, who will say, "Yes, dear sir,
I know that believers' baptism is in the Word; I am quite clear upon that; but I
have never yet attended to it"? Have you impressed upon that person's mind the
willful disobedience involved in such neglect? It is not the case of a person
who says, "I do not see such an ordinance to be commanded in the Word of God;"
that would be a sin of ignorance. But he says, "It is there," yet he neglects
it, and boasts that he can be saved without it. Do not be in a hurry to confirm
that statement, for it may turn out that the man who says, "I believe in Jesus,"
and then willfully refuses to keep His known commandments, is not saved.
Assuredly, such a man is not saved from willful disobedience. What sort of faith
is that which does not work by love, but sets up its own will in opposition to
the precept of Christ? We must protest against all tampering with the law of the
great Head of the Church. I mention the point of baptism merely as an example;
but upon every other point of sacred rule we must be earnestly urgent. Christ is
Lord as well as Savior. He has not come into His house to be trifled with, and
to have His words shuffled like a pack of cards.

You may quit the rule of your Lord in another way. A brother is going to decide
upon his course of action on a certain important Christian matter; but he first
wants to know what is the opinion of gentlemen who subscribe considerable sums
to church work. If any one of you does this, I shall cry, "Who is thy master,
after all? Judas with his bag in the corner, or the Christ whom he kisses with a
traitor's kiss?" Be true, and dare all things. If we do not do so, Christ Jesus
is not Law-giver to us. Scorn the bribe, though it be a covert one, and lose all
for truth, if need be. Our Lord also stands before us as our example and
pattern. We preach the grace of God, and the blood of Christ; but if any suppose
that we do not preach Christ as an example, they know nothing of our ministry;
for we insist upon it that faith must obey her Savior's will as well as trust
His grace. We have had some among us, like, the old Scotchwoman, who said, "It
was a good sermon, all but the duties at the end." It may be possible that we
put the precept in such a way that we countenance the suspicion that we are
legal in spirit; this we must carefully avoid. We would preach Christ as the
perfect pattern, that saints may long to be conformed to Him. Men must have the
spirit of Christ, or they are lost. There is no Heaven to be found in a mere
forensic justification, apart from a spiritual work within the soul,–a change of
heart, and a renewal of mind.

Once more, I trust that we shall always hold Christ as Lord and God. Whatever
else He is, He is Lord and God to us. Therefore He is to be spoken of and
thought upon with deepest reverence of soul. The spirit that trifles with the
Word of God, and the things of Christ, is almost more vicious than the action
which comes out of it. I have read many things which I have shuddered at; but I
have shuddered much more at the state of mind into which a man must have come to
be able to write them. Let us cultivate the highest reverence for our Divine
Lord, and the surest confidence in His power, and in His ultimate victory. Trust
in that hand which He keeps on the helm. Have no shadow of a doubt that His
wisdom and might will cause all things to end well. Go, therefore, and speak in
His Name. When you have done stating a doctrine, command your hearers, in the
Name of Jesus, to believe it. Be daring enough for that. As the apostles
commanded lame men to stand, and even dead men to live, so, in the Name of Jesus
Christ of Nazareth, command sinners to turn unto Him, and to live. He who gives
you faith will answer to His own word.

Now let us turn our earnest attention to the subject OF OUR POSITION TOWARDS OUR
LORD. The position of the Christian minister towards Christ is a theme upon
which one might speak in many ways, and for many a day, and yet barely do more
than touch the fringe of it. The most striking view of it comes before us in
meditating upon the fact, that, as He stood in our stead, we also stand in His
stead. To our hearers we can truly say, "We pray you, in Christ's stead, be ye
reconciled to God." Our Lord Jesus lays His pierced hands upon our shoulders,
and He says, "As the Father hath sent Me into the world, even so send I you." We
are commissioned to plead for Christ, even as He is commissioned to plead for
us. For Him we climb those stairs, to point that sick and ignorant woman to the
blood of reconciliation. For Him we stand in the pulpit, and speak of sin, and
righteousness, and judgment to come. In His place we cry, "Behold the Lamb of
God, which taketh away the sin of the world!" Beloved brethren, do we always
feel that we are not only laboring for Christ, but in His stead? Could we set
forth some of our sermons as having been preached in Christ's stead? Should we
not expect our own conscience to cry out against us if we were to make such a
claim for those discourses? Some of our hearers would think, if they did not say
so, "If that sermon is in Christ's stead, there is an awful falling off from
what it would have been had Jesus spoken on His own account." Of course, there
would necessarily be a falling off in Divine authority and ability; but there
should be none as to truthful and earnest purpose.

We must plead with men in Christ's stead; and that will prevent partiality. We
shall not give all our thoughts to the wealthy and educated few; but, as Jesus
did, we shall care for the many. James the fifth of Scotland was known as "the
poor mans king," because every peasant, who desired it, could get an audience
with him. The Lord make us the poor men's preachers! for how else can we be in
Christ's stead? In His ministry, the poor had the gospel preached unto them. If
there be one of our flock more sick, more poor, more ignorant than another, let
us, for the Lord's sake, seek him first. Let us assume no upstart dignity, but
feel at one with the forlorn, the poor, the fallen, even as Jesus did.

If we be in Christ's stead, we shall not bully, but tenderly persuade. We shall
have true sympathy, and so we shall plead with sinners unto tears, as though
their ruin were our woe, and their salvation would be our bliss. We shall weep
over them, because Jesus would have done so; and we shall be patient with them,
because of His Divine long-suffering. We shall watch for opportunities, and use
them with perseverance; for so would Jesus have done. We shall deal with our
hearers as a shepherd with his lost sheep, and we shall never rest till we have
brought them home upon our shoulders rejoicing; for so was it with our Lord.
This position of ours, in Christ's stead, is greatly responsible; we shall need
great grace to bear its weight. Behave yourselves, Christian brethren, for you
bear a great Name. Do not disgrace the Name of the holy Jesus. It was shameful
of Sheridan, when he was picked up in the gutter, to give his name to the
constable as "Wilberforce." What a cruel wrong to our Lord Jesus, for a harsh,
or proud, or idle minister to give in his name as acting in the stead of Christ!
God forgive the wrong: it is a very heinous one. If you are indeed in Christ's
stead, what manner of persons ought you to be! May God help you to be worthy of
the embassage on which you are sent!

Therefore, brethren, we must love sinners for Christ's sake. Are there not a
great many in your congregation whom you could not love for any other reason?
Could the Lord Jesus Christ ever have loved you for your merit's sake? He loved
you and me for a reason which He found in His own heart; and so must we love our
hearers, from causes which are not so much in them as in our own hearts. He
"loved me, and gave Himself for me;" and if now He says to me, "Love others, and
give yourself for them," shall I not do it? Every angry temper must be chased
out. The fallen, the frivolous, the captious, the indifferent, and even the
malicious must share our love. We must love them to Jesus. With cords of a man
and bands of love must we draw them. Our mission is to perpetuate on earth the
love of the Savior.

Further than this, your relation to Christ is of such a sort that you are to
"fill up that which is behind of the sufferings of Christ for His body's sake,
which is the Church." His atoning griefs are finished; into that winepress, none
of us can set a foot. But those sufferings by which men are won to Christ are
far from being finished. All the martyr host have bled and died to keep the
truth alive for us, that by the truth men may still be brought to Jesus. Every
sufferer who bears pain, or slander, or loss, or personal unkindness for
Christ's sake, is filling up that amount of suffering which is necessary to the
bringing together of the whole body of Christ, and the upbuilding of His elect
Church. "Oh!" cries one minister, "I have been shamefully treated." Yes, and
worthier men have been even more evilly entreated than you have. You need not
look among your fellow-soldiers for equals in suffering: consider how your Lord
Himself "endured such contradiction of sinners." When Alexander led his men into
Persia, and they had to cut through a very mountain of ice and snow, they were
ready to turn back, and therefore Alexander alighted from his horse, and took an
ice-ax in his hand, and went forward, often up to his waist in snow, cleaving
the blocks of ice, and leading the way. Then the Macedonians felt that they
would cut through the world with Alexander in front of them. With Christ your
Lord cleaving His way by the agonies on the cross, will not you follow where He
leads, and fill up the measure that may be wanted of toil, and labor, and
suffering, for the salvation of those whom He has redeemed by blood? Nothing was
more affecting in our supplications this morning than the prayers of those who
had been great sufferers. Through suffering comes blessing. When our Lord means
to give His household wine, that our festivals may be full of gladness, what
does He do? He says, "Fill the waterpots with water." We must be filled with
affliction to the brim. We must have as much of it as we can hold, and then He
will say, "Draw out now." This is His beginning of miracles; and some of us
rejoice that it was not only wrought at Cana in Galilee, but it is still wrought
in this island of the sea. Do you not think that we all make mistakes as to what
will be a blessing? In the matter of faith-healing, health is set before us as
if it were the great thing to be desired above all other things. Is it so? I
venture to say that the greatest earthly blessing that God can give to any of us
is health, with the exception of sickness. Sickness has frequently been of more
use to the saints of God than health has. If some men, that I know of, could
only be favored with a month of rheumatism, it would, by God's grace, mellow
them marvellously. Assuredly, they need something better to preach than what
they now give their people; and, possibly, they would learn it in the chamber of
suffering. I would not wish for any man a long time of sickness; and pain; but a
twist now and then one might almost ask for him. A sick wife, a newly-made
grave, poverty, slander, sinking of spirit, might teach lessons nowhere else to
be learned so well. Trials drive us to the realities of religion. You may feed
on chaff until you have real work to do, or real grief to bear; but then you
want the old corn of the land, and you must have it, or else you will faint and
fail Our afflictions come to us as blessings, though they frown like curses. I
have heard of one who was generous, but extremely eccentric. A man, who was
deeply in debt, passed his door, and he knew that the poor debtor was terribly
exercised about the matter. One day, this odd man of wealth, generous as he was,
was so cruel as to throw a heavy bag at the poor debtor. The man was hurt by the
missile, and looked round to see what it was. He saw no man who had inflicted
the injury. He picked up the bag. He heard the chink of the coin, and when he
opened the bag, he found enough to pay his debt, and he heard a voice saying,
"Keep it for yourself." He never summoned that man for an assault; but thanked
him for the gift. Ofttimes has Providence, with a rough hand, thrown countless
gain in our way in the form of the trial of our faith, which is much more
precious than gold. Blessed be the Lord, our temporary bruise is soon forgotten,
but the spiritual gain abides for ever. In any case, the cause of our Lord Jesus
Christ is our cause, and we are linked with Him in a fellowship which cannot be
broken, whatever it may involve. We have counted the cost, and we can say, "From
henceforth let no man trouble me. I am the branded slave of Jesus, and my ear is
bored for Him."

Furthermore, brethren, our position towards our Lord will become most practical
when we realize what He has done for us. I do not think that we always clearly
perceive what He has actually accomplished on our behalf. We say, "We are poor,
but Christ makes us rich." Why do we not say, "We are rich, for Christ has made
us so "? Our poverty has passed away, and we have become rich in Christ.
Brethren, He hath called us "out of darkness into His marvelous light." We are
apt, when we preach from the text, to enlarge considerably upon nature's
darkness; but would it not be as well to be even more full upon the "marvelous
light "? Have we the present experience which would lead us to do so? Why do we
make so very vivid that word of the apostle, "When I am weak"? Can we not
equally dwell upon the next words, "then am I strong"? Our Lord's blessings are
realities, and not fancies; let us so treat them. "Blessed are they which do
hunger and thirst after righteousness, for they shall be filled;" why spend all
the time on the hunger and the thirst? Are we not filled? If not, Lord, fill us!
But if we are filled, let us feel and preach the sweetness of the Heavenly
bread, and commend it with glad hearts to our hearers. Brethren, let us get on
the bright side of our religion, and not be always harping upon what we are in
ourselves. "The darkness is past, and the true light now shineth." We are now in
Christ Jesus. We were all that is evil, but we are washed, cleansed, sanctified.
Oh, for the rich enjoyment of the present blessings of the covenant! Oh, for
grace to speak as we find! As Abraham's servant took care to talk largely of his
master's riches, and to show the precious things which he had brought with him
from his house, so let us try to win hearts for our great Lord, by showing who
He is, and what He has, and what we personally know thereof.

I think, again, that we shall do well to stand towards Christ as those who are
conscious of His power and presence. Brethren, our Lord is with us. The best of
all is, that He is with us indeed and of a truth. If we are with Jesus, and
preach His truth, Jesus is assuredly with us; for He said, "Lo, I am with you
alway, even unto the end of the world." That promise was not a pretty piece of
romance: it is true that He is with us at this hour. Let us believe it, and act
accordingly. If we do not always feel His brightness, let us, like the flowers,
turn towards the sun. When the sun is not shining, the flowers know where there
is most of light, and their faces turn that way. Let us be true heliotropes, or
turners to the sun. When we get into the pulpit, let us look Christward and lean
Christward. What a wondrous place the pulpit is when Jesus is there! In the
study, when we sit down, and begin to rub our foreheads, and anxiously enquire,
"What shall we preach about?" let us turn towards our Lord, and pray with our
window open towards His cross and His throne. May we ever feel an influence
drawing us Christward when the Bible is open before us! If it be so, our
weakness will all vanish, for His strength will be remembered When you are
contemplating the great struggle against sin, and are making up your account as
to the forces that are on the right side, fail not to remember Jesus. You have
put yourself down: that amounts to less than nothing. Now you put down your
deacons: after estimating them lovingly, they are as nothing, too. You have made
an item of praying friends and workers, and so on; but the total sum is just a
line of ciphers. What do all these noughts amount to? Your distrust cries out,
"I have here nothing, and nothing, and nothing." That is a poor reckoning for
you to rely upon; but you have not done yet. What are you going to put before
all these noughts? Where will you place the Infinite One? If you put him after
these ciphers, like a figure in decimals, you reduce the one to the ten
thousandth! Each nought set before THE ONE robs Him of glory, and diminishes Him
But if HE be put first, before the ciphers, what a sum you have! This is not
fancy; it is sound arithmetic. Go and test it, and see if it does not turn out
to be mathematically true in the spirit world. Powerless as we are alone, our
Lord is with us.

Some preachers evidently do not believe that the Lord is with their gospel,
because, in order to attract and save sinners, their gospel is insufficient, and
they have to add to it inventions of men. Plain gospel preaching must be
supplemented,–so they think. Bridget was very busy catching and killing flies.
Her mistress said to her, "Bridget, what are you doing?" She answered, "You see,
ma'am, we have bought some fly-papers, and we must have the flies caught on
them; and as they don't go on of themselves, I am sticking them on." I should
not care for fly-papers of that sort. If the gospel must be a failure unless we
attract the people by some extraneous method, it is a poor business. If the
flypaper does not attract the flies, and hold them, we may as well burn the
flypaper. If your gospel cannot bring the people to hear you, and if, when they
come, your gospel will not impress and convert them, well, then, give it up.
Open a coffee-shop, or start in the ginger-beer line; but do not call your
useless talk the blessed gospel. If you are not conscious of a supernatural
power and presence with the Word of the Lord, let it alone. A man said to me,
"You told a dead sinner to believe." I pleaded guilty, but told him I would do
it again. He said, "I could not do it, I should feel that it was of no use to do
so." I answered, "Possibly, it might be of no use for you to do it, for you have
not the necessary faith; but, as I believe that God bids me do so, I deliver the
message in the Name of the Lord, and the dead sinners believe and live." I do
not trust in the dead sinner's power to live, but in the power of the gospel to
make him live. Now, if your gospel has not the power of the Holy Ghost in it,
you cannot preach it with confidence, and you are tempted to have a performance
in the schoolroom to allure the people, whom Christ crucified does not draw. If
you are depending on sing-song, and fiddles, and semi-theatricals, you are
disgracing the religion which you pretend to honor.

Once more, dear friends, our position towards our Lord is that of waiting for
His coming. I do not know how far the most of you are warmly affected towards
the blessed truth of the Second Advent; but I trust that many of you believe it,
and are enlivened by faith in it. That great hope is gaining ground among lovers
of Evangelical doctrine. At first, ministers seemed half-afraid of this grand
belief, because of the fanaticism which is supposed to grow out of it. Certain
charlatans also do great harm by pretending to know the day and the hour when
the Lord will come. Times and seasons are not with us; but the Lord will come.
He is on His way even now, for He says, "I am coming quickly." Our Lord may come
right soon; certain signs raise our hopes very high. The love of many waxes
cold, and the devil is doubly busy; and this last is no doubtful sign. When you
see a farmer beginning to burn the gates, and break down the hedges, and unroof
the barns, and so on, you say., "That fellow's lease has run out." Satan has
great wrath when he knows that his time is short In the case of the demoniac
child, we read, "As he was yet a-coming, the devil threw him down, and tare
him." He knew that he was about to be expelled, so he did his worst. The double
veiling of the heavens only brings on that darkest part of the night which
precedes the dawn of day. When the tale of bricks is doubled, Moses appears; and
the same is true of our still greater Deliverer. Let us take courage, and be of
good heart; for while we lift Christ on high, and glorify His Name, He is on the
way to take up the quarrel of His covenant, and utterly to rout His foes.

Now for two or three words to finish with, upon OUR POSITION INDIVIDUALLY.
Peradventure, some sentence may come with power to this man and to that.

Let me say to you, brethren, be self-contained. I would to God that we had among
us more men in the fulness of spiritual and mental vigor. The want of the period
is brethren who know the gospel for themselves, who have had a personal
experience of its power, who have tested it as silver is tried in a furnace of
earth, and who set such a value upon it, that they would sooner part with life
than give it up. We have too many in our company who will go right if they are
led aright, and who are sure to swim in the right direction if the current is
strong enough to carry them with it; these are all very well when the wind blows
from the right quarter, but they are of small use in ill weather. At this hour,
there is a call for men who can breast the torrent, and swim up stream. We need
heroes who would just as soon go alone, if necessary, as march with a thousand
comrades. We need men who are doing their own thinking, and do not put it out,
as families do with their washing. They have thought out the truth; and, having
gone to God about it, and felt the power of it in their own souls, they are not
now to be moved from the hope of their calling. They are pillars in the house of
our God, abiding, in their places; and not mere caterpillars, crawling after
something to eat. We need captains for the good ship who know their longitude
and latitude, and can tell whence they came, and to what port they are steering.
Our Commander needs warriors true as steel for this hour of conflict.

"Ye that are men, now serve Him Against unnumbered foes."

A man is now more precious than the gold of Ophir. To be dependent upon the
judgment of friends or foes in these days, is to be but half a man. Let us stand
before the living God in our integrity, and seek no patronage from societies or
individuals. Are you all in this state? I fear that the God-dependent are still
few. We have members of our churches who do not know a good sermon till they
have consulted that dear old gentleman who is their oracle. Some ministers have
no opinion till they have been to "the fraternal meeting." They must hear the
bell of the leading sheep before they know which way to go; for the Master's
voice they neither hear nor know. O brother, thou wilt need the Spirit within
thine own soul; for the right path runs through a solitary land, and if thou
darest not travel alone, thou wilt never reach the Celestial City! In the next
place, we must learn, in these times, to be selective in our companionships.
When a man is himself right, let him not compromise himself by association with
those who are not clear in their standing. Why be drawn down by holding on to
the wreck which is sinking? Continual consorting with those who have no sympathy
with the great truths of the gospel, is running into perpetual peril. For my
part, I find association with persons of loose views a thing too painful for me.
Worldly-minded men are wretched company for spiritual minds. Gordon Cumming
describes a territory in Africa as "a forest of fish-hooks, relieved with
patches of penknives." Men of new views, loose habits, and unspiritual talk, are
quite as uncomfortable as acquaintances; especially when they pretend to be very
orthodox, and yet believe nothing of the old faith. Clear yourselves of all
connections which bring your own faithfulness into question. Do not talk about
separation from that which is evil, and then remain in fellowship with it. Be as
chaste in your companionships as in your own persons, or evil will come of it.

Furthermore, be sanctified in life. I cannot say that word with too much
emphasis. I would drive that nail home. Be ye holy, for ye serve a holy God. If
you were making a present to a prince, you would not find him a lame horse to
ride upon; you would not offer him a book out of which leaves had been torn, nor
carry him a timepiece whose wheels were broken. No, the best of the best you
would give to one whom you honored and loved. Give your very best to your Lord.
Seek to be at your best whenever you serve Him. Pray Him to make you perfect in
every good work to do His will, and then present yourself unto Him a living
sacrifice. Let no one of us preach a sermon, and have to feel afterwards, "I
could have done better than that, but it was good enough for so poor an
audience." On a Wednesday evening, in a cottage, with no more than half-a-dozen
present, and those old women, do your utmost. Our richest fruit is poor enough.
Give your second-best never. Keep you to the very first and fullest that you can
produce for Christ; let your whole life be the noblest exertion of which you are
capable. I said, last night, that the minister who can do any more, and does not
do it, is a sluggard. It is so. We must do all that we can do, and do it in our
ablest way, or we are idle. He has come up to Christ's mark, who can truly say
that he can do no more, and that, if he could do anything more, he would do it
at once. How few of us could conscientiously claim to have come so far! Be
diligent in action. Put all your irons into the fire. Use every faculty for
Jesus. Be wide-awake to watch opportunities, and quick to seize upon them.
Believe that the smallest sphere has in it or around it glorious openings for
enlargement. In a very small village, infinite results may be realized. If one
place be evangelized, strike out for another; and ever, like the dwellers on a
common, keep up a rolling fence, which encloses a little more and a little more.
Content with what we are doing must be far from us, while there is yet very much
land to be possessed. May you feed your flocks as pastors, and increase them by
being evangelists! In this respect, be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the
earth. We must use every energy, and be of an adventurous and industrious spirit
in these days, that we may checkmate the incessant activities of the prince of
darkness.

Lastly, I desire to send you away with this in your ear, yea, with this in your
heart, be confident in spirit. We are not going to show the white feather, nor
even to tolerate a trembling thought. Years ago, they used to charge me
vehemently with being too flippant and jocose; but of late the charge has
shifted, and I am reviled as despondent, bilious, and morose. I conceive that my
innocence is clear. Have you read The Salt-Cellars, written by a morose person
who never smiles, who is a pessimistic alarmist, dreaming of awful catastrophes
which never occur? The description must have been originally meant for someone
else. I protest that I am quite as merry as may be fit. If I have undergone so
great a reformation of manners as to have swung round from cheerfulness to
gloom, it is singular that I am not in the least aware of it. I cannot endorse
the statement that I have lost my tendency to humor, for I feel very much the
other way; and were I not watchful, I should become too hilarious.

I have received a measure of pity because I am in opposition to so many; but the
pity may be spared, or handed over to those on the other side. Years ago, when I
preached a sermon upon Baptismal Regeneration, my venerable friend, Dr. Steane,
said to me, "You have got into hot water." I replied, "No; I do not feel the
water to be hot. The truth is far otherwise. I am cool enough; I am only the
stoker, and other folks are in the hot water, which I am doing my best to make
so hot that they will be glad to get out of it." We do not wish to fight; but if
we do, we hope that the pity will be needed by those with whom we contend. The
hot water does not come near to me, nor even does a breath of steam blow in my
eyes. I am content with that which must inevitably come to the man who protests
in downright earnest; that is to say, I am content to be criticized,
misunderstood, and misrepresented. The cost was counted long ago, and the
estimate was so liberal that there is no fear of its being exceeded. "I know
whom I have believed, and am persuaded that He is able to keep that which I have
committed unto Him against that day."

There is no room for fear; at least, I see none while we hold fast to the truth.
You never met an old salt, down by the sea, who was in trouble because the tide
had been ebbing out for hours. No! He waits confidently for the turn of the
tide, and it comes in due time. Yonder rock has been uncovered during the last
half-hour, and if the sea continues to ebb out for weeks, there will be no water
in the English Channel, and the French will walk over from Cherbourg. Nobody
talks in that childish way, for such an ebb will never come. Nor will we speak
as though the gospel would be routed, and eternal truth driven out of the land.
We serve an almighty Master. Pompeii, when asked what he would do if his foes
attacked him, replied, "Sir, if I stamp my foot, all Italy will swarm with
soldiers." Thus he boasted; but it is no boast to say that, if our Lord does but
stamp His foot, He can win for Himself all the nations of the earth against
heathenism, and Mohammedanism, and Agnosticism, and Modern-thought, and every
other foul error. Who is he that can harm us if we follow Jesus? How can His
cause be defeated? At His will, converts will flock to His truth as numerous as
the sands of the sea. Is it not written, "Thy people shall be willing in the day
of Thy power, in the beauties of holiness from the womb of the morning: Thou
hast the dew of Thy youth"? Wherefore, be of good courage, and go on your way
singing,–

"The winds of hell have blown, The world its hate hath shown, Yet it is not
o'erthrown.

Hallelujah for the Cross!

It shall never suffer loss!" The Lord of hosts is with us, the God of Jacob is
our refuge.


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  CHAPTER 92: BOOK: AROUND THE WICKET GALE (11 SERMONS)
========================================================================

Around the Wicket Gate by

C. H. Spurgeon Around the Wicket Gate: or, A Friendly Talk with Seekers
Concerning Faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.

Preface I. Chapter One: Awakening II. Chapter Two: Jesus Only III. Chapter
Three: Personal Faith in Jesus IV. Chapter Four: Faith Very Simple V. Chapter
Five: Fearing to Believe VI. Chapter Six: Difficulty in the Way of Believing
VII. Chapter Seven: A Helpful Survey VIII. Chapter Eight: A Real Hindrance IX.
Chapter Nine: On Raising Questions X. Chapter Ten: Without Faith No Salvation
XI. Chapter Eleven: To Those Who Have Believed


========================================================================
  CHAPTER 93: PREFACE
========================================================================

Millions of men are in the outlying regions, far off from God and peace; for
these we pray, and to these we give warning. But just now we have to do with a
smaller company, who are not far from the kingdom, but have come right up to the
wicket gate which stands at the head of the way of life. One would think that
they would hasten to enter, for a free and open invitation is placed over the
entrance, the porter waits to welcome them, and there is but this one way to
eternal life. He that is most loaded seems the most likely to pass in and begin
the heavenward journey; but what ails the other men? This is what I want to find
out. Poor fellows! they have come a long way already to get where they are; and
the King’s highway, which they seek, is right before them: why do they not take
to the Pilgrim Road at once? Alas! they have a great many reasons; and foolish
as those reasons are, it needs a very wise man to answer them all. I cannot
pretend to do so. Only the Lord Himself can remove the folly which is bound up
in their hearts, and lead them to take the great decisive step. Yet the Lord
works by means; and I have prepared this little book in the earnest hope that He
may work by it to the blessed end of leading seekers to an immediate, simple
trust in the Lord Jesus. He who does not take the step of faith, and so enter
upon the road to heaven, will perish. It will be an awful thing to die just
outside the gate of life. Almost saved, but altogether lost! This is the most
terrible of positions. A man just outside Noah’s ark would have been drowned; a
manslayer close to the wall of the city of refuge, but yet outside of it, would
be slain; and the man who is within a yard of Christ, and yet has not trusted
Him, will be lost. Therefore am I in terrible earnest to get my hesitating
friends over the threshold. Come in! Come in! is my pressing entreaty.
“Wherefore standest thou without?” is my solemn enquiry. May the Holy Spirit
render my pleadings effectual with many who shall glance at these pages! May He
cause His own Almighty power to create faith in the soul at once! My reader, if
God blesses this book to you, do the writer this favour—either lend your own
copy to one who is lingering at the gate, or buy another and give it away; for
his great desire is that this little volume should be of service to many
thousands of souls. To God this book is commended; for without His grace nothing
will come of all that is written.

—C. H. SPURGEON.


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  CHAPTER 94: I. CHAPTER ONE: AWAKENING
========================================================================

I. Chapter One — Awakening

Great numbers of persons have no concern about eternal things. They care more
about their cats and dogs than about their souls. It is a great mercy to be made
to think about ourselves, and how we stand towards God and the eternal world.
This is full often a sign that salvation is coming to us. By nature we do not
like the anxiety, which spiritual concern causes us, and we try, like sluggards,
to sleep again. This is great foolishness; for it is at our peril that we trifle
when death is so near, and judgment is so sure. If the Lord has chosen us to
eternal life, he will not let us return to our slumber. If we are sensible, we
shall pray that our anxiety about our souls may never come to an end till we are
really and truly saved.

Let us say from our hearts:—

“He that suffered in my stead, Shall my Physician be;

I will not be comforted Till Jesus comfort me.”

It would be an awful thing to go dreaming down to hell, and there to lift up our
eyes with a great gulf fixed between us and heaven. It will be equally terrible
to be aroused to escape from the wrath to come, and then to shake off the
warning influence, and go back to our insensibility. I notice that those who
overcome their convictions and continue in their sins are not so easily moved
the next time: every awakening which is thrown away leaves the soul more drowsy
than before, and less likely to be again stirred to holy feeling. Therefore our
heart should be greatly troubled at the thought of getting rid of its trouble in
any other than the right way. One who had the gout was cured of it by a quack
medicine, which drove the disease within, and the patient died. To be cured of
distress of mind by a false hope, would be a terrible business: the remedy would
be worse than the disease. Better far that our tenderness of conscience should
cause us long years of anguish, than that we should lose it, and perish in the
hardness of our hearts.

Yet awakening is not a thing to rest in, or to desire to have lengthened out
month after month. If I start up in a fright, and find my house on fire, I do
not sit down at the edge of the bed, and say to myself, “I hope I am truly
awakened! Indeed, I am deeply grateful that I am not left to sleep on!” No, I
want to escape from threatened death, and so I hasten to the door or to the
window, that I may get out, and may not perish where I am. It would be a
questionable boon to be aroused, and yet not to escape from the danger.

Remember, awakening is not salvation. A man may know that he is lost, and yet he
may never be saved. He may be made thoughtful, and yet he may die in his sins.
If you find out that you are a bankrupt, the consideration of your debts will
not pay them. A man may examine his wounds all the year around, and they will be
none the nearer being healed because he feels their smart, and notes their
number. It is one trick of the devil to tempt a man to be satisfied with a sense
of sin; and another trick of the same deceiver to insinuate that the sinner may
not be content to trust Christ, unless he can bring a certain measure of despair
to add to the Saviour’s finished work. Our awakenings are not to help the
Saviour, but to help us to the Saviour. To imagine that my feeling of sin is to
assist in the removal of the sin is absurd. It is as though I said that water
could not cleanse my face unless I had looked longer in the glass, and had
counted the smuts upon my forehead. A sense of need of salvation by grace is a
very healthful sign; but one needs wisdom to use it aright, and not to make an
idol of it.

Some seem as if they had fallen in love with their doubts, and fears, and
distresses. You cannot get them away from their terrors—they seem wedded to
them. It is said that the worst trouble with horses when their stables are on
fire, is that you cannot get them to come out of their stalls. If they would but
follow your lead, they might escape the flames; but they seem to be paralyzed
with fear. So the fear of the fire prevents their scaping the fire. Reader, will
your very fear of the wrath to come prevent your escaping from it? We hope not.

One who had been long in prison was not willing to come out. The door was open;
but he pleaded even with tears to be allowed to stay where he had been so long.
Fond of prison! Wedded to the iron bolts and the prison fare! Surely the
prisoner must have been a little touched in the head! Are you willing to remain
an awakened one, and nothing more? Are you not eager to be at once forgiven?

If you would tarry in anguish and dread, surely you, too, must be a little out
of your mind! If peace is to be had, have it at once! Why tarry in the darkness
of the pit, wherein your feet sink in the miry clay? There is light to be had;
light marvellous and heavenly; why lie in the gloom and die in anguish? You do
not know how near salvation is to you. If you did, you would surely stretch out
your hand and take it, for there it is; and it is to be had for the taking. Do
not think that feelings of despair would fit you for mercy. When the pilgrim, on
his way to the Wicket Gate. tumbled into the Slough of Despond, do you think
that, when the foul mire of that slough stuck to his garments, it was a
recommendation to him, to get him easier admission at the head of the way? It is
not so. The pilgrim did not think so by any means; neither may you. It is not
what you feel that will save you, but what Jesus felt. Even if there were some
healing value in feelings, they would have to be good ones; and the feeling
which makes us doubt the power of Christ to save, and prevents our finding
salvation in him, is by no means a good one, but a cruel wrong to the love of
Jesus. Our friend has come to see us, and has travelled through our crowded
London by rail, or tram, or omnibus. On a sudden he turns pale. We ask him what
is the matter, and he answers, “I have lost my pocket-book, and it contained all
the money I have in the world”. He goes over the amount to a penny, and
describes the cheques, bills, notes, and coins. We tell him that it must be a
great consolation to him to be so accurately acquainted with the extent of his
loss. He does not seem to see the worth of our consolation. We assure him that
he ought to be grateful that he has so clear a sense of his loss; for many
persons might have lost their pocket-books and have been quite unable to compute
their losses. Our friend is not, however, cheered in the least. “No,” says he,
“to know my loss does not help me to recover it. Tell me where I can find my
property, and you have done me real service; but merely to know my loss is no
comfort whatever.” Even so, to believe that you have sinned, and that your soul
is forfeited to the justice of God, is a very proper thing; but it will not
save. Salvation is not by our knowing our own ruin, but by fully grasping the
deliverance provided in Christ Jesus. A person who refuses to look to the Lord
Jesus, but persists in dwelling upon his sin and ruin, reminds us of a boy who
dropped a shilling down an open grating of a London sewer, and lingered there
for hours, finding comfort in saying, “It rolled in just there! Just between
those two iron bars I saw it go right down.” Poor soul! Long might he remember
the details of his loss before he would in this way get back a single penny into
his pocket, wherewith to buy himself a piece of bread. You see the drift of the
parable; profit by it.


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  CHAPTER 95: II. CHAPTER TWO: JESUS ONLY
========================================================================

II. Chapter Two — Jesus Only

We cannot too often or too plainly tell the seeking soul that his only hope for
salvation lies in the Lord Jesus Christ. It lies in Him completely, only, and
alone. To save both from the guilt and the power of sin, Jesus is
all-sufficient. His name is called Jesus, because “He shall save His people from
their sins”. “The Son of man hath power on earth to forgive sins.” He is exalted
on high “to give repentance and remission of sins”. It pleased God from of old
to devise a method of salvation which should be all contained in His
only-begotten Son. The Lord Jesus, for the working out of this salvation, became
man, and being found in fashion as a man, became obedient to death, even the
death of the cross. If another way of deliverance had been possible, the cup of
bitterness would have passed from Him. It stands to reason that the darling of
heaven would not have died to save us if we could have been rescued at less
expense. Infinite grace provided the great sacrifice; infinite love submitted to
death for our sakes. How can we dream that there can be another way than the way
which God has provided at such cost, and set forth in Holy Scripture so simply
and so pressingly? Surely it is true that “Neither is there salvation in any
other: for there is none other name under heaven given among men. whereby we
must be saved”. To suppose that the Lord Jesus has only half saved men, and that
there is needed some work or feeling of their own to finish His work, is wicked.
What is there of ours that could be added to His blood and righteousness? “All
our righteousnesses are as filthy rags.” Can these be patched on to the costly
fabric of His divine righteousness? Rags and fine white linen! Our dross and His
pure gold! It is an insult to the Saviour to dream of such a thing. We have
sinned enough, without adding this to all our other offences.

Even if we had any righteousness in which we could boast; if our fig leaves were
broader than usual, and were not so utterly fading, it would be wisdom to put
them away, and accept that righteousness which must be far more pleasing to God
than anything of our own. The Lord must see more that is acceptable in His Son
than in the best of us. The best of us! The words seem satirical, though they
were not so intended. What best is there about any of us? “There is none that
doeth good; no, not one.” I who write these lines, would most freely confess
that I have not a thread of goodness of my own. I could not make up so much as a
rag, or a piece of a rag. I am utterly destitute. But if I had the fairest suit
of good works which even pride can imagine, I would tear it up that I might put
on nothing but the garments of salvation, which are freely given by the Lord
Jesus, out of the heavenly wardrobe of His own merits.

It is most glorifying to our Lord Jesus Christ that we should hope for every
good thing from Him alone. This is to treat Him as He deserves to be treated;
for as He is God, and beside Him there is no one else, we are bound to look unto
Him and be saved. This is to treat Him as He loves to be treated, for He bids
all those who labour and are heavy laden to come to Him, and He will give them
rest. To imagine that He cannot save to the uttermost is to limit the Holy One
of Israel, and put a slur upon His power; or else to slander the loving heart of
the Friend of sinners, and cast a doubt upon His love. In either case, we should
commit a cruel and wanton sin against the tenderest points of His honour, which
are His ability and willingness to save all that come unto God by Him. The
child, in danger of the fire, just clings to the fireman, and trusts to him
alone. She raises no question about the strength of his limbs to carry her, or
the zeal of his heart to rescue her; but she clings. The heat is terrible, the
smoke is blinding, but she clings; and her deliverer quickly bears her to
safety. In the same childlike confidence cling to Jesus, who can and will bear
you out of danger from the flames of sin. The nature of the Lord Jesus should
inspire us with the fullest confidence. As He is God, He is almighty to save; as
He is man, He is filled with all fulness to bless; as He is God and man in one
Majestic Person, He meets man in His creatureship and God in His holiness. The
ladder is long enough to reach from Jacob prostrate on the earth, to Jehovah
reigning in heaven. To bring another ladder would be to suppose that He failed
to bridge the distance; and this would be grievously to dishonour Him. If even
to add to His words is to draw a curse upon ourselves, what must it be to
pretend to add to Himself?

Remember that He, Himself, is the Way; and to suppose that we must, in some
manner, add to the divine road, is to be arrogant enough to think of adding to
Him. Away with such a notion! Loathe it as you would blasphemy; for in essence
it is the worst of blasphemy against the Lord of love. To come to Jesus with a
price in our hand, would be insufferable pride, even if we had any price that we
could bring. What does He need of us? What could we bring if He did need it?
Would He sell the priceless blessings of His redemption? That which He wrought
out in His heart’s blood, would He barter it with us for our tears, and vows, or
for ceremonial observances, and feelings, and works?

He is not reduced to make a market of Himself: He will give freely, as beseems
His royal love; but He that offereth a price to Him knows not with whom he is
dealing, nor how grievously he vexes His free Spirit. Empty-handed sinners may
have what they will. All that they can possibly need is in Jesus, and He gives
it for the asking; but we must believe that He is all in all, and we must not
dare to breathe a word about completing what He has finished, or fitting
ourselves for what He gives to us as undeserving sinners. The reason why we may
hope for forgiveness of sin, and life eternal, by faith in the Lord Jesus, is
that God has so appointed. He has pledged Himself in the gospel to save all who
truly trust in the Lord Jesus, and He will never run back from His promise. He
is so well pleased with His only-begotten Son, that He takes pleasure in all who
lay hold upon Him as their one and only hope. The great God Himself has taken
hold on him who has taken hold on His Son. He works salvation for all who look
for that salvation to the once-slain Redeemer. For the honour of His Son, He
will not suffer the man who trusts in Him to be ashamed. “He that believeth on
the Son hath everlasting life”; for the ever-living God has taken him unto
Himself, and has given to him to be a partaker of His life.

If Jesus only be your trust, you need not fear but what you shall effectually be
saved, both now and in the day of His appearing. When a man confides, there is a
point of union between him and God, and that union guarantees blessing. Faith
saves us because it makes us cling to Christ Jesus, and He is one with God, and
thus brings us into connection with God. I am told that, years ago, above the
Falls of Niagara, a boat was upset, and two men were being carried down by the
current, when persons on the shore managed to float a rope out to them, which
rope was seized by them both.

One of them held fast to it, and was safely drawn to the bank; but the other,
seeing a great log come floating by, unwisely let go the rope, and clung to the
great piece of timber, for it was the bigger thing of the two, and apparently
better to cling to. Alas! the timber, with the man on it, went right over the
vast abyss, because there was no union between the wood and the shore. The size
of the log was no benefit to him who grasped it; it needed a connection with the
shore to produce safety. So, when a man trusts to his works, or to his prayers,
or almsgivings, or to sacraments, or to anything of that sort, he will not be
saved, because there is no junction between him and God through Christ Jesus;
but faith, though it may seem to be like a slender cord, is in the hand of the
great God on the shore side; infinite power pulls in the connecting line, and
thus draws the man from destruction. Oh, the blessedness of faith, because it
unites us to God by the Saviour, whom He has appointed, even Jesus Christ! O
reader, is there not common sense in this matter? Think it over, and may there
soon be a band of union between you and God, through your faith in Christ Jesus!


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  CHAPTER 96: III. CHAPTER THREE: PERSONAL FAITH IN JESUS
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III. Chapter Three — Personal Fa ith in Jesus

There is a wretched tendency among men to leave Christ Himself out of the
gospel. They might as well leave flour out of bread. Men hear the way of
salvation explained, and consent to it as being Scriptural, and in every way
such as suits their case; but they forget that a plan is of no service unless it
is carried out; and that in the matter of salvation their own personal faith in
the Lord Jesus is essential. A road to York will not take me there, I must
travel along it for myself. All the sound doctrine that ever was believed will
never save a man unless he puts his trust in the Lord Jesus for himself.

Mr. Macdonald asked the inhabitants of the island of St. Kilda how a man must be
saved. An old man replied, “We shall be saved if we repent, and forsake our
sins, and turn to God”. “Yes,” said a middle-aged female, “and with a true heart
too.” “Ay,” rejoined a third, “and with prayer”; and, added a fourth, “It must
be the prayer of the heart.” “And we must be diligent too,” said a fifth, “in
keeping the commandments.” Thus, each having contributed his mite, feeling that
a very decent creed had been made up, they all looked and listened for the
preacher’s approbation; but they had aroused his deepest pity: he had to begin
at the beginning, and preach Christ to them. The carnal mind always maps out for
itself a way in which self can work and become great; but the Lord’s way is
quite the reverse. The Lord Jesus puts it very compactly in (Mark 16:16) “He
that believeth and is baptized shall be saved.”

Believing and being baptized are no matters of merit to be gloried in; they are
so simple that boasting is excluded, and free grace bears the palm. This way of
salvation is chosen that it might be seen to be of grace alone. It may be that
the reader is unsaved: what is the reason? Do you think the way of salvation, as
laid down in the text we have quoted, to be dubious? Do you fear that you would
not be saved if you followed it? How can that be, when God has pledged His own
word for its certainty? How can that fail which God prescribes, and concerning
which He gives a promise? Do you think it very easy?

Why, then, do you not attend to it? Its ease leaves those without excuse who
neglect it. If you would have done some great thing, be not so foolish as to
neglect the little thing. To believe is to trust, or lean upon Christ Jesus; in
other words, to give up self-reliance, and to rely upon the Lord Jesus. To be
baptized is to submit to the ordinance which our Lord fulfilled at Jordan, to
which the converted ones submitted at Pentecost, to which the jailer yielded
obedience on the very night of his conversion. It is the outward confession
which should always go with inward faith. The outward sign saves not; but it
sets forth to us our death, burial, and resurrection with Jesus, and, like the
Lord’s Supper, it is not to be neglected. The great point is to believe in
Jesus, and confess your faith. Do you believe in Jesus? Then, dear friend,
dismiss your fears; you shall be saved. Are you still an unbeliever? Then
remember, there is but one door, and if you will not enter by it, you must
perish in your sins. The door is there; but unless you enter by it, what is the
use of it to you? It is of necessity that you obey the command of the gospel.

Nothing can save you if you do not hear the voice of Jesus, and do His bidding
indeed and of a truth. Thinking and resolving will not answer the purpose; you
must come to real business; for only as you actually believe will you truly live
unto God.

I heard of a friend who deeply desired to be the means of the conversion of a
young man, and one said to him, “You may go to him, and talk to him, but you
will get him no further; for he is exceedingly well acquainted with the plan of
salvation”. It was eminently so; and therefore, when our friend began to speak
with the young man, he received for an answer, “I am much obliged to you, but I
do not know that you can tell me much, for I have long known and, admired the
plan of salvation by the substitutionary sacrifice of Christ”. Alas! he was
resting in the plan, but he had not believed in the Person. The plan of
salvation is most blessed, but it can avail us nothing unless we personally
believe in the Lord Jesus Christ Himself. What is the comfort of a plan of a
house if you do not enter the house itself? What is the good of a plan of
clothing if you have not a rag to cover you? Have you never heard of the Arab
chief at Cairo, who was very ill, and went to the missionary, and the missionary
said he could give him a prescription? He did so; and a week after he found the
Arab none the better. “Did you take my prescription?” he asked. “Yes, I ate
every morsel of the paper.”

He dreamed that he was going to be cured by devouring the physician’s writing,
which I may call the plan of the medicine. He should have had the prescription
made up, and then it might have wrought him good, if he had taken the draught:
it could do him no good to swallow the recipe. So is it with salvation: it is
not the plan of salvation which can save, it is the carrying out of that plan by
the Lord Jesus in His death on our behalf, and our acceptance of the same. Under
the Jewish law, the offerer brought a bullock, and laid his hands upon it: it
was no dream, or theory, or plan. In the victim for sacrifice he found something
substantial, which he could handle and touch: even so do we lean upon the real
and true work of Jesus, the most substantial thing under heaven. We come to the
Lord Jesus by faith, and say, “God has provided an atonement here, and I accept
it. I believe in the fact accomplished on the cross; I am confident that sin was
put away by Christ, and I rest on Him”. If you would be saved, you must get
beyond the acceptance of plans and doctrines to a resting in the divine person
and finished work of the Lord Jesus Christ. Dear reader, will you have Christ
now?

Jesus invites all those who labour and are heavy laden to come to Him, and He
will give them rest. He does not promise this to their merely dreaming about
Him. They must come; and they must come to Him, and not merely to the Church, to
baptism, or to the orthodox faith, or to anything short of His divine person.
When the brazen serpent was lifted up in the wilderness, the people were not to
look to Moses, nor to the Tabernacle, nor to the pillar of cloud, but to the
brazen serpent itself. Looking was not enough unless they looked to the right
object: and the right object was not enough unless they looked. It was not
enough for them to know about the serpent of brass; they must each one look to
it for himself. When a man is ill, he may have a good knowledge of medicine, and
yet he may die if he does not actually take the healing draught. We must receive
Jesus; for “to as many as received Him, to them gave He power to become the sons
of God”. Lay the emphasis on two words: We must receive Him, and we must Receive
him. We must open wide the door, and take Christ Jesus in; for “Christ in you”
is “the hope of glory”. Christ must be no myth, no dream, no phantom to us, but
a real man, and truly God; and our reception of Him must be no forced and
feigned acceptance, but the hearty and happy assent and consent of the soul that
He shall be the all in all of our salvation. Will we not at once come to Him,
and make Him our sole trust? The dove is hunted by the hawk, and finds no
security from its restless enemy. It has learned that there is shelter for it in
the cleft of the rock, and it hastens there with gladsome wing. Once wholly
sheltered within its refuge, it fears no bird of prey. But if it did not hide
itself in the rock, it would be seized upon by its adversary. The rock would be
of no use to the dove, if the dove did not enter its cleft. The whole body must
be hidden in the rock. What if ten thousand other birds found a fortress there,
yet that fact would not save the one dove which is now pursued by the hawk! It
must put its whole self into the shelter, and bury itself within its refuge, or
its life will be forfeited to the destroyer.

What a picture of faith is this! It is entering into Jesus, hiding in His
wounds.

“Rock of Ages, cleft for me, Let me hide myself in Thee.” The dove is out of
sight: the rock alone is seen. So does the guilty soul dart into the riven side
of Jesus by faith, and is buried in Him out of sight of avenging justice. But
there must be this personal application to Jesus for shelter; and this it is
that so many put off from day to day, till it is to be feared that they will
“die in their sins”. What an awful word is that! It is what our Lord said to the
unbelieving Jews; and He says the same to us at this hour: “If ye believe not
that I am He, ye shall die in your sins.” It makes one’s heart quiver to think
that even one who shall read these lines may yet be of the miserable company who
will thus perish. The Lord prevent it of His great grace!

I saw, the other day, a remarkable picture, which I shall use as an illustration
of the way of salvation by faith in Jesus. An offender had committed a crime for
which he must die, but it was in the olden time, when churches were considered
to be sanctuaries in which criminals might hide themselves, and so escape from
death. See the transgressor! He rushes towards the church, the guards pursue him
with their drawn swords, athirst for his blood! They follow him even to the
church door. He rushes up the steps, and just as they are about to overtake him,
and hew him in pieces on the threshold of the church, out comes the Bishop, and
holding up the cross, he cries, “Back, back! Stain not the precincts of God’s
house with blood! Stand back! “The fierce soldiers at once respect the emblem,
and retire, while the poor fugitive hides himself behind the robes of the
Bishop. It is even so with Christ. The guilty sinner flies straight away to
Jesus; and though Justice pursues him, Christ lifts up His wounded hands, and
cries to Justice, “Stand back! I shelter this sinner; in the secret place of my
tabernacle do I hide him; I will not suffer him to perish, for he puts his trust
in Me.”

Sinner, fly to Christ! But you answer, “I am too vile”. The viler you are, the
more will you honour Him by believing that He is able to protect even you. “But
I am so great a sinner.” Then the more honour shall be given to Him if you have
faith to confide in Him, great sinner though you are. If you have a little
sickness, and you tell your physician—“Sir, I am quite confident in your skill
to heal,” there is no great compliment in your declaration. Anybody can cure a
finger-ache, or a trifling sickness. But if you are sore sick with a
complication of diseases which grievously torment you, and you say—“Sir, I seek
no better physician; I will ask no other advice but yours; I trust myself
joyfully with you”, what an honour have you conferred on him, that you can trust
your life in his hands while it is in extreme and immediate danger! Do the like
with Christ; put your soul into His care: do it deliberately, and without a
doubt. Dare to quit all other hopes: venture all on Jesus; I say “venture”
though there is nothing really venturesome in it, for He is abundantly able to
save. Cast yourself simply on Jesus; let nothing but faith be in your soul
towards Jesus; believe Him, and trust in Him, and you shall never be made
ashamed of your confidence.

“He that believeth on Him shall not be confounded” (1 Peter 2:6).


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  CHAPTER 97: IV. CHAPTER FOUR: FAITH VERY SIMPLE
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Chapter Four — Faith Very Simple To many, faith seems a hard thing. The truth
is, it is only hard because it is easy. Naaman thought it hard that he should
have to wash in Jordan; but if it had been some great thing, he would have done
it right cheerfully. People think that salvation must be the result of some act
or feeling, very mysterious, and very difficult; but God’s thoughts are not our
thoughts, neither are His ways our ways. In order that the feeblest and the most
ignorant may be saved, He has made the way of salvation as easy as the A, B, C.
There is nothing about it to puzzle anyone; only, as everybody expects to be
puzzled by it, many are quite bewildered when they find it to be so exceedingly
simple. The fact is, we do not believe that God means what He is saying; we act
as if it could not be true. I have heard of a Sunday-school teacher who
performed an experiment which I do not think I shall ever try with children, for
it might turn out to be a very expensive one. Indeed, I feel sure that the
result in my case would be very different from what I now describe. This teacher
had been trying to illustrate what faith was, and, as he could not get it into
the minds of his boys, he took his watch, and he said, “Now, I will give you
this watch, John. Will you have it?” John fell thinking what the teacher could
ean, and did not seize the treasure, but made no answer. The teacher said to the
next boy, “Henry, here is the watch. Will you have it?” The boy, with a very
proper modesty, replied, “No, thank you, sir”. The teacher tried several of the
boys with the same result; till at last a youngster, who was not so wise or so
thoughtful as the others, but rather more believing, said in the most natural
way, “Thank you, sir,” and put the watch into his pocket “Then the other boys
woke up to a startling fact: their companion had received a watch which they had
refused. One of the boys quickly asked of the teacher, “Is he to keep it?”. “Of
course he is,” said the teacher, “I offered it to him, and he accepted it. I
would not give a thing and take a thing: that would be very foolish. I put the
watch before you, and said that I gave it to you, but none of you would have
it.” “Oh!” said the boy, “if I had known you meant it, I would have had it.” Of
course he would. He thought it was a piece of acting, and nothing more.

All the other boys were in a dreadful state of mind to think that they had lost
the watch. Each one cried, “Teacher, I did not know you meant it, but I
thought—”. No one took the gift; but every one thought. Each one had his theory,
except the simple-minded boy who believed what he was told, and got the watch.
Now I wish that I could always be such a simple child as literally to believe
what the Lord says, and take what He puts before me, resting quite content that
He is not playing with me, and that I cannot be wrong in accepting what He sets
before me in the gospel. Happy should we be if we would trust, and raise no
questions of any sort. But, alas! we will get thinking and doubting. When the
Lord uplifts His dear Son before a sinner, that sinner should take Him without
hesitation. If you take Him, you have Him; and none can take Him from you. Out
with your hand, man, and take Him at once! When enquirers accept the Bible as
literally true, and see that Jesus is really given to all who trust Him, all the
difficulty about understanding the way of salvation vanishes like the morning’s
frost at the rising of the sun.

Two enquiring ones came to me in my vestry. They had been hearing the gospel
from me for only a short season, but they had been deeply impressed by it. They
expressed their regret that they were about to remove far away, but they added
their gratitude that they had heard me at all. I was cheered by their kind
thanks, but felt anxious that a more effectual work should be wrought in them,
and therefore I asked them, “Have you in very deed believed in the Lord Jesus
Christ? Are you saved?” One of them replied, “I have been trying hard to
believe.” This statement I have often heard, but I will never let it go by me
unchallenged. “No,” I said, “that will not do. Did you ever tell your father
that you tried to believe him?”

After I had dwelt a while upon the matter, they admitted that such language
would have been an insult to their father. I then set the gospel very plainly
before them in as simple language as I could, and begged them to believe Jesus,
who is more worthy of faith than the best of fathers. One of them replied, “I
annot realize it: I cannot realize that I am saved.” Then I went on to say, “God
bears testimony to His Son, that whosoever trusts in His Son is saved. Will you
make him a liar now, or will you believe His Word?”

While I thus spoke, one of them started as if astonished, and she startled us
all as she cried, “O sir, I see it all; I am saved! Oh, do bless Jesus for me;
He has shown me the way, and He has saved me! I see it all.” The esteemed sister
who had brought these young friends to me knelt down with them while, with all
our hearts, we blessed and magnified the Lord for a soul brought into light. One
of the two sisters, however, could not see the gospel as the other had done,
though I feel sure she will do so before long. Did it not seem strange that,
both hearing the same words, one should come out into clear light, and the other
should remain in the gloom? The change which comes over the heart when the
understanding grasps the gospel is often reflected in the face, and shines there
like the light of heaven. Such newly enlightened souls often exclaim, “Why, sir,
it is so plain; how is it I have not seen it before this? I understand all I
have read in the Bible now, though I could not make it out before. It has all
come in a minute, and now I see what I could never understand before.” The fact
is, the truth was always plain, but they were looking for signs and wonders, and
therefore did not see what was nigh them. Old men often look for their
spectacles when they are on their foreheads; and it is commonly observed that we
fail to see that which is straight before us. Christ Jesus is before our faces,
and we have only to look to Him, and live; but we make all manner of
bewilderment of it, and so manufacture a maze out of that which is plain as a
pikestaff. The little incident about the two sisters reminds me of another. A
much-esteemed friend came to me one Sabbath morning after service, to shake
hands with me, “for,” said she, “I was fifty years old on the same day as
yourself. I am like you in that one thing, sir; but I am the very reverse of you
in better things.” I remarked, “Then you must be a very good woman; for in many
things I wish I also could be the reverse of what I am.” “No, no,” she said, “I
did not mean anything of that sort: I am not right at all.” “What!” I cried,
“are you not a believer in the Lord Jesus?” “Well,” she said, with much emotion,
“I, I will try to be.” I laid hold of her hand, and said, “My dear soul, you are
not going to tell me that you will try to believe my Lord Jesus! I cannot have
such talk from you. It means blank unbelief. What has HE done that you should
talk of Him in that way? Would you tell me that you would try to believe me? I
know you would not treat me so rudely. You think me a true man, and so you
believe me at once; and surely you cannot do less with my Lord Jesus.” Then with
tears she exclaimed, “Oh, sir, do pray for me! “ To this I replied, “I do not
feel that I can do anything of the kind. What can I ask the Lord Jesus to do for
one who will not trust Him? I see nothing to pray about. If you will believe
Him, you shall be saved; and if you will not believe Him, I cannot ask Him to
invent a new way to gratify your unbelief.”

Then she said again, “I will try to believe”; but I told her solemnly I would
have none of her trying; for the message from the Lord did not mention “trying”,
but said, “Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved”. I pressed
upon her the great truth, that “He that believeth on Him hath everlasting life”;
and its terrible reverse—“He that believeth not is condemned already, because he
hath not believed in the name of the only-begotten Son of God.” I urged her to
full faith in the once crucified but now ascended Lord, and the Holy Spirit
there and then enabled her to trust. She most tenderly said, “Oh, sir, I have
been looking to my feelings, and this has been my mistake! Now I trust my soul
with Jesus, and I am saved.” She found immediate peace through believing. There
is no other way.

God has been pleased to make the necessities of life very simple matters. We
must eat; and even a blind man can find the way to his mouth. We must drink; and
even the tiniest babe knows how to do this without instruction. We have a
fountain in the grounds of the Stockwell Orphanage, and when it is running in
the hot weather, the boys go to it naturally. We have no class for
fountain-drill. Many poor boys have come to the Orphanage, but never one who was
so ignorant that he did not know how to drink. Now faith is, in spiritual
things, what eating and drinking are in temporal things. By the mouth of faith
we take the blessings of grace into our spiritual nature, and they are ours. O
you who would believe, but think you cannot, do you not see that, as one can
drink without strength, and as one can eat without strength, and gets strength
by eating, so we may receive Jesus without effort, and by accepting Him we
receive power for all such further effort as we may be called to put forth?

Faith is so simple a matter that, whenever I try to explain it, I am very
fearful lest I should becloud its simplicity. When Thomas Scott had printed his
notes upon “The Pilgrim’s Progress”, he asked one of his parishioners whether
she understood the book. “Oh yes, sir,” said she, “I understand Mr. Bunyan well
enough, and I am hoping that one day, by divine grace, I may understand your
explanations.” Should I not feel mortified if my reader should know what faith
is, and then get confused by my explanation? I will, however, make one trial,
and pray the Lord to make it clear.

I am told that on a certain highland road there was a disputed right of way. The
owner wished to preserve his supremacy, and at the same time he did not wish to
inconvenience the public: hence an arrangement which occasioned the following
incident. Seeing a sweet country girl standing at the gate, a tourist went up to
her, and offered her a shilling to permit him to pass. “No, no,” said the child,
“I must not take anything from you; but you are to say, ‘Please allow me to
pass,’ and then you may come through and welcome.” The permission was to be
asked for; but it could be had for the asking. Just so, eternal life is free;
and it can be had, yea, it shall be at once had, by trusting in the Word of Him
who cannot lie. Trust Christ, and by that trust you grasp salvation and eternal
life. Do not philosophize. Do not sit down, and bother your poor brain. Just
believe Jesus as you would believe your father. Trust Him as you trust your
money with a banker, or your health with a doctor.

Faith will not long seem a difficulty to you; nor ought it to be so, for it is
simple. Faith is trusting, trusting wholly upon the person, work, merit, and
power of the Son of God. Some think this trusting is a romantic business, but
indeed it is the simplest thing that can possibly be. To some of us, truths
which were once hard to believe are now matters of fact which we should find it
hard to doubt. If one of our great grandfathers were to rise from the dead, and
come into the present state of things, what a deal of trusting he would have to
do! He would say tomorrow morning, “Where are the flint and steel? I want a
light”; and we should give him a little box with tiny pieces of wood in it, and
tell him to strike one of them on the box. He would have to trust a good deal
before he would believe that fire would thus be produced. We should next say to
him, “Now that you have a light, turn that tap, and light the gas.” He sees
nothing. How can light come through an invisible vapour? And yet it does. “Come
with us, grandfather. Sit in that chair. Look at that box in front of you. You
shall have your likeness directly.” “No, child,” he would say, “it is
ridiculous. The sun take my portrait? I cannot believe it.” “Yes, and you shall
ride fifty miles in an hour without horses.” He will not believe it till we get
him into the train.

“My dear sir, you shall speak to your son in New York, and he shall answer you
in a few minutes.” Should we not astonish the old gentleman? Would he not want
all his faith? Yet these things are believed by us without effort, because
experience has made us familiar with them. Faith is greatly needed by you who
are strangers to spiritual things; you seem lost while we are talking about
them. But oh, how simple it is to us who have the new life, and have communion
with spiritual realities! We have a Father to whom we speak, and He hears us,
and a blessed Saviour who hears our heart’s longings, and helps us in our
struggles against sin. It is all plain to him that understandeth. May it now be
plain to you!


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  CHAPTER 98: V. CHAPTER FIVE: FEARING TO BELIEVE
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Chapter Five — Fearing to Believe

It is an odd product of our unhealthy nature—the fear to believe. Yet have I met
with it often: so often that I wish I may never see it again. It looks like
humility, and tries to pass itself off as the very soul of modesty, and yet it
is an infamously proud thing: in fact, it is presumption playing the hypocrite.
If men were afraid to disbelieve, there would be good sense in the fear; but to
be afraid to trust their God is at best an absurdity, and in very deed it is a
deceitful way of refusing to the Lord the honour that is due to His faithfulness
and truth.

How unprofitable is the diligence which busies itself in finding out reasons why
faith in our case should not be saving! We have God’s word for it, that
whosoever believeth in Jesus shall not perish, and we search for arguments why
we should perish if we did believe. If any one gave me an estate, I certainly
should not commence raising questions as to the title. What can be the use of
inventing reasons why I should not hold my own house, or possess any other piece
of property which is enjoyed by me? If the Lord is satisfied to save me through
the merits of His dear Son, assuredly I may be satisfied to be so saved. If I
take God at His word, the responsibility of fulfilling His promise does not lie
with me, but with God, who made the promise. But you fear that you may not be
one of those for whom the promise is intended. Do not be alarmed by that idle
suspicion. No soul ever came to Jesus wrongly. No one can come at all unless the
Father draw him; and Jesus has said, “Him that cometh to me I will in no wise
cast out.” No soul ever lays hold on Christ in a way of robbery; he that hath
Him hath Him of right divine; for the Lord’s giving of Himself for us, and to
us, is so free, that every soul that takes Him has a grace-given right to do so.
If you lay hold on Jesus by the hem of His garment, without leave, and behind
Him, yet virtue will flow from Him to you as surely as if He had called you out
by name, and bidden you trust Him. Dismiss all fear when you trust the Saviour.
Take Him and welcome, He that believeth in Jesus is one of God’s elect. Did you
suggest that it would be a horrible thing if you were to trust in Jesus and yet
perish? It would be so. But as you must perish if you do not trust, the risk at
the worst is not very great.

“I can but perish if I go;

I am resolved to try; For if I stay away, I know I must for ever die.”

Suppose you stand in the Slough of Despond forever; what will be the good of
that? Surely it would be better to die struggling along the King’s highway
towards the Celestial City, than sinking deeper and deeper in the mire and filth
of dark distrustful thoughts! You have nothing to lose, for you have lost
everything already; therefore make a dash for it, and dare to believe in the
mercy of God to you, even to you. But one moans, “What if I come to Christ, and
He refuses me?” My answer is, “Try Him.” Cast yourself on the Lord Jesus, and
see if He refuses you. You will be the first against whom He has shut the door
of hope. Friend, don’t cross that bridge till you come to it! When Jesus casts
you out, it will be time enough to despair; but that time will never come. “This
man receiveth sinners”: He has not so much as begun to cast them out. Have you
never heard of the man who lost his way one night, and came to the edge of a
precipice, as he thought. and in his own apprehension fell over the cliff? He
clutched at an old tree, and there hung, clinging to his frail support with all
his might. He felt persuaded that, should he quit his hold, he would be dashed
in pieces on some awful rocks that waited for him down below. There he hung,
with the sweat upon his brow, and anguish in every limb.

He passed into a desperate state of fever and faintness, and at last his hands
could hold up his body no longer. He relaxed his grasp! He dropped from his
support! He fell—about a foot or so, and was received upon a soft mossy bank,
whereon he lay, altogether unhurt, and perfectly safe till morning. Thus, in the
darkness of their ignorance, many think that sure destruction awaits them, if
they confess their sin, quit all hope in self, and resign themselves into the
hands of God. They are afraid to quit the hope to which they ignorantly cling.
It is an idle fear. Give up your hold upon everything but Christ, and drop. Drop
from all trust in your works, or prayers, or feelings. Drop at once! Drop now!
Soft and safe shall be the bank that receives you. Jesus Christ, in His love, in
the efficacy of His precious blood, in His perfect righteousness, will give you
immediate rest and peace. Cease from self-confidence.

Fall into the arms of Jesus. This is the major part of faith—giving up every
other hold, and simply falling upon Christ. There is no reason for fear: only
ignorance causes your dread of that which will be your eternal safety. The death
of carnal hope is the life of faith, and the life of faith is life everlasting.
Let self die, that Christ may live in you. But the mischief is that, to the one
act of faith in Jesus, we cannot bring men. They will adopt any expedient sooner
than have done with self. They fight shy of believing, and fear faith as if it
were a monster. O foolish tremblers, who has bewitched you? You fear that which
would be the death of all your fear, and the beginning of your joy. Why will you
perish through perversely preferring other ways to God’s own appointed plan of
salvation?

Alas! there are many, many souls that say, “We are bidden to trust in Jesus, but
instead of that we will attend the means of grace regularly.” Attend public
worship by all means, but not as a substitute for faith, or it will become a
vain confidence. The command is, “Believe and live”; attend to that, whatever
else you do. “Well, I shall take to reading good books; perhaps I shall get good
that way.” Read the good books by all means, but that is not the gospel: the
gospel is, “Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved.” Suppose
a physician has a patient under his care, and he says to him, “You are to take a
bath in the morning; it will be of very great service to your disease.” But the
man takes a cup of tea in the morning instead of the bath, and he says, “That
will do as well, I have no doubt.” What does his physician say when he
enquires—“Did you follow my rule?” “No, I did not.” “Then you do not expect, of
course, that there will be any good result from my visits, since you take no
notice of my directions.” So we, practically, say to Jesus Christ, when we are
under searching of soul, “Lord, Thou badest me trust Thee, but I would sooner do
something else! Lord, I want to have horrible convictions; I want to be shaken
over hell’s mouth; I want to be alarmed and istressed!” Yes, you want anything
but what Christ prescribes for you, which is that you should simply trust Him.

Whether you feel or do not feel, cast yourself on Him, that He may save you, and
He alone. “But you do not mean to say that you speak against praying, and
reading good books, and so on?” Not one single word do I speak against any of
those things, any more than, if I were the physician I quoted, I should speak
against the man’s drinking a cup of tea. Let him drink his tea; but not if he
drinks it instead of taking the bath which is prescribed for him. So let the man
pray: the more the better. Let the man search the Scriptures; but, remember,
that if these things are put in the place of simple faith in Christ, the soul
will be ruined. Beware lest it be said of any of you by our Lord, “Ye search the
Scriptures, for in them ye think ye have eternal life; but ye will not come unto
Me that ye might have life.”

Come by faith to Jesus, for without Him you perish forever. Did you ever notice
how a fir-tree will get a hold among rocks which seem to afford it no soil? It
sends a rootlet into any little crack which opens; it clutches even the bare
rock as with a huge bird’s claw; it holds fast, and binds itself to earth with a
hundred anchorages. We have often seen trees thus firmly rooted upon detached
masses of bare rock. Now, dear heart, let this be a picture of yourself. Grip
the Rock of Ages. With the rootlet of little-faith hold to Him. Let that tiny
feeler grow; and, meanwhile, send out another to take a new grasp of the same
Rock. Lay hold on Jesus, and keep hold on Jesus. Grow up into Him. Twist the
roots of your nature, the fibres of your heart, about Him. He is as free to you
as the rocks are to the fir-tree: be you as firmly lashed to Him as the pine is
to the mountain’s side.


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  CHAPTER 99: VI. CHAPTER SIX: DIFFICULTY IN THE WAY OF BELIEVING
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VI. Chapter Six — Difficulty in the Way of Believing

It may be that the reader feels a difficulty in believing. Let him consider. We
cannot believe by an immediate act. The state of mind which we describe as
believing is a result, following upon certain former states of mind. We come to
faith by degrees. There may be such a thing as faith at first sight; but usually
we reach faith by stages: we become interested, we consider, we hear evidence,
we are convinced, and so led to believe. If, then, I wish to believe, but for
some reason or other find that I cannot attain to faith, what shall I do? Shall
I stand like a cow staring at a new gate; or shall I, like an intelligent being,
use the proper means? If I wish to believe anything, what shall I do? We will
answer according to the rules of common sense.

If I were told that the Sultan of Zanzibar was a good man, and it happened to be
a matter of interest to me, I do not suppose I should feel any difficulty in
believing it. But if for some reason I had a doubt about it, and yet wished to
believe the news, how should I act? Should I not hunt up all the information
within my reach about his Majesty, and try, by study of the newspapers and other
documents, to arrive at the truth? Better still, if he happened to be in this
country, and would see me, and I could also converse with members of his court,
and citizens of his country, I should be greatly helped to arrive at a decision
by using these sources of information. Evidence weighed and knowledge obtained
lead up to faith. It is true that faith in Jesus is the gift of God: but yet He
usually bestows it in accordance with the laws of mind, and hence we are told
that “faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the Word of God”. If you want to
believe in Jesus, hear about Him, read about Him, think about Him, know about
Him, and so you will find faith springing up in your heart, like the wheat which
comes up through the moisture and the heat operating upon the seed which has
been sown. If I wished to have faith in a certain physician, I should ask for
testimonials of his cures, I should wish to see the diplomas which certified to
his professional knowledge, and I should also like to hear what he has to say
upon certain complicated cases. In fact, I should take means to know, in order
that I might believe. Be much in hearing concerning Jesus. Souls by hundreds
come to faith in Jesus under a ministry which sets Him forth clearly and
constantly. Few remain unbelieving under a preacher whose great subject is
Christ crucified. Hear no minister of any other sort. There are such. I have
heard of one who found in his pulpit Bible a paper bearing this text, “Sir, we
would see Jesus”. Go to the place of worship to see Jesus; and if you cannot
even hear the mention of His name, take yourself off to another place where He
is more thought of, and is therefore more likely to be present.Be much in
reading about the Lord Jesus. The books of Scripture are the lilies among which
He feedeth. The Bible is the window through which we may look and see our Lord.
Read over the story of His sufferings and death with devout attention, and
before long the Lord will cause faith secretly to enter your soul. The Cross of
Christ not only rewards faith, but begets faith.

Many a believer can say—

“When I view Thee, wounded, grieving, Breathless, on the cursed tree, Soon I
feel my heart believing Thou has suffered thus for me.”

If hearing and reading suffice not, then deliberately set your mind to work to
overhaul the matter, and have it out. Either believe, or know the reason why you
do not believe. See the matter through to the utmost of your ability, and pray
God to help you to make a thorough investigation, and to come to an honest
decision one way or the other. Consider who Jesus was, and whether the
constitution of His Person does not entitle Him to confidence. Consider what He
did, and whether this also must not be good ground for trust.

Consider Him as dying, rising from the dead, ascending, and ever living to
intercede for transgressors; and see whether this does not entitle Him to be
relied on by you. Then cry to Him, and see if He does not hear you. When Usher
wished to know whether Rutherford was indeed as holy a man as he was said to be,
he went to his house as a beggar, and gained a lodging, and heard the man of God
pouring out his heart before the Lord in the night. If you would know Jesus, get
as near to Him as you can by studying His character, and appealing to His love.
At one time I might have needed evidence to make me believe in the Lord Jesus;
but now I know Him so well, by proving Him, that I should need a very great deal
of evidence to make me doubt Him.

It is now more natural to me to trust than to disbelieve: this is the new nature
triumphing; it was not so at the first. The novelty of faith is, in the
beginning, a source of weakness; but act after act of trusting turns faith into
a habit. Experience brings to faith strong confirmation.

I am not perplexed with doubt, because the truth which I believe has wrought a
miracle on me. By its means I have received and still retain a new life, to
which I was once a stranger: and this is confirmation of the strongest sort. I
am like the good man and his wife who had kept a lighthouse for years. A
visitor, who came to see the lighthouse, looking out from the window over the
waste of waters, asked the good woman, “Are you not afraid at night, when the
storm is out, and the big waves dash right over the lantern? Do you not fear
that the lighthouse, and all that is in it, will be carried away? I am sure I
should be afraid to trust myself in a slender tower in the midst of the great
billows.” The woman remarked that the idea never occurred to her now. She had
lived there so long that she felt as safe on the lone rock as ever she did when
she lived on the mainland. As for her husband, when asked if he did not feel
anxious when the wind blew a hurricane, he answered, “Yes, I feel anxious to
keep the lamps well trimmed, and the light burning, lest any vessel should be
wrecked.” As to anxiety about the safety of the lighthouse, or his own personal
security in it, he had outlived all that. Even so it is with the full-grown
believer. He can humbly say, “I know whom I have believed, and am persuaded that
He is able to keep that which I have committed unto Him against that day.” From
henceforth let no man trouble me with doubts and questionings; I bear in my soul
the proofs of the Spirit’s truth and power, and I will have none of your artful
reasonings. The gospel to me is truth: I am content to perish if it be not true.
I risk my soul’s eternal fate upon the truth of the gospel, and I know that
there is no risk in it. My one concern is to keep the lights burning, that I may
thereby benefit others. Only let the Lord give me oil enough to feed my lamp, so
that I may cast a ray across the dark and treacherous sea of life, and I am well
content.

Now, troubled seeker, if it be so, that your minister, and many others in whom
you confide, have found perfect peace and rest in the gospel, why should not
you? Is the Spirit of the Lord straitened? Do not His words do good to them that
walk uprightly? Will not you also try their saving virtue? Most true is the
gospel, for God is its Author. Believe it. Most able is the Saviour, for He is
the Son of God. Trust Him. Most powerful is His precious blood. Look to it for
pardon. Most loving is His gracious heart. Run to it at once.

Thus would I urge the reader to seek faith; but if he be unwilling, what more
can I do? I have brought the horse to the water, but I cannot make him drink.
This, however, be it remembered—unbelief is wilful when evidence is put in a
man’s way, and he refuses carefully to examine it. He that does not desire to
know, and accept the truth, has himself to thank if he dies with a lie in his
right hand. It is true that “he that believeth and is baptized shall be saved”:
it is equally true that “he that believeth not shall be damned”.


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Source: https://sermonindex.net/books/works-of-charles-spurgeon-volume-1/
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