WHEN Christian and Hopeful left the Delectable Mountains to pursue their way towards the Celestial City the shepherds bade them ‘Beware of the Flatterer.’ They learned afterwards, by sad experience, the folly of neglecting this advice, for thus the story runs:—

They went then till they came at a place where they saw a way put itself into their way, and seemed withal to lie as straight as the way which they should go: and here they knew not which of the two to take, for both seemed straight before them; therefore, here they stood still to consider. And as they were thinking about the way, behold, a man, black of flesh, but covered with a very light robe, came to them, and asked them why they stood there. They answered, they were going to the Celestial City, but knew not which of these ways to take.

‘Follow me,’ said the man, ‘it is thither that I am going.’

So they followed him in the way that but now came into the road, which by degrees turned, and turned them so from the city that they desired to go to, that, in little time, their faces were turned away from it; yet they followed him. But by-and-by, before they were aware, he led them both within the compass of a net, in which they were both so entangled, that they knew not what to do; and with that the white robe fell off the black man’s back. Then they saw where they were. Wherefore they lay crying some time, for they could not get themselves out.

Then said Christian to his fellow, ‘Now do I see myself in an error. Did not the shepherds bid us beware of the Flatterer? As in the saying of the wise man, so we have found it this day, “A man that flattereth his neighbour spreadeth a net for his feet”’ (Prov. 29:5).

Hope. ‘They also gave us a note of directions about the way, for our more sure finding thereof; but therein we have also forgotten to read, and have not kept ourselves from the paths of the destroyer. Here David was wiser than we; for, saith he, concerning the works of men, “By the word of thy lips I have kept me from the paths of the destroyer”’ (Psa. 17:4). Thus they lay bewailing themselves in the net.

This is not a picture of a temptation to turn aside altogether from the good way. The path of the destroyer appeared to run parallel to that in which they ought to have kept. Nor did they go blundering on, but consulting with one another. Therein they were mistaken, for they should have consulted their Book of instructions. Then they were misled by a gentleman of pleasing appearance, who looked like a servant of the King of kings, and who spoke softly to them, assuring them that, as he himself was bound for the Celestial City, he could lead them thither. His winning accents caused them to yield themselves to his guidance; and, by-and-by, their faces were turned directly away from the city towards which aforetime they had been pressing. You see, it is not a case of the deliberate choice of sin; but rather of being deluded through neglect of the word of God, which is the true guide of the pilgrim.

There are flatterers of this kind in our own hearts. It has often happened, in our experience, that we have been living in simple dependence upon the Lord Jesus  Christ, which is the straight and narrow way which leadeth unto life eternal, and, by-and-by, we have, perhaps, read the experience of some great man, and we think, ‘Well, it must be right to feel as he felt, to doubt as he doubted, to be tempest-tossed as he was.’ There is another road, and we begin to think that it is well to live by feeling. The flatterer does not tell us, in so many words, to give up faith in Christ alone. We should recognize him, and be shocked if he did that: but he insinuates that we may walk a little by our holy feelings. We are not now such infants as we used to be; we have grown in grace somewhat; we may now rely a little upon the past; there is not the same need to be daily hanging upon Christ; why not rest on what was enjoyed at conversion, and make up, if necessary, with some present frames and feelings, present power in prayer, or present usefulness in the Lord’s work?

Mr Flatterer knows well that, when we are most sanctified, there is enough cause to weep over every day in our life. He knows that those who most resemble Jesus are very, very far from being quite like him. There is much more cause to deplore our sinnership, than to admire our saintship. As we have received Christ Jesus the Lord, so must we walk in him. Still we rely upon his merits alone. If you begin to walk by yourself even a little way, you will soon find that path leading you, insensibly, into such legality that you try, if not actually to save yourself, yet to keep yourself saved through the works of the law. In a very little time, the believer who does this will fall into the net. He will find the pangs of hell, as it were, get hold upon him; he will find trouble and sorrow. When a bird is caught in a net, it attempts to get out this way and that way. It may break its wings, but it cannot escape; it rather entangles itself more completely. So the soul, that has forsaken simple faith, to live upon its own works, and feelings, and experiences, will try in vain to get relief. It is in legal bondage. The Ten Commandments suffice to make a heavy net when they twist around the sinner who has broken them. Apart from the blood of Jesus Christ, who can hope to escape from an awakened conscience? Thus is the Christian caught in a net when the Flatterer, who lives in his soul, tempts him to self-righteousness and to forsake the Lord. Luther used to say, ‘You need fear a black devil half so much as a white one.’ The white devil of self-righteousness is more dangerous to the Christian than even the black devil of open sin. When open sin tempts us, we know it to be sin, and we are helped to forsake it. But oftentimes, the white devil seems to be an angel of light; and, under the garb of striving after sanctification, or aiming at perfection, we are tempted to leave our child-like confidence in the Lord. This way lies the net!

There are so many other nets that I should not care to have to count them. You young converts may meet with a person who will say to you, ‘I hear you are converted; I am glad of that, but where do you attend?’ ‘Oh, So-and-so!’ ‘Ah! you should not go there; it is very well for some things, but there are higher truths that you will never learn there; you should come with us, and hear how we can explain the prophecies to you’; and so, under the guise of desiring you to listen to prophetic truth, they will lead you into some new form of error.

Others will seek to win you to admire with them the splendours of outward forms and ceremonies. How many unwary ones have been thus allured to Ritualism and Romanism! Certain others will say, ‘Oh, you should not have a minister!’ They cry down the Lord’s shepherds who are found on the Delectable Mountains, and urge you to go where everybody teaches everybody. They are the people of God; they are not a sect, though ten thousand times more bigoted than any sect that ever existed. Beware, I pray you, of any form of doctrine or practice which would lead you from the place where you were born to God, where you have been nurtured in Christ, where you have been made useful, and helped forward in the divine life. There are certain sects that only live by stealing members from other churches, whereas the aim of a Christian church should be to win souls direct from the world. These flatterers, for they are generally such, will tell you that you are too experienced to sit under the ordinary ministry; you are much too useful, or too spiritual, to remain in such a congregation. If you hearken unto them, you will soon find  that leanness has come into your soul, and that you are entangled in the net, for you have been drawn away from the truth as it is in Jesus by some creed of man’s devising.

I would warn our young members especially against that form of faith which holds only half the Bible; against those who proclaim the divine election, but ignore human responsibility, and who preach up high doctrine, but have little or nothing to say about Christian practice. I am persuaded that this is another net of the Flatterer, and many have I seen taken in it. They have ceased from all care about the souls of others, have become indifferent as to whether children were perishing or being saved, have settled on their lees, to eat the fat, and drink the sweet, and have come to think that this was all for which they were redeemed. Their compassions have failed; they have had no weeping eyes over perishing sinners; in fact, they have thought it a sign of being unsound to care about saving sinners at all. May God keep you from being flattered into this net, lest you become pierced through with many sorrows! To the Bible only you must look. Test every new idea with this touchstone: ‘To the law and to the testimony.’ Require a ‘Thus saith the Lord’ from every flattering notion. The old Book is our infallible guide.

Now let us read the passage in which Bunyan describes the pilgrims’ release from the net.

At last they espied a Shining One coming towards them, with a whip of small cord in his hand. When he was come to the place where they were, he asked them whence they came, and what they did there.

They told him that they were poor pilgrims going to Zion, but were led out of their way by a black man, clothed in white, ‘who bid us,’ said they, ‘follow him, for he was going thither too.’ Then said he with the whip, ‘It is Flatterer, a false apostle, that hath transformed himself into an angel of light’ (Prov. 29:5; Dan. 11:32; 2 Cor. 11:14, 15).

So he rent the net, and let the men out.

Then said he to them, ‘Follow me, that I may set you in your way again.’

So he led them back to the way which they had left to follow the Flatterer.

Then he asked them, saying, ‘Where did you lie last night?’

They said, ‘With the Shepherds, upon the Delectable Mountains.’

He asked them then, if they had not of those Shepherds a note of direction for the way.

They answered, ‘Yes.’ ‘But did you,’ said he, ‘when you were at a stand, pluck out and read your note?’

They answered, ‘No.’

He asked them, ‘Why?’

They said they forgot.

He asked, moreover, if the Shepherds did not bid them beware of the Flatterer.

They answered, ‘Yes; but we did not imagine,’ said they, ‘that this finespoken man had been he’ (Rom. 16:18).

Then I saw in my dream, that he commanded them to lie down; which, when they did, he chastised them sore, to teach them the good way wherein they should walk (Deut. 25:2);

and as he chastised them, he said, ‘As many as I love, I rebuke and chasten: be zealous, therefore, and repent’ (Rev. 3:19; 2 Chron. 6:26, 27).

This done, he bid them go on their way, and take good heed to the other directions of the Shepherds.

So they thanked him for all his kindness, and went softly along the right way, singing,—

‘Come hither, you that walk along the way;

See how the pilgrims fare that go astray?

They catched are in an entangling net,

’Cause they good counsel lightly did forget:

’Tis true, they rescued were,

but yet you see

They’re scourged to boot.

Let this your caution be.’

When a Christian gets into the net of self-righteousness, he is sure to be delivered because he belongs to the Lord, who will not suffer him to be destroyed. But the Shining One, who comes to deliver him out of the net, will certainly bring a scourge of small cords with him, and will chasten him, again and again, till he is willing to walk humbly with his God. Alas! how soon we get high looks and a proud bearing! We dream that we need not come crouching at the Cross-foot, as other sinners do. I heard one say that he had not prayed for forgiveness of sin for twelve months; he had had his sins forgiven years ago. But when the Lord gives us a good dose of bitters, and makes us drink of the  waters of Marah, we ask to be washed as Peter did when he changed his mind, and said, ‘Lord, not my feet only, but also my hands and my head.’ Then we feel the need of daily application of the precious blood, and we are willing to stand with the poor publican, and say, ‘God be merciful to me a sinner.’ We must be chastened to keep us low. A good old countryman, now in heaven, said to me, as I was walking with him in the field where he was ploughing, many years ago, ‘Ah, Master Spurgeon! if I get one inch above the ground, I get that inch too high, and have to come down again.’ So shall we. We must cling to the faith that owns that Christ is our All-in-all. If the Flatterer leads us astray, woe will be unto us. So will it be, I believe, with Christian men and women who, having received a blessing in any church, are induced to turn aside from it. ‘As a bird that wandereth from her nest, so is a man that wandereth from his place.’ Many such have been well chastened, and have had to come back to their old church again, and have rejoiced once more to sit with the Lord’s people with whom they had happy fellowship in days gone by.

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Peace on earth, and mercy mild; God and sinners reconciled.

O ye sinners, who tremble at the thought of the divine wrath, as well you may, lift up your heads with joyful hope of pardon and favour, for God must be full of grace and mercy to that race which he so distinguishes above all others by taking it into union with himself! Be of good cheer, O men of women born, and expect untold blessings, for ‘unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given.’ If you look at rivers, you can often tell, by their colour, whence they have come, and the soil over which they have flowed; those which flow from melting glaciers can be recognized at once. There is a text, concerning a heavenly river, which you will understand if you look at it in this light. John, in the Revelation, says concerning the angel, ‘He shewed me a pure river of water of life, clear as crystal, proceeding out of the throne of God and of the Lamb.’ Where the throne is jointly occupied by God and the appointed mediator, the incarnate God, the once-bleeding Lamb, then the river that flows from it must be a river, not of the molten lava of devouring wrath, but of the water of life.

The consequences of Christ’s incarnation must be pleasant, profitable, saving, and ennobling to the sons of men. They include, among many other blessings, a pledge of our deliverance. We are a fallen race, we are sunken in the mire, we are sold under sin, in bondage and in slavery to Satan; but if God comes to our race, and espouses our nature, why, then, it must be because he has resolved to retrieve our fall. It cannot be possible for the gates of hell to enclose those who have God with them. Slaves under sin, and bondsmen beneath the law, hearken to the trump of jubilee, for one has come among you, born of a woman, made under the law, who is also ‘the mighty God,’ pledged to set you free.

He is a Saviour, and a great one; he is able to save, for he is almighty; and he is pledged to do it, for he has entered the lists on our behalf, and put on the harness for the battle. The champion of his people is one who will not fail, nor be discouraged; the victory over all their foes shall be fully won. Jesus coming down from heaven is the pledge that he will take his people up to heaven; his taking our nature is the seal of our being lifted up to stand before his throne.

Were it an angel who had interposed on our behalf, we might have some fears as to the result of the conflict. Were it a mere man who had espoused our cause, we might go beyond fear, and sit down in despair; but as God has actually taken manhood into union with himself, let us ‘ring the bells of heaven,’ and be full of glad thanksgiving. There must be brighter and happier days in store for us, there must be salvation for man, there must be glory to God, now that we have ‘God with us.’ Let us bask in the beams of the Sun of righteousness, who now has risen upon us, a Light to lighten the Gentiles, and to be the glory of his people Israel.

Good Tidings of Great Joy, 38 meditations from Charles Spurgeon on the incarnation of the Lord Jesus Christ, is now available from the Banner of Truth (Clothbound, 176 pages, RP: £10.50).

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DELIVERED ON SABBATH MORNING, APRIL 22, 1855, BY THE

REV. C. H. SPURGEON,

AT EXETER HALL, STRAND.

‘The carnal mind is enmity against God.’—Rom. 8:7

THIS is a very solemn indictment which the apostle Paul here prefers against the carnal mind. He declares it to be enmity against God. When we consider what man once was, only second to the angels, the companion of God, who walked with him in the garden of Eden in the cool of the day; when we think of him as being made in the very image of his Creator, pure, spotless, and unblemished, we cannot but feel bitterly grieved to find such an accusation as this preferred against us as a race. We may well hang our harps upon the willows while we listen to the voice of Jehovah, solemnly speaking to his rebellious creature. ‘How art thou fallen from heaven, thou son of the morning!’ ‘Thou sealest up the sum, full of wisdom, and perfect in beauty. Thou hast been in Eden the garden of God; every precious stone was thy covering—the workmanship of thy tabrets and of thy pipes was prepared in thee in the day that thou wast created. Thou art the anointed cherub that covereth; and I have set thee so: thou wast upon the holy mountain of God; thou hast walked up and down in the midst of the stones of fire. Thou wast perfect in thy ways from the day that thou wast created, till iniquity was found in thee, and thou hast sinned; therefore I will cast thee as profane out of the mountain of God: and I will destroy thee, O covering cherub, from the midst of the stones of fire.’

There is much to sadden us in a view of the ruins of our race. As the Carthaginian who might tread the desolate site of his much-loved city, would shed many tears when he saw it laid in heaps by the Romans; or as the Jew, wandering through the deserted streets of Jerusalem, would lament that the ploughshare had marred the beauty and the glory of that city which was the joy of the whole earth; so ought we to mourn for ourselves and our race, when we behold the ruins of that goodly structure which God had piled, that creature, matchless in symmetry, second only to angelic intellect, that mighty being, man,—when we behold how he is ‘fallen, fallen, fallen, from his high estate’, and lies in a mass of destruction. A few years ago a star was seen blazing out with considerable brilliance, but soon disappeared; it has since been affirmed that it was a world on fire, thousands of millions of miles from us, and yet the rays of the conflagration reached us; the noiseless messenger of light gave to the distant dwellers on this globe the alarm of ‘A world on fire!’ But what is the conflagration of a distant planet, what is the destruction of the mere material of the most ponderous orb, compared with this fall of humanity, this wreck of all that is holy and sacred in ourselves? To us, indeed, the things are scarcely comparable, since we are deeply interested in one, though not in the other. The fall of Adam was our fall; we fell in and with him; we were equal sufferers; it is the ruin of our own house that we lament, it is the destruction of our own city that we bemoan, when we stand and see written in lines too plain for us to mistake their meaning, ‘The carnal mind’—that very self-same mind which was once holiness, and has now become carnal—‘is enmity against God.’ May God help me this morning, solemnly to prefer this indictment against you all! Oh! that the Holy Spirit may so convince us of sin, that we may unanimously plead ‘guilty’ before God.

There is no difficulty in understanding my text: it needs scarcely any explanation. We all know that the word ‘carnal’ here signifies fleshly. The old translators rendered the passage thus: ‘The mind of the flesh is enmity against God’,—that is to say, the natural mind, that soul which we inherit from our fathers, that which was born within us when our bodies were fashioned by God. The fleshly mind, the phronema sarkos, the lusts, the passions of the soul; it is this which has gone astray from God and become enmity against him.

But before we enter upon a discussion of the doctrine of the text, observe how strongly the Apostle expresses it. ‘The carnal mind,’ he says, ‘is enmity against God.’ He uses a noun, and not an adjective. He does not say it is opposed to God merely, but it is the positive enmity. It is not black, but blackness; it is not at enmity, but enmity itself; it is not corrupt, but corruption; it is not rebellious, it is rebellion; it is not wicked, it is wickedness itself. The heart, though it be deceitful, is positively deceit; it is evil in the concrete, sin in the essence; it is the distillation, the quintessence of all things that are vile; it is not envious against God, it is envy; it is not at enmity, it is actual enmity.

Nor need we say a word to explain that it is ‘enmity against God’. It does not charge manhood with an aversion merely to the dominion, laws, or doctrines of Jehovah; but it strikes a deeper and surer blow. It does not strike man upon the head, but it penetrates into his heart; it lays the axe at the root of the tree, and pronounces him ‘enmity against God’, against the person of the Godhead, against the Deity, against the mighty Maker of this world; not at enmity against his Bible or against his gospel, though that were true, but against God himself, against his essence, his existence, and his person. Let us, then, weigh the words of the text, for they are solemn words. They are well put together by that master of eloquence, Paul, and they were, moreover, dictated by the Holy Spirit, who telleth man how to speak aright. May he help us to expound, as he has already given us the passage to explain.

We shall be called upon to notice, this morning, first, the truthfulness of this assertion; secondly, the universality of the evil here complained of; thirdly, we will still further enter into the depths of the subject, and press it to your hearts, by showing the enormity of the evil; and after that, should we have time, we will deduce one or two doctrines from the general fact.

First, we are called upon to speak of the truthfulness of this great statement: ‘The carnal mind is enmity against God’. It needs no proof, for since it is written in God’s word, we, as Christian men, are bound to bow before it. The words of the Scriptures are words of infinite wisdom, and if reason cannot see the ground of a statement of revelation, it is bound, most reverently, to believe it, since we are well assured even should it be above our reason, that it cannot be contrary thereunto. Here I find it written in the Scriptures, ‘the carnal mind is enmity against God’; and that of itself is enough for me. But did I need witnesses, I would conjure up the nations of antiquity; I would unroll the volume of ancient history; I would tell you of the awful deeds of mankind. It may be I might move your souls to detestation, if I spake of the cruelty of this race to itself, if I showed you how it made the world an Aceldama^[1] by its wars, and deluged it with blood by its fightings and murders; if I should recite the black list of vices in which whole nations have indulged or even bring before you the characters of some of the most eminent philosophers, I should blush to speak of them, and you would refuse to hear; yea it would be impossible for you, as refined inhabitants of a civilized country, to endure the mention of the crimes that were committed by those very men, who nowadays, are held up as being paragons of perfection. I fear if all the truth were written, we should rise up from reading the lives of earth’s mightiest heroes and proudest sages, and would say at once of all of them, ‘They are clean gone out of the way; they are altogether become unprofitable; there is none that doeth good; no not one.’

And did not that suffice, I would point you to the delusions of the heathen; I would tell you of their priestcraft, by which their souls have been enthralled in superstition; I would drag their gods before you; I would let you witness the horrid obscenities, the diabolical rites which are to these besotted men most sacred things. Then after you had heard what the natural religion of man is, I would ask what must his irreligion be? If this is his devotion, what must be his impiety? If this be his ardent love of the Godhead, what must his hatred thereof be? Ye would, I am sure, at once confess, did ye know what the race is, that the indictment is proven and that the world must unreservedly and truthfully exclaim, ‘Guilty!’

A further argument I might find in the fact, that the best of men have been always the readiest to confess their depravity. The holiest men, the most free from impurity, have always felt it most. He whose garments are the whitest, will best perceive the spots upon them. He whose crown shineth the brightest, will know when he hath lost a jewel. He who giveth the most light to the world, will always be able to discover his own darkness. The angels of heaven veil their faces; and the angels of God on earth, his chosen people, must always veil their faces with humility, when they think of what they were. Hear David: he was none of those who boast of a holy nature and a pure disposition. He says, ‘Behold, I was shapen in iniquity; and in sin did my mother conceive me.’ Hear all those holy men who have written in the inspired volume, and ye shall find them all confessing that they were not clean, no, not one; yea, one of them exclaimed, ‘O wretched man that I am; who shall deliver me from the body of this death?’

And more, I will summon one other witness to the truthfulness of this fact, who shall decide the question; it shall be your conscience. Conscience, I will put thee in the witness-box, and cross-examine thee this morning! Conscience, truly answer! Be not drugged with the laudanum of self-security! Speak the truth! Didst thou never hear the heart say, ‘I wish there were no God’? Have not all men, at times, wished that our religion were not true? Though they could not entirely rid their souls of the idea of the Godhead, did they not wish that there might not be a God? Have they not had the desire that it might turn out that all these divine realities were a delusion, a farce, and an imposture? ‘Yea,’ saith every man, ‘that has crossed my mind sometimes. I have wished I might indulge in folly; I have wished there were no laws to restrain me; I have wished, as the fool, that there were no God.’ That passage in the Psalms, ‘The fool hath said in his heart, there is no God’, is wrongly translated. It should be, ‘The fool hath said in his heart, no God.’ The fool does not say in his heart there is no God, for he knows there is a God; but he says, ‘No God,—I don’t want any, I wish there were none.’ And who amongst us has not been so foolish as to desire that there were no God? Now conscience, answer another question! Thou hast confessed that thou hast at times wished there were no God; now, suppose a man wished another dead, would not that show that he hated him? Yes, it would. And so, my friends, the wish that there were no God, proves that we dislike God. When I wish such a man dead and rotting in his grave; when I desire that he were non est, I must hate that man; otherwise I should not wish him to be extinct. So that wish—and I do not think there has been a man in this world who has not had it—proves that ‘the carnal mind is enmity against God’.

But conscience, I have another question. Has not thine heart ever desired, since there is a God, that he were a little less holy, a little less pure, so that those things which are now great crimes might be regarded as venial offences, as peccadillos? Has thy heart never said ‘Would to God these sins were not forbidden! Would that he would be merciful and pass them by without an atonement! Would that he were not so severe, so rigorously just, so sternly strict to his integrity.’ Hast thou never said that, my heart? Conscience must reply, ‘Thou hast.’ Well, that wish to change God, proves that thou art not in love with the God that now is, the God of heaven and earth; and though thou mayest talk of natural religion, and boast that thou dost reverence the God of the green fields, the grassy meads, the swelling flood, the rolling thunder, the azure sky, the starry night, and the great universe—though, thou lovest the poetic beau ideal of Deity, it is not the God of Scripture, for thou hast wished to change his nature, and in that hast thou proved that thou art at enmity with him. But wherefore, conscience, should I go thus round about? Thou canst bear faithful witness, if thou wouldst speak the truth, that each person here has so transgressed against God, so continually broken his laws, violated his sabbath, trampled on his statutes, despised his gospel, that it is true, aye, most true, that ‘the carnal mind is enmity against God’.

Now, secondly, we are called upon to notice the universality of this evil. What a broad assertion it is. It is not a single carnal mind, or a certain class of characters, but ‘the carnal mind’. It is an unqualified statement, including every individual. Whatever mind may properly be called carnal, not having been spiritualized by the power of God’s Holy Ghost, is ‘enmity against God’.

Observe then, first of all, the universality of this as to all persons. Every carnal mind in the world is at enmity against God. This does not exclude even infants at the mother’s breast. We call them innocent, and so they are of actual transgression, but as the poet says, ‘Within the youngest breast there lies a stone.’ There is in the carnal mind of an infant, enmity against God; it is not developed, but it lieth there. Some say that children learn sin by imitation. But no; take a child away, place it under the most pious influences, let the very air it breathes be purified by piety; let it constantly drink in draughts of holiness; let it hear nothing but the voice of prayer and praise; let its ear be always kept in tune by notes of sacred song; and that child, notwithstanding, may still become one of the grossest of transgressors; and though placed apparently on the very road to heaven, it shall, if not directed by divine grace, march downwards to the pit. Oh! how true it is that some who have had the best of parents, have been the worst of sons; that many who have been trained up under the most holy auspices, in the midst of most favourable scenes of piety, have nevertheless, become loose and wanton! So it is not by imitation, but it is by nature, that the child is evil. Grant me that the child is carnal, and my text says, ‘The carnal mind is enmity against God.’ The young crocodile, I have heard, when broken from the shell, will in a moment begin to put itself in a posture of attack, opening its mouth as if it had been taught and trained. We know that young lions when tamed and domesticated, still will have the wild nature of their fellows of the forest, and were liberty given them, would prey as fiercely as others. So with the child; you may bind him with the green withes of education, you may do what you will with him, since you cannot change his heart, that carnal mind shall still be at enmity against God; and notwithstanding intellect, talent, and all you may give to boot, it shall be of the same sinful complexion as every other child, if not as apparently evil; for, ‘the carnal mind is enmity against God’.

And if this applies to children, equally does it include every class of men. There be some men that are born into this world master spirits, who walk about it as giants, wrapped in mantles of light and glory. I refer to the poets, men who stand aloft like Colossi, mightier than we, seeming to be descended from celestial spheres. There be others of acute intellect, who, searching into mysteries of science, discover things that have been hidden from the creation of the world; men of keen research, and mighty erudition; and yet of each of these—poet, philosopher, metaphysician, and great discoverer—it shall be said, ‘The carnal mind is enmity against God.’ Ye may train him up, ye may make his intellect almost angelic, ye may strengthen his soul until he shall take what are riddles to us, and unravel them with his fingers in a moment; ye may make him so mighty, that he can grasp the iron secrets of the eternal hills and grind them to atoms in his fist; ye may give him an eye so keen, that he can penetrate the arcana of rocks and mountains; ye may add a soul so potent that he may slay the giant Sphinx, that had for ages troubled the mightiest men of learning; yet when ye have done all, his mind shall be a depraved one, and his carnal heart shall still be in opposition to God. Yea, more, ye shall bring him to the house of prayer; ye shall make him sit constantly under the clearest preaching of the word, where he shall hear the doctrines of grace in all their purity, attended by a holy unction; but if that holy unction does not rest upon him, all shall be vain: he shall still come most regularly, but like the pious door of the chapel, that turneth in and out, he shall still be the same; having an outside superficial religion, and his carnal mind shall still be at enmity against God. Now, this is not my assertion, it is the declaration of God’s word, and you must leave it if you do not believe it; but quarrel not with me, it is my Master’s message; and it is true of every one of you,—men, women, and children, and myself too,—that if we had not been regenerated and converted, if we have not experienced a change of heart, our carnal mind is still at enmity against God.

Again, notice the universality of this at all times. The carnal mind is at all times enmity against God. ‘Oh,’ say some, ‘it may be true that we are at times opposed to God, but surely we are not always so.’ ‘There be moments,’ says one, ‘when I feel rebellious, at times my passions lead me astray; but surely there are other favourable seasons when I really am friendly to God, and offer true devotion. ‘I have,’ continues the objector, ‘stood upon the mountain-top, until my whole soul has kindled with the scene below, and my lips have uttered the song of praise,—

These are thy glorious works, parent of good,

Almighty, thine this universal frame,

Thus wondrous fair: thyself how wondrous then!’

Yes, but mark, what is true one day is not false another; ‘the carnal mind is enmity against God’ at all times. The wolf may sleep, but it is a wolf still. The snake with its azure hues, may slumber amid the flowers, and the child may stroke its slimy back, but it is a serpent still; it does not change its nature, though it is dormant. The sea is the house of storms, even when it is glassy as a lake; the thunder is still the mighty rolling thunder, when it is so much aloft that we hear it not. And the heart, when we perceive not its ebullitions, when it belches not forth its lava, and sendeth not forth the hot stones of its corruption, is still the same dread volcano. At all times, at all hours, at every moment (I speak this as God speaketh it), if ye are carnal, ye are each one of you enmity against God.

Another thought concerning the universality of this statement. The whole of the mind is enmity against God. The text says, ‘The carnal mind is enmity against God’; that is, the entire man, every part of him—every power, every passion. It is a question often asked, ‘What part of man was injured by the fall?’ Some think that the fall was only felt by the affections, and that the intellect was unimpaired; this they argue from the wisdom of man, and the mighty discoveries he has made, such as the law of gravitation, the steam engine, and the sciences. Now, I consider these things as being a very mean display of wisdom, compared with what is to come in a hundred years, and very small compared with what might have been, if man’s intellect had continued in its pristine condition. I believe that the fall crushed man entirely; albeit, when it rolled like an avalanche upon the mighty temple of human nature some shafts were still left undestroyed, and amidst the ruins you find here and there, a flute, a pedestal, a cornice, a column, not quite broken, yet the entire structure fell, and its most glorious relics are fallen ones, levelled in the dust.  The whole of man is defaced. Look at our memory; is it not true that the memory is fallen? I can recollect evil things far better than those which savour of piety. I hear a ribald song, that music of hell shall jar in my ear when grey hairs shall be upon my head. I hear a note of holy praise: alas! it is forgotten! For memory graspeth with an iron hand ill things, but the good she holdeth with feeble fingers. She suffereth the glorious timbers from the forest of Lebanon to swim down the stream of oblivion, but she stoppeth all the draff that floateth from the foul city of Sodom. She will retain evil, she will lose good. Memory is fallen. So are the affections. We love everything earthly better than we ought; we soon fix our heart upon a creature, but very seldom upon the Creator; and when the heart is given to Jesus it is prone to wander. Look at the imagination too. Oh! how can the imagination revel, when the body is in an ill condition? Only give man something that shall well nigh intoxicate him; drug him with opium; and how will his imagination dance with joy! Like a bird uncaged, how will it mount with more than eagles’ wings! He sees things he had not dreamed of even in the shades of night. Why did not his imagination work when his body was in a normal state—when it was healthy? Simply because it is depraved; and until he had entered a foul element—until the body had begun to quiver with a kind of intoxication—the fancy would not hold its carnival. We have some splendid specimens of what men could write, when they have been under the accursed influence of ardent spirits. It is because the mind is so depraved that it loves something which puts the body into an abnormal condition; and here we have a proof that the imagination itself has gone astray. So with the judgment—I might prove how ill it decides. So might I accuse the conscience, and tell you how blind it is, and how it winks at the greatest follies. I might review all our powers, and write upon the brow of each one, ‘Traitor against heaven! Traitor against God!’ The whole ‘carnal mind is enmity against God’.

Now, my hearers, ‘the Bible alone is the religion of Protestants’: but whenever I find a certain book much held in reverence by our Episcopalian brethren, entirely on my side, I always feel the greatest delight in quoting from it. Do you know I am one of the best Churchmen in the world, the very best, if you will judge me by the Articles, and the very worst if you measure me in any other way. Measure me by the Articles of the Church of England, and I will not stand second to any man under heaven’s blue sky in preaching the gospel contained in them; for if there be an excellent epitome of the gospel, it is to be found in the Articles of the Church of England. Let me show you that you have not been hearing strange doctrine. Here is the 9th Article, upon Original or Birth Sin: ‘Original Sin standeth not in the following of Adam (as the Pelagians do vainly talk); but it is the fault and corruption of the nature of every man, that naturally is engendered of the offspring of Adam; whereby man is very far gone from original righteousness, and is of his own nature inclined to evil, so that the flesh lusteth always contrary to the spirit; and, therefore, in every person born into this world, it deserveth God’s wrath and damnation. And this infection of nature doth remain, yea, in them that are regenerated; whereby the lust of the flesh, called in the Greek, phronema sarkos, which some do expound the wisdom, some sensuality, some the affection, some the desire, of the flesh, is not subject to the law of God. And although there is no condemnation for them that believe and are baptized, yet the Apostle doth confess, that concupiscence and lust hath of itself the nature of sin.’ I want nothing more. Will anyone who believes in the Prayer Book dissent from the doctrine that ‘the carnal mind is enmity against God’?

III. I have said that I would endeavour, in the third place, to show the great enormity of this guilt. I do fear, my brethren, that very often when we consider our state, we think not so much of the guilt as of the misery. I have sometimes read sermons upon the inclination of the sinner to evil, in which it has been very powerfully proved, and certainly the pride of human nature has been well humbled and brought low; but one thing always strikes me, if it is left out, as being a very great omission, viz.—the doctrine that man is guilty in all these things. If his heart is against God, we ought to tell him it is his sin; and if he cannot repent, we ought to show him that sin is the sole cause of his disability—that all his alienation from God is sin—that as long as he keeps from God it is sin. I fear many of us here must acknowledge that we do not charge the sin of it to our own consciences. Yes, say we, we have many corruptions. Oh! yes. But we sit down very contented. My brethren we ought not to do so. The having those corruptions is our crime, which should be confessed as an enormous evil; and if I, as a minister of the gospel, do not press home the sin of the thing, I have missed what is the very virus of it. I have left out the very essence, if I have not shown that it is a crime. Now, ‘the carnal mind is enmity against God’. What a sin it is! This will appear in two ways. Consider the relation in which we stand to God, and then remember what God is; and after I have spoken of these two things, I hope, you will see, indeed, that it is a sin to be at enmity with God.

What is God to us? He is the Creator of the heavens and the earth; he bears up the pillars of the universe; his breath perfumes the flowers; his pencil paints them; he is the author of this fair creation; ‘we are the sheep of his pasture, he hath made us, and not we ourselves’. He stands to us in the relationship of a Maker and Creator; and from that fact he claims to be our King. He is our legislator, our law-maker; and then, to make our crime still worse and worse, he is the ruler of providence; for it is he who keeps us from day to day. He supplies our wants; he keeps the breath within our nostrils; he bids the blood still pursue its course through the veins; he holdeth us in life, and preventeth us from death; he standeth before us, our creator, our king, our sustainer, our benefactor; and I ask, is it not a sin of enormous magnitude—is it not high treason against the emperor of heaven—is it not an awful sin, the depth of which we cannot fathom with the line of all our judgment—that we, his creatures, dependent upon him, should be at enmity with God?

But the crime may be seen to be worse when we think of what God is. Let me appeal personally to you in an interrogatory style for this has weight with it. Sinner! why art thou at enmity with God? God is the God of love; he is kind to his creatures; he regards you with his love of benevolence; for this very day his sun hath shone upon you, this day you have had food and raiment, and you have come up here in health and strength. Do you hate God because he loves you? Is that the reason? Consider how many mercies you have received at his hands all your lives long! You are born with a body not deformed; you have had a tolerable share of health; you have been recovered many times from sickness; when lying at the gates of death; his arm has held back your soul from the last step to destruction. Do you hate God for all this? Do you hate him because he spared your life by his tender mercy? Behold his goodness that he hath spread before you! He might have sent you to hell; but you are here. Now, do you hate God for sparing you? Oh, wherefore art thou at enmity with him? My fellow creature, dost thou not know that God sent his Son from his bosom, hung him on the tree, and there suffered him to die for sinners, the just for the unjust? And dost thou hate God for that? Oh, sinner, is this the cause of thine enmity? Art thou so estranged that thou givest enmity for love? And when he surroundeth thee with favours, girdeth thee with mercies, encircleth thee with lovingkindness, dost thou hate him for this? He might say as Jesus did to the Jews: ‘For which of these works do ye stone me?’ For which of these works do ye hate God? Did an earthly benefactor feed you, would you hate him? Did he clothe you, would you abuse him to his face? Did he give you talents, would you turn those powers against him? Oh, speak! Would you forge the iron and strike the dagger into the heart of your best friend? Do you hate your mother who nursed you on her knee? Do you curse your father who so wisely watched over you? Nay, ye say, we have some little gratitude towards earthly relatives. Where are your hearts, then? Where are your hearts, that ye can still despise God, and be at enmity with him? Oh! diabolical crime! Oh! satanic enormity! Oh! iniquity for which words fail in description! to hate the all-lovely—to despise the essentially good—to abhor the constantly merciful—to spurn the ever-beneficent—to scorn the kind, the gracious one; above all, to hate the God who sent his Son to die for man! Ah! in that thought—‘the carnal mind is enmity against God’,—there is something which may make us shake; for it is a terrible sin to be at enmity with God. I would I could speak more powerfully, but my Master alone can impress upon you the enormous evil of this horrid state of heart.

But there are one or two doctrines which we will try to deduce from this. Is the carnal mind at ‘enmity against God’? Then salvation cannot be by merit; it must be by grace. If we are at enmity with God, what merit can we have? How can we deserve anything from the being we hate? Even if we were pure as Adam, we could not have any merit; for I do not think Adam had any desert before his Creator. When he had kept all his Master’s law, he was but an unprofitable servant; he had done no more than he ought to have done; he had no surplus—no balance. But since we have become enemies, how much less can we hope to be saved by works! Oh, no; the whole Bible tells us, from beginning to end, that salvation is not by the works of the law, but by the deeds of grace. Martin Luther declared that he constantly preached justification by faith alone, ‘because,’ said he, ‘the people would forget it; so that I was obliged almost to knock my Bible against their heads, to send it into their hearts’. So it is true, we constantly forget that salvation is by grace alone. We always want to be putting in some little scrap of our own virtue; we want to be doing something. I remember a saying of old Matthew Wilkes: ‘Saved by your works! you might as well try to go to America in a paper boat!’ Saved by your works! It is impossible! Oh no; the poor legalist is like a blind horse going round and round the mill; or like the prisoner going up the treadmill, and finding himself no higher after all he has done; he has no solid confidence, no firm ground to rest upon. He has not done enough—‘never enough’. Conscience always says, ‘this is not perfection; it ought to have been better’. Salvation for enemies must be by an ambassador—by an atonement—yea, by Christ.

Another doctrine we gather from this is, the necessity of an entire change of our nature. It is true that by birth we are at enmity with God. How necessary then it is, that our nature should be changed! There are few people who sincerely believe this. They think that if they cry ‘Lord, have mercy upon me’, when they lie a-dying, they shall go to heaven directly. Let me suppose an impossible case for a moment. Let me imagine a man entering heaven without a change of heart. He comes within the gates. He hears a sonnet. He starts! It is to the praise of his enemy. He sees a throne, and on it sits one who is glorious; but it is his enemy. He walks streets of gold, but those streets belong to his enemy. He sees hosts of angels; but those hosts are the servants of his enemy. He is in an enemy’s house; for he is at enmity with God. He could not join the song, for he would not know the tune. There he would stand; silent, motionless; till Christ should say, with a voice louder than ten thousand thunders, ‘What dost thou here? Enemies at a marriage banquet? Enemies in the children’s house? Enemies in heaven? Get thee gone! Depart ye cursed, into everlasting fire in hell!’ Oh! sirs, if the unregenerate man could enter heaven, I mention once more the oft-repeated saying of Whitefield, he would be so unhappy in heaven, that he would ask God to let him run down into hell for shelter. There must be a change, if ye consider the future state; for how can enemies to God ever sit down at the banquet of the Lamb?

And to conclude, let me remind you—and it is in the text after all—that this change must be worked by a power beyond your own. An enemy may possibly make himself a friend; but enmity cannot. If it be but an adjunct of his nature to be an enemy he may change himself into a friend; but if it is the very essence of his existence to be enmity, positive enmity, enmity cannot change itself. No, there must be something done more than we can accomplish. This is just what is forgotten in these days. We must have more preaching of the Holy Spirit, if we are to have more conversion work. I tell you, sirs, if you change yourselves, and make yourselves better, and better, and better, a thousand times, you will never be good enough for heaven, till God’s Spirit has laid his hand upon you; till he has renewed the heart, till he has purified the soul, till he has changed the entire spirit and new-made the man, there can be no entering heaven. How seriously, then, should each stand and think. Here am I, a creature of a day, a mortal born to die, but yet an immortal! At present I am at enmity with God. What shall I do? Is it not my duty, as well as my happiness, to ask, whether there be a way to be reconciled to God?

Oh! weary slaves of sin, are not your ways the paths of folly? Is it wisdom, O my fellow creatures, is it wisdom to hate your Creator? Is it wisdom to stand in opposition against him? Is it prudent to despise the riches of his grace? If it be wisdom, it is hell’s wisdom; if it be wisdom, it is a wisdom which is folly with God. Oh! may God grant that you may turn unto Jesus with full purpose of heart! He is the ambassador; he it is who can make peace through his blood; and though you came in here an enemy, it is possible you may go out through that door a friend yet, if you can but look to Jesus Christ, the brazen serpent which was lifted up.

And now, it may be, some of you are convinced of sin, by the Holy Spirit. I will now proclaim to you the way of salvation. ‘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.’ Behold, O trembling penitent, the means of thy deliverance. Turn thy tearful eye to yonder Mount of Calvary! See the victim of justice—the sacrifice of atonement for your transgression. View the Saviour in his agonies, with streams of blood purchasing thy soul, and with intensest agonies enduring thy punishment. He died for thee, if now thou dost confess thy guilt. O come thou condemned one, self-condemned, and turn thine eye this way, for one look will save. Sinner, thou art bitten. Look! it is nought but ‘Look!’ It is simply ‘Look!’ If thou canst but look to Jesus thou art safe. Hear the voice of the Redeemer: ‘Look unto me, and be ye saved.’ Look! Look! Look! O guilty souls.

Venture on him, venture wholly,

Let no other trust intrude;

None but Jesus

Can do helpless sinners good.

May my blessed Master help you to come to him, and draw you to his Son, for Jesu’s sake. Amen and Amen.

^[1] ‘Field of blood’, cf. Acts 1:19.—Publisher.

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DELIVERED ON SABBATH MORNING, APRIL 8, 1855, BY THE

REV. C. H. SPURGEON,

AT EXETER HALL, STRAND.

‘Come, see the place where the Lord lay.’—Matt. 28:6.

EVERY circumstance connected with the life of Christ is deeply interesting to the Christian mind. Wherever we behold our Saviour, he is well worthy of our notice:

His cross, his manger, and his crown,

Are big with glories yet unknown.

All his weary pilgrimage, from Bethlehem’s manger to Calvary’s cross, is in our eyes paved with glory. Each spot upon which he trod is, to our souls, consecrated at once, simply because there the foot of earth’s Saviour and our own Redeemer once was placed. When he comes to Calvary the interest thickens; then our best thoughts are centred on him in the agonies of crucifixion, nor does our deep affection permit us to leave him, even when, the struggle being over, he yields up the ghost. His body, when it is taken down from the tree, still is lovely in our eyes—we fondly linger around the motionless clay. By faith we discern Joseph of Arimathea, and the timid Nicodemus, assisted by those holy women, drawing out the nails and taking down the mangled body; we behold them wrapping him in clean white linen, hastily girding him round with belts of spices; then putting him in his tomb, and departing for the Sabbath rest. We shall on this occasion go where Mary went on the morning of the first day of the week, when waking from her couch before the dawn, she aroused herself to be early at the sepulchre of Jesus. We will try if it be possible, by the help of God’s Spirit, to go as she did—not in body, but in soul—we will stand at that tomb; we will examine it, and we trust we shall hear some truth-speaking voice coming from its hollow bosom which will comfort and instruct us, so that we may say of the grave of Jesus when we go away, ‘It was none other than the gate of heaven’,—a sacred place, deeply solemn, and sanctified by the slain body of our precious Saviour.

1. An invitation given. I shall commence my remarks this morning, by inviting all Christians to come with me to the tomb of Jesus. ‘Come, see the place where the Lord lay.’ We will labour to render the place attractive, we will gently take your hand to guide you to it, and may it please our Master to make our hearts burn within us, while we talk by the way.

Away, ye profane—ye souls whose life is laughter, folly, and mirth! Away, ye sordid and carnal minds who have no taste for the spiritual, no delight in the celestial. We ask not your company; we speak to God’s beloved, to the heirs of heaven, to the sanctified, the redeemed, the pure in heart—and we say to them ‘Come, see the place where the Lord lay.’ Surely ye need no argument to move your feet in the direction of the holy sepulchre; but still we will use the utmost power to draw your spirit thither. Come then, for ’tis the shrine of greatness, ’tis the resting-place of the man, the Restorer of our race, the Conqueror of death and hell. Men will travel hundreds of miles to behold the place where a poet first breathed the air of earth; they will journey to the ancient tombs of mighty heroes, or the graves of men renowned by fame; but whither shall the Christian go to find the grave of one so famous as was Jesus? Ask me the greatest man who ever lived—I tell you the Man Christ Jesus, was ‘anointed with the oil of gladness above his fellows’. If ye seek a chamber honoured as the resting-place of genius, turn in hither; if ye would worship at the grave of holiness, come ye here; if ye would see the hallowed spot where the choicest bones that e’er were fashioned lay for awhile, come with me, Christian, to that quiet garden, hard by the walls of Jerusalem.

Come with me, moreover, because it is the tomb of your best friend. The Jews said of Mary, ‘She goeth unto his grave to weep there.’ Ye have lost your friends, some of you, ye have planted flowers upon their tombs, ye go and sit at eventide upon the green sward, bedewing the grass with your tears, for there your mother lies, and there your father, or your wife. Oh! in pensive sorrow come with me to this dark garden of our Saviour’s burial; come to the grave of your best friend—your brother, yea, one who ‘sticketh closer than a brother’. Come thou to the grave of thy dearest relative, O Christian, for Jesus is thy husband, ‘Thy Maker is thy husband, the Lord of hosts is his name.’ Doth not affection draw you? Do not the sweet lips of love woo you? Is not the place sanctified where one so well-beloved slept, although but for a moment? Surely ye need no eloquence; if it were needed I have none. I have but the power, in simple, but earnest accents, to repeat the words, ‘Come, see the place where the Lord lay.’ On this Easter morning pay a visit to his grave, for it is the grave of your best friend.

Yea, more, I will further urge you to this pious pilgrimage. Come, for angels bid you. Angels said, ‘Come, see the place where the Lord lay.’ The Syriac version reads, ‘Come, see the place where our Lord lay.’ Yes, angels put themselves with those poor women, and used one common pronoun—our. Jesus is the Lord of angels as well as of men. Ye feeble women—ye have called him Lord, ye have washed his feet, ye have provided for his wants, ye have hung upon his lips to catch his honeyed sentences, ye have sat entranced beneath his mighty eloquence; ye call him Master and Lord, and ye do well; ‘But,’ said the seraph, ‘he is my Lord too’; bowing his head, he sweetly said, ‘Come, see the place where our Lord lay.’ Dost fear then, Christian, to step into that tomb? Dost dread to enter there, when the angel pointeth with his finger and saith, ‘Come, we will go together, angels and men, and see the royal bedchamber’? Ye know that angels did go into his tomb, for they sat one at his head and the other at his foot in holy meditation. I picture to myself those bright cherubs sitting there talking to one another. One of them said, ‘It was there his feet lay’; and the other replied, ‘And there his hands, and there his head’; and in celestial language did they talk concerning the deep things of God; then they stooped and kissed the rocky floor, made sacred to the angels themselves, not because there they were redeemed, but because there their Master and their Monarch, whose high behests they were obeying, did for awhile become the slave of death, and the captive of destruction. Come, Christian, then, for angels are the porters to unbar the door; come, for a cherub is thy messenger to usher thee into the death-place of Death himself. Nay, start not from the entrance; let not the darkness affright thee; the vault is not damp with the vapours of death, nor doth the air contain aught of contagion. Come, for it is a pure and healthy place. Fear not to enter that tomb. I will admit that catacombs are not the places where we, who are full of joy, would love to go. There is something gloomy and noisome about a vault. There are noxious smells of corruption; oftimes pestilence is born where a dead body hath lain; but fear it not, Christian, for Christ was not left in hell,—in Hades,—neither did his body see corruption. Come, there is no scent, yea, rather a perfume. Step in here, and, if thou didst ever breathe the gales of Ceylon, or winds from the groves of Araby, thou shalt find them far excelled by that sweet holy fragrance left by the blessed body of Jesus, that alabaster vase which once held divinity, and was rendered sweet and precious thereby. Think not thou shalt find aught obnoxious to thy senses. Corruption Jesus never saw; no worms ever devoured his flesh; no rottenness ever entered into his bones; he saw no corruption. Three days he slumbered, but not long enough to putrefy; he soon arose, perfect as when he entered, uninjured as when his limbs were composed for their slumber. Come then, Christian, summon up thy thoughts, gather all thy powers; here is a sweet invitation, let me press it again. Let me lead thee by the hand of meditation, my brother; let me take thee by the arm of thy fancy, and let me again say to thee, ‘Come, see the place where the Lord lay.’

There is yet one reason more why I would have thee visit this Royal sepulchre—because it is a quiet spot. Oh! I have longed for rest, for I have heard this world’s rumours in my ears so long, that I have begged for

A lodge in some vast wilderness,

Some boundless contiguity of shade,

where I might hide myself for ever. I am sick of this tiring and trying life; my frame is weary, my soul is mad to repose herself awhile. I would I could lie myself down a little by the edge of some pebbly brook, with no companion save the fair flowers or the nodding willows. I would I could recline in stillness, where the air brings balm to the tormented brain, where there is no murmur save the hum of the summer bee, no whisper save that of the zephyrs, and no song except the carolling of the lark. I wish I could be at ease for a moment. I have become a man of the world; my brain is racked, my soul is tired. Oh! wouldst thou be quiet, Christian? Merchant, wouldst thou rest from thy toils? wouldst thou be calm for once? then come hither. It is in a pleasant garden, far from the hum of Jerusalem; the noise and din of business will not reach thee there; ‘Come, see the place where the Lord lay.’ It is a sweet resting spot, a withdrawing room for thy soul, where thou mayest brush thy garments from dust of earth and muse awhile in peace.

2. Attention requested. Thus I have pressed the invitation: now we will enter the tomb. Let us examine it with deep attention, noticing every circumstance connected with it.

And first, mark that it is a costly tomb. It is no common grave; it is not an excavation dug out by the spade for a pauper in which to hide the last remains of his miserable and over-wearied bones. It is a princely tomb; it was made of marble, cut in the side of a hill. Stand here, believer, and ask why Jesus had such a costly sepulchre. He had no elegant garments; he wore a coat without seam, woven from the top throughout, without an atom of embroidery. He owned no sumptuous palace, for he had not where to lay his head. His sandals were not rich with gold, or studded with brilliants. He was poor. Why, then, does he lie in a noble grave? We answer, for this reason: Christ was unhonoured till he had finished his sufferings; Christ’s body suffered contumely, shame, spitting, buffeting, and reproach, until he had completed his great work; he was trampled under foot, he was ‘despised and rejected of men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief’; but the moment he had finished his undertaking, God said, ‘No more shall that body be disgraced; if it is to sleep, let it slumber in an honourable grave; if it is to rest, let nobles bury it; let Joseph, the councillor, and Nicodemus, the man of Sanhedrim, be present at the funeral; let the body be embalmed with precious spices, let it have honour; it has had enough of contumely, and shame, and reproach, and buffeting; let it now be treated with respect.’ Christian, dost thou discern the meaning; Jesus after he had finished his work, slept in a costly grave, for now his Father loved and honoured him, since his work was done.

But though it is a costly grave, it is a borrowed one. I see over the top of it, ‘Sacred to the memory of the family of Joseph of Arimathea’; yet Jesus slept there. Yes, he was buried in another’s sepulchre. He who had no house of his own, and rested in the habitation of other men; who had no table, but lived upon the hospitality of his disciples; who borrowed boats in which to preach, and had not anything in the wide world, was obliged to have a tomb from charity. Oh! should not the poor take courage? They dread to be buried at the expense of their neighbours; but if their poverty be unavoidable, wherefore should they blush, since Jesus Christ himself was interred in another’s grave? Ah! I wish I might have had Joseph’s grave, to let Jesus be buried in it. Good Joseph thought he had cut it out for himself, and that he should lay his bones there. He had it excavated as a family vault, and lo, the Son of David makes it one of the tombs of the kings. But he did not lose it by lending it to the Lord: rather, he had it back with precious interest. He only lent it three days: then Christ resigned it: he had not injured, but perfumed and sanctified it, and made it far more holy, so that it would be an honour in future to be buried there. It was a borrowed tomb; and why? I take it not to dishonour Christ, but in order to show that as his sins were borrowed sins, so his burial was in a borrowed grave. Christ had no transgressions of his own; he took ours upon his head; he never committed a wrong, but he took all my sin, and all yours, if ye are believers. Concerning all his people, it is true, he bore their griefs and carried their sorrows in his own body on the tree; therefore, as they were others’ sins, so he rested in another’s grave; as they were sins imputed, so that grave was only imputedly his. It was not his sepulchre: it was the tomb of Joseph.

Let us not weary in this pious investigation, but with fixed attention observe everything connected with this holy spot. The grave, we observe, was cut in a rock. Why was this? The Rock of ages was buried in a rock—a Rock within a rock. But why? Most persons suggest that it was so ordained that it might be clear that there was no covert way by which the disciples or others could enter and steal the body away. Very possibly it was the reason; but oh! my soul, canst thou not find a spiritual reason? Christ’s sepulchre was cut in a rock. It was not cut in mould that might be worn away by the water, or might crumble and fall into decay. The sepulchre stands, I believe, entire to this day; if it does not naturally, it does spiritually. The same sepulchre which took the sins of Paul, shall take my iniquities into its bosom; for if I ever lose my guilt, it must roll off my shoulders into the sepulchre. It was cut in a rock, so that if a sinner were saved a thousand years ago, I too can be delivered, for it is a rocky sepulchre where sin was buried—it was a rocky sepulchre of marble where my crimes were laid for ever—buried never to have a resurrection.

You will mark, moreover, that tomb was one wherein no other man had ever lain. Christopher Ness says, ‘When Christ was born he lay in a virgin’s womb, and when he died he was placed in a virgin tomb; he slept where never man had slept before.’ The reason was, that none might say that another person rose, for there never had been any other body there; thus a mistake of persons was impossible. Nor could it be said that some old prophet was interred in the place, and that Christ rose because he had touched his bones. You remember when Elisha was buried, and as they were burying a man, behold he touched the prophet’s bones, and arose. Christ touched no prophet’s bones, for none had ever slept there; it was a new chamber, where the Monarch of the earth did take his rest for three days and three nights.

We have learned a little, then, with attention, but let us stoop down once more before we leave the grave, and notice something else. We see the grave, but do you notice the grave-clothes, all wrapped and laid in their places, the napkin being folded up by itself? Wherefore are the grave-clothes wrapped up? The Jews said robbers had abstracted the body; but if so, surely they would have stolen the clothes; they would never have thought of wrapping them up and laying them down so carefully; they would be too much in haste to think of it. Why was it then? To manifest to us that Christ did not come out in a hurried manner. He slept till the last moment; then he awoke: he came not in haste. They shall not come out in haste, neither by flight, but at the appointed moment shall his people come to him. So at the precise hour, the decreed instant, Jesus Christ leisurely awoke, took off his cerements, left them all behind him, and came forth in his pure and naked innocence, perhaps to show us that as clothes are the offspring of sin—when sin was atoned for by Christ, he left all raiment behind him—for garments are the badges of guilt: if we had not been guilty we should never have needed them.

Then, the napkin, mark you, was laid by itself. The grave-clothes were left behind for every departed Christian to wear. The bed of death is well sheeted with the garments of Jesus, but the napkin was laid by itself, because the Christian when he dies, does not need that; it is used by the mourners, and the mourners only. We shall all wear grave-clothes, but we shall not need the napkin. When our friends die, the napkin is laid aside for us to use; but do our ascended brethren and sisters use it? No; the Lord God hath wiped away all tears from their eyes. We stand and view the corpses of the dear departed, we moisten their faces with our tears, letting whole showers of grief fall on their heads; but do they weep? Oh, no. Could they speak to us from the upper spheres, they would say, ‘Weep not for me, for I am glorified. Sorrow not for me; I have left a bad world behind me, and have entered into a far better.’ They have no napkin—they weep not. Strange it is that those who endure death weep not; but those who see them die are weepers. When the child is born it weeps while others smile (say the Arabs), and when it dies it smiles while others weep. It is so with the Christian. O blessed thing! The napkin is laid by itself, because Christians will never want to use it when they die.

III. Emotion excited. We have thus surveyed the grave with deep attention, and, I hope, with some profit to ourselves. But that is not all. I love a religion which consists, in a great measure, of emotion. Now, if I had power, like a master, I would touch the strings of your hearts, and fetch a glorious tune of solemn music from them, for this is a deeply solemn place, into which I have conducted you.

First, I would bid you stand and see the place where the Lord lay with emotions of deep sorrow. O come, my beloved brother, thy Jesus once lay there. He was a murdered man, my soul, and thou the murderer.

Ah, you, my sins, my cruel sins,

His chief tormentors were,

Each of my crimes became a nail,

And unbelief the spear.

Alas! and did my Saviour bleed?

And did my Sov’reign die?

I slew him—this right hand struck the dagger to his heart. My deeds slew Christ. Alas! I slew my best beloved; I killed him who loved me with an everlasting love. Ye eyes, why do ye refuse to weep when ye see Jesus’ body mangled and torn? Oh! give vent to your sorrow, Christians, for ye have good reason to do so. I believe in what Hart says, that there was a time in his experience when he could so sympathise with Christ, that he felt more grief at the death of Christ than he did joy. It seemed so sad a thing that Christ should have to die; and to me it often appears too great a price for Jesus Christ to purchase worms with his own blood. Methinks I love him so much that if I had seen him about to suffer, I should have been as bad as Peter, and have said, ‘That be far from thee, Lord’, but then he would have said to me, ‘Get thee behind me, Satan’; for he does not approve of that love which would stop him from dying. ‘The cup which my Father hath given me, shall I not drink it?’ But I think, had I seen him going up to his cross, I could fain have pressed him back, and said, ‘Oh! Jesus, thou shalt not die; I cannot have it. Wilt thou purchase my life with a price so dear?’ It seems too costly for him who is the prince of life and glory to let his fair limbs be tortured in agony; that the hands which carried mercies should be pierced with accursed nails; that the temples that were always clothed with love, should have cruel thorns driven through them. It appears too much. Oh! weep, Christian, and let your sorrow rise. Is not the price all but too great, that your Beloved should for you resign himself. Oh! I should think if a person were saved from death by another, he would always feel deep grief if his deliverer lost his life in the attempt. I had a friend, who, standing by the side of a piece of frozen water, saw a young lad in it, and sprang upon the ice in order to save him. After clutching the boy he held him in his hands, and cried out, ‘Here he is! here he is! I have saved him.’ But just as they caught hold of the boy, he sank himself, and his body was not found for some time afterwards, when he was quite dead. Oh! it is so with Jesus. My soul was drowning. From heaven’s high portals he saw me sinking in the depths of hell. He plunged in.

He sank beneath his heavy woes,

To raise me to a crown;

There’s ne’er a gift his hand bestows,

But cost his heart a groan.

Ah! we may indeed regret our sin, since it slew Jesus.

Now, Christian, change thy note a moment. ‘Come, see the place where the Lord lay’, with joy and gladness. He does not lie there now. Weep, when ye see the tomb of Christ, but rejoice because it is empty. Thy sin slew him, but his divinity raised him up. Thy guilt hath murdered him, but his righteousness hath restored him. Oh! he hath burst the bonds of death; he hath ungirt the cerements of the tomb, and hath come out more than conqueror, crushing death beneath his feet. Rejoice, O Christian, for he is not there—he is risen. ‘Come, see the place where the Lord lay.’

One more thought, and then I will speak a little concerning the doctrines we may learn from this grave. ‘Come, see the place where the Lord lay’ with solemn awe, for you and I will have to lay there too.

Hark! from the tomb a doleful sound,

Mine ears, attend the cry;

Ye living men, come view the ground,

Where ye must shortly lie.

Princes, this clay must be your bed,

In spite of all your powers;

The tall, the wise, the reverend head,

Must lie as low as ours.

It is a fact we do not often think of, that we shall all be dead in a little while. I know that I am made of dust and not of iron; my bones are not brass, nor my sinews steel: in a little while my body must crumble back to its native elements. But do you ever try to picture to yourself the moment of your dissolution? My friends, there are some of you who seldom realize how old you are, how near you are to death. One way of remembering our age is, to see how much remains. Think how old eighty is, and then see how few years there are before you will get there. We should remember our frailty. Sometimes I have tried to think of the time of my departure. I do not know whether I shall die a violent death or not; but I would to God that I might die suddenly, for sudden death is sudden glory. I would I might have such a blessed exit as Doctor Beaumont, and die in my pulpit, laying down my body with my charge, and ceasing at once to work and live. But it is not mine to choose. Suppose I lie lingering for weeks in the midst of pains, and griefs, and agonies; when that moment comes, that moment which is too solemn for my lips to speak of, when the spirit leaves the clay—let the physician put it off for weeks or years, as we say he does, though he does not—when that moment comes oh, ye lips, be dumb, and profane not its solemnity. When death comes, how is the strong man bowed down. How doth the mighty man fall. They may say they will not die, but there is no hope for them: they must yield, the arrow has gone home. I knew a man who was a wicked wretch, and I remember seeing him pace the floor of his bedroom, saying, ‘O God, I will not die, I will not die.’ When I begged him to lie on his bed, for he was dying, he said he could not die while he could walk, and he would walk till he did die. Ah! he expired in the utmost torments, always shrieking, ‘O God, I will not die.’ Oh! that moment, that last moment. See how clammy is the sweat upon the brow, how dry the tongue, how parched the lips. The man shuts his eyes and slumbers, then opens them again; and if he be a Christian, I can fancy he will say:

Hark! they whisper: angels say

Sister spirit, come away.

What is this absorbs me quite—

Steals my senses—shuts my sight—

Drowns my spirit—draws my breath?

Tell me, my soul, can this be death?

We know not when he is dying. One gentle sigh, and the spirit breaks away. We can scarcely say ‘He is gone’, before the ransomed spirit takes its mansion near the throne. Come to Christ’s tomb then, for the silent vault must soon be your habitation. Come to Christ’s grave, for you must slumber there. And even you, ye sinners, for one moment I will ask you to come also, because ye must die as well as the rest of us. Your sins cannot keep you from the jaws of death. I say, sinner, I want thee to look at Christ’s sepulchre too, for when thou diest it may have done thee great good to think of it. You have heard of Queen Elizabeth crying out that she would give an empire for a single hour; or, have you read the despairing cry of the gentleman on board the Arctic, when it was going down, who shouted to the boat ‘Come back! I will give you £30,000 if you will come and take me in.’ Ah! poor man, it were but little if he had thirty thousand worlds, if he could thereby prolong his life, ‘Skin for skin; yea, all that a man hath will he give for his life.’ Some of you who can laugh this morning, who came to spend a merry hour in this hall, will be dying, and then ye will pray and crave for life, and shriek for another Sabbath day. Oh! how the Sabbaths ye have wasted will walk like ghosts before you! Oh! how they will shake their snaky hair in your eyes! How will ye be made to sorrow and weep, because ye wasted precious hours, which, when they are gone, are gone too far ever to be recalled. May God save you from the pangs of remorse.

3. Instruction imparted. And now, Christian brethren, ‘Come, see the place where the Lord lay, to learn a doctrine or two. What did you see when you visited ‘the place where the Lord lay’? ‘He is not here: for he is risen!’ The first thing you perceive, if you stand by his empty tomb, is his divinity. The dead in Christ shall rise first at the resurrection; but he who rose first—their leader, rose in a different fashion. They rise by imparted power. He rose by his own. He could not slumber in the grave, because he was God. Death had no more dominion over him. There is no better proof of Christ’s divinity, than that startling resurrection of his, when he rose from the grave, by the glory of the Father. O Christian, thy Jesus is a God; his broad shoulders that hold thee up are indeed divine; and here thou hast the best proof of it—because he rose from the grave.

A second doctrine here taught, well may charm thee, if the Holy Spirit apply it with power. Behold this empty tomb, O true believer: it is a sign of thine acquittal and thy full discharge. If Jesus had not paid the debt, he ne’er had risen from the grave. He would have lain there till this moment if he had not cancelled the entire debt, by satisfying eternal vengeance. Oh! beloved, is not that an overwhelming thought?

It is finished! It is finished!

Hear the rising Saviour cry.

The heavenly turnkey came; a bright angel stepped from heaven and rolled away the stone: but he would not have done so if Christ had not done all; he would have kept him there; he would have said, ‘Nay, nay, thou art the sinner now; thou hast the sins of all thine elect upon thy shoulder, and I will not let thee go free till thou hast paid the uttermost farthing.’ In his going free I see my own discharge.

My Jesu’s blood’s my full discharge.

As a justified man, I have not a sin against me in God’s book. If I were to turn over God’s eternal book I should see every debt of mine receipted and cancelled.

Here’s pardon for transgressions past,

It matters not how black their cast,

And O my soul with wonder view,

For sins to come here’s pardon too.

While through Thy blood absolved I am

From sin’s tremendous curse and blame.

One more doctrine we learn, and with that we will conclude—the doctrine of the resurrection. Jesus rose, and as the Lord our Saviour rose, so all his followers must rise. Die I must—this body must be a carnival for worms; it must be eaten by those tiny cannibals: peradventure it shall be scattered from one portion of the earth to another; the constituent particles of this my frame will enter into plants, from plants pass into animals, and thus be carried into far distant realms; but at the blast of the archangel’s trumpet every separate atom of my body shall find its fellow; like the bones lying in the valley of vision, though separated from one another, the moment God shall speak, the bone will creep to its bone; then the flesh shall come upon it; the four winds of heaven shall blow, and the breath shall return. So, let me die, let beasts devour me, let fire turn this body into gas and vapour, all its particles shall yet again be restored; this very selfsame actual body shall start up from its grave, glorified and made like Christ’s body, yet still the same body, for God hath said it. Christ’s same body rose: so shall mine. O my soul, dost thou now dread to die? Thou wilt lose thy partner body a little while, but thou wilt be married again in heaven; soul and body shall again be united before the throne of God. The grave—what is it? It is the bath in which the Christian puts the clothes of his body to have them washed and cleansed. Death—what is it? It is the waiting room where we robe ourselves for immortality; it is the place where the body, like Esther, bathes itself in spices, that it may be fit for the embrace of its Lord. Death is the gate of life; I will not fear to die, then, but will say,

Shudder not to pass the stream,

Venture all thy care on Him—

Him, whose dying love and power

Still’d its tossing, hush’d its roar;

Safe is the expanded wave,

Gentle as a summer’s eve;

Not one object of His care

Ever suffer’d shipwreck there!

Come view the place, then, with all-hallowed meditation, where the Lord lay. Spend this afternoon, my beloved brethren, in meditating upon it, and very often go to Christ’s grave both to weep and to rejoice. Ye timid ones, do not be afraid to approach, for ’tis no vain thing to remember that timidity buried Christ. Faith would not have given him a funeral at all; faith would have kept him above ground, and would never have let him been buried, for it would have said it would be useless to bury Christ if he were to rise. Fear buried him. Nicodemus, the night disciple, and Joseph of Arimathea, secretly, for fear of the Jews, went and buried him. Therefore, ye timid ones, ye may go too. Ready-to-halt, poor Fearing, and thou Mrs Despondency, and Much-afraid, go often there, let it be your favourite haunt, there build a tabernacle, there abide. And often say to your heart, when you are in distress and sorrow, ‘Come, see the place where the Lord lay.’

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DELIVERED ON SUNDAY MORNING, APRIL 1, 1855, BY THE

REV. C. H. SPURGEON,

AT EXETER HALL, STRAND.

‘The archers have sorely grieved him, and shot at him, and hated him; but his bow abode in strength and the arms of his hands were made strong by the hands of the mighty God of Jacob; (from thence is the Shepherd, the stone of Israel).’—Gen. 49:23, 24.

IT must have been a fine sight to see the hoary-headed Jacob sitting up in his bed whilst he bestowed his parting benediction upon his twelve sons. He had been noble in many instances during his life—at the sleeping place of Bethel, the brook of Jabbok, and the halting of Peniel. He had been a glorious old man, one before whom we might bow down with reverence, and truly say, ‘There were giants in those days.’ But his closing scene was the best. I think if ever he stood out more illustrious than at any other time, if his head was, at any one season more than another, encircled with a halo of glory, it was when he came to die. Like the sun at setting, he seemed then to be the greater in brilliance, tinging the clouds of his weakness with the glory of grace within. Like good wine which runs clear to the very bottom, unalloyed by dregs, so did Jacob, till his dying hour, continue to sing of love, of mercy, and of goodness, past and future. Like the swan, which (as old writers say) singeth not all its life until it comes to die, so the old patriarch remained silent as a songster for many years, but when he stretched himself on his last couch of rest, he stayed himself up in his bed, turned his burning eye from one to another, and although with a hoarse and faltering voice, he sang a sonnet upon each of his offspring, such as earthly poets, uninspired, cannot attempt to imitate. Looking upon his son Reuben, a tear was in his eye, for he recollected Reuben’s sin; he passed over Simeon and Levi, giving some slight rebuke; upon the others he sung a verse of praise, as his eyes saw into the future history of the tribes. By-and-by his voice failed him, and the good old man, with long drawn breath, with eyes pregnant with celestial fire, and heart big with heaven, lifted his voice to God, and said, ‘I have waited for thy salvation, O God’, rested a moment on his pillow, and then, again, sitting up, re-commenced the strain, passing briefly by the names of each. But oh! when he came to Joseph, his youngest son but one—when he looked on him, I picture that old man as the tears ran down his cheeks. There stood Joseph, with all his mother Rachel in his eyes—that dear-loved wife of his—there he stood, the boy for whom that mother had prayed with all the eagerness of an eastern wife. For a long twenty years she had tarried a barren woman and kept no house, but then she was a joyful mother, and she called her son ‘increase’. Oh! how she loved the boy; and for that mother’s sake, though she had been buried for some years and hidden under the cold sod, old Jacob loved him too. But more than that; he loved him for his troubles. He was parted from him to be sold into Egypt. His father recollected Joseph’s trials in the round house and the dungeon, and remembered his royal dignity as prince of Egypt; and now with a full burst of harmony, as if the music of heaven had united with his own, as when the widened river meets the sea, and the tide coming up doth amalgamate with the stream that cometh down, and swelleth into a broad expanse, so did the glory of heaven meet the rapture of his earthly feelings, and giving vent to his soul, he sung ‘Joseph is a fruitful bough, even a fruitful bough by a well, whose branches run over the wall; the archers have sorely grieved him, and shot at him, and hated him; but his bow abode in strength, and the arms of his hands were made strong by the hands of the mighty God of Jacob; (from thence is the shepherd, the stone of Israel) even by the God of thy father, who shall help thee; and by the Almighty, who shall bless thee with blessings of heaven above, blessings of the deep that lieth under, blessings of the breasts, and of the womb: the blessings of thy fathers have prevailed above the blessings of my progenitors unto the utmost bound of the everlasting hills: they shall be on the head of Joseph, and on the crown of the head of him that was separate from his brethren.’ What a splendid stanza with which to close! He has only one more blessing to give; but surely this was the richest which he conferred on Joseph.

Joseph is dead, but the Lord has his Josephs now. There are some still who understand by experience—and that is the best kind of understanding—the meaning of this passage, ‘The archers have sorely grieved him, and shot at him, and hated him: but his bow abode in strength, and the arms of his hands were made strong by the hands of the mighty God of Jacob.’

There are four things for us to consider this morning: first of all, the cruel attack,—‘the archers have sorely grieved him, and shot at him, and hated him’; secondly, the shielded warrior,—‘but his bow abode in strength’; thirdly, his secret strength,—‘the arms of his hands were made strong by the mighty power of the God of Jacob’; and fourthly, the glorious parallel drawn between Joseph and Christ,—‘from thence is the shepherd, the stone of Israel’.

First, then, we commence with the cruel attack. ‘The archers have sorely grieved him.’ Joseph’s enemies were archers. The original has it, ‘masters of the arrows’, that is, men who were well skilled in the use of the arrow. Though all weapons are alike approved by the warrior in his thirst for blood, there seems something more cowardly in the attack of the archer, than in that of the swordsman. The swordsman plants himself near you, foot to foot, and lets you defend yourself and deal your blows against him; but the archer stands at a distance, hides himself in ambuscade, and, without your knowing it, the arrow comes whizzing through the air, and perhaps penetrates your heart. Just so are the enemies of God’s people. They very seldom come foot to foot with us; they will not show their faces before us; they hate the light, they love darkness; they dare not come and openly accuse us to our face, for then we could reply; but they shoot the bow from a distance, so that we cannot answer them; cowardly and dastardly as they are, they forge their arrowheads, and aim them, winged with hell-bird’s feathers, at the hearts of God’s people. The archers sorely grieved poor Joseph. Let us consider who are the archers who so cruelly shot at him. First, there were the archers of envy; secondly, the archers of temptation; and thirdly, the archers of slander and calumny.

First, Joseph had to endure the archers of envy. When he was a boy, his father loved him. The youth was fair and beautiful; in person, he was to be admired; moreover, he had a mind that was gigantic, and an intellect that was lofty; but, best of all in him dwelt the spirit of the living God. He was one who talked with God; a youth of piety and prayerfulness; beloved of God, even more than he was by his earthly father. Oh! how his father loved him! for in his fond affection, he made him a princely coat of many colours, and treated him better than the others—a natural but foolish way of showing his fondness. Therefore, his brethren hated him. Full often did they jeer at the youthful Joseph, when he retired to his prayers; when he was with them at a distance from his father’s house, he was their drudge, their slave; the taunt, the jeer, did often wound his heart, and the young child endured much secret sorrow. On an ill day, as it happened, he was with them at a distance from home, and they thought to slay him; but upon the entreaty of Reuben they put him into a pit, until, as providence would have it, the Ishmaelites did pass that way. They then sold him for the price of a slave, stripped him of his coat, and sent him naked, they knew not, and they cared not whither, so long as he might be out of their way, and no longer provoke their envy and their anger. Oh! the agonies he felt,—parted from his father, losing his brethren, without a friend, dragged away by cruel-mansellers, chained upon a camel it may be, with fetters upon his hands. Those who have borne the gyves and fetters, those who have felt that they were not free men, that they had not liberty, might tell how sorely the archers grieved him when they shot at him the arrows of their envy. He became a slave, sold from his country, dragged from all he loved. Farewell to home and all its pleasures—farewell to a father’s smiles and tender cares. He must be a slave, and toil where the slaves’ task-master makes him; he must be exposed in the market, he must be stripped in the streets, he must be beaten, he must be scourged, he must be reduced from the man to the animal, from the free man to the slave. Truly the archers sorely shot at him. And, my brethren, do you hope, if you are the Lord’s Josephs, that you shall escape envy? I tell you, nay; that green-eyed monster envy, lives in London as well as elsewhere, and he creeps into God’s church, moreover. Oh! it is hardest of all to be envied by one’s brethren. If the devil hates us, we can bear it; if the foes of God’s truth speak ill of us, we buckle up our harness, and say, ‘Away, away, to the conflict.’ But when the friends within the house slander us; when brethren who should uphold us, turn our foes; and when they try to tread down their younger brethren; then, sirs, there is some meaning in the passage, ‘The archers have sorely grieved him, and shot at him, and hated him.’ But blessed be God’s name, it is sweet to be informed that ‘his bow abode in strength’. None of you can be the people of God without provoking envy; and the better you are, the more you will be hated. The ripest fruit is most pecked by the birds, and the blossoms that have been longest on the tree, are the most easily blown down by the wind. But fear not; you have nought to do with what man shall say of you. If God loves you, man will hate you; if God honours you, man will dishonour you. But recollect, could ye wear chains for Christ’s sake, ye should wear chains of gold in heaven, could ye have rings of burning iron round your waists, ye should have your brow rimmed with gold in glory; for blessed are ye when men shall say all manner of evil against you falsely, for Christ’s name sake; for so persecuted they the prophets that were before you. The first archers were the archers of envy.

But a worse trial than this was to overtake him. The archers of temptation shot at him. Here I know not how to express myself. I would that some one more qualified to speak were here, that he might tell you the tale of Joseph’s trial, and Joseph’s triumph. Sold to a master who soon discovered his value, Joseph was made the bailiff of the house, and the manager of the household. His wanton mistress fixed her adulterous love on him; and he, being continually in her presence, was perpetually, day by day, solicited by her to evil deeds. Constantly did he refuse, still enduring a martyrdom at the slow fire of her enticements. On one eventful day she grasped him, seeking to compel him to crime; but he, like a true hero, as he was, said to her, ‘How can I do this great wickedness and sin against God?’ Like a wise warrior, he knew that in such a case fleeing was the better part of valour. He heard a voice in his ears, ‘Fly, Joseph, fly; there remains no way of victory but flight’; and out he fled, leaving his garment with his adulterous mistress. Oh, I say in all the annals of heroism there is not one that shall surpass this. You know it is opportunity that makes a man criminal, and he had abundant opportunity; but importunity will drive most men astray. To be haunted day by day by solicitations of the softest kind—to be tempted hour by hour—oh! it needs a strength super-angelic, a might more than human, a strength which only God can grant, for a young man thus to cleanse his way, and take heed thereto according to God’s word. He might have reasoned within himself, ‘Should I submit and yield, there lies before me a life of ease and pleasure; I shall be exalted, I shall be rich. She shall prevail over her husband, to cover me with honours; but should I still adhere to my integrity, I shall be cast into prison, I shall be thrown into the dungeon; there awaits me nothing but shame and disgrace.’ Oh! there was a power indeed within that heart of his; there was an inconceivable might, which made him turn away with unutterable disgust, with fear and trembling, while he said, ‘How can I? how can I—God’s Joseph—how can I—other men might, but how can I do this great wickedness and sin against God.’ Truly the archers sorely grieved him and shot at him; but his bow abode in strength. Then another host of archers assailed him: these were the archers of malicious calumny. Seeing that he would not yield to temptation, his mistress falsely accused him to her husband, and his lord believing the voice of his wife, cast him into prison. It was a marvellous providence that he did not put him to death, for Potiphar, his master, was the chief of the slaughtermen; he had only to call in a soldier, who would have cut him in pieces on the spot. But he cast him into prison. There was poor Joseph. His character ruined in the eyes of man, and very likely looked upon with scorn even in the prison-house; base criminals went away from him as if they thought him viler than themselves, as if they were angels in comparison with him. Oh! it is no easy thing to feel your character gone, to think that you are slandered, that things are said of you that are untrue. Many a man’s heart has been broken by this, when nothing else could make him yield. The archers sorely grieved him when he was so maligned—so slandered. O child of God, dost thou expect to escape these archers? Wilt thou never be slandered? Shalt thou never be calumniated? It is the lot of God’s servants, in proportion to their zeal, to be evil spoken of. Remember the noble Whitfield, how he stood and was the butt of all the jeers and scoffs of half an age, while his only answer was a blameless life.

And he who forged, and he who threw the dart,

Had each a brother’s interest in his heart.

They reviled him and imputed to him crimes that Sodom never knew. So shall it be always with those who preach God’s truth, and all the followers of Christ—they must all expect it; but blessed be God, they have not said worse things of us than they said of our Master. What have they laid to our charge? They may have said ‘He is drunken and a winebibber’: but they have not said ‘He hath a devil.’ They have accused us of being mad, so was it said of Paul. Oh, holy infatuation, heavenly furor, would that we could bite others until they had the same madness. We think if to go to heaven be mad, we will not choose to be wise; we see no wisdom in preferring hell; we can see no great prudence in despising and hating God’s truth. If to serve God be vile, we purpose to be viler still. Ah! friends, some now present know this verse by heart, ‘The archers have sorely grieved him, and shot at him, and hated him.’ Expect it; do not think it a strange thing; all God’s people must have it. There are no royal roads to heaven—they are paths of trial and trouble: the archers will shoot at you as long as you are on this side of the flood.

We have seen these archers shoot their flights of arrows; we will now go up the hill a little, behind a rock, to look at the shielded warrior and see how his courage is while the archers have sorely grieved him. What is he doing? ‘His bow abideth in strength.’ Let us picture God’s favourite. The archers are down below. There is a parapet of rock before him; now and then he looks over it to see what the archers are about, but generally he keeps behind. In heavenly security he is set upon a rock, careless of all below. Let us follow the track of the wild goat, and behold the warrior in his fastness.

First, we notice that he has a bow himself, for we read that ‘his bow abode in strength’. He could have retaliated if he pleased, but he was very quiet and would not combat with them. Had he pleased, he might have drawn his bow with all his strength, and sent his weapon to their hearts with far greater precision than they had ever done to him. But mark the warrior’s quietness. There he rests, stretching his mighty limbs; his bow abode in strength; he seemed to say, ‘Rage on, ay, let your arrows spend themselves, empty your quivers on me, let your bow-strings be worn out, and let the wood be broken with its constant bending: here am I, stretching myself in safe repose; my bow abides in strength; I have other work to do besides shooting at you; my arrows are against yon foes of God, the enemies of the Most High; I cannot waste an arrow on such pitiful sparrows as you are; ye are birds beneath my noble shot; I would not waste an arrow on you.’ Thus he remains behind the rock and despises them all. His bow abideth in strength.

Mark well his quietness. His bow ‘abideth’. It is not rattling, it is not always moving, but it abides, it is quite still; he takes no notice of the attack. The archers sorely grieved Joseph, but his bow was not turned against them, it abode in strength. He turned not his bow on them. He rested while they raged. Doth the moon stay herself to lecture every dog that bayeth her? Doth the lion turn aside to rend each cur that barketh at him? Do the stars cease to shine because the nightingales reprove them for their dimness? Doth the sun stop in its course because of the officious cloud which veils it? Or doth the river stay because the willow dippeth its leaves into its waters? Ah! no; God’s universe moves on, and if men will oppose it, it heeds them not. It is as God hath made it; it is working together for good, and it shall not be stayed by the censure, nor moved on by the praise of man. Let your bows, my brethren, abide. Do not be in a hurry to set yourselves right. God will take care of you. Leave yourselves alone; only be very valiant for the Lord God of Israel: be steadfast in the truth of Jesus, and your bow shall abide.

But we must not forget the next word. ‘His bow abode in strength.’ Though his bow was quiet, it was not because it was broken. Joseph’s bow was like that of William the Conqueror, no man could bend it but Joseph himself; it abode ‘in strength’. I see the warrior bending his bow—how with his mighty arms he pulls it down and draws the string to make it ready. His bow abode in strength; it did not snap, it did not start aside. His chastity was his bow, and he did not lose that: his faith was his bow, and that did not yield, it did not break; his courage was his bow, and that did not fail him; his character, his honesty was his bow; he did not cast it away. Some men are so very particular about reputation. They think, ‘Surely, surely, surely they shall lose their characters.’ Well, well, if we do not lose them through our own fault, we never need care about anybody else. You know there is not a man that stands at all prominent, but what any fool in the world can set afloat some bad tale against him. It is a great deal easier to set a story afloat than to stop it. If you want truth to go round the world you must hire an express train to pull it; but if you want a lie to go round the world, it will fly; it is as light as a feather, and a breath will carry it. It is well said in the old Proverb, ‘A lie will go round the world while truth is pulling its boots on.’ Nevertheless, it does not injure us; for if light as a feather it travels as fast, its effect is just about as tremendous as the effect of down, when it is blown against the walls of a castle: it produces no damage whatever, on account of its lightness and littleness. Fear not, Christian. Let slander fly, let envy send forth its forked tongue, let it hiss at you, your bow shall abide in strength. Oh! shielded warrior, remain quiet, fear no ill; but, like the eagle in its lofty eyrie, look thou down upon the fowlers in the plain; turn thy bold eye upon them and say, ‘Shoot ye may, but your shots will not reach half way to the pinnacle where I stand. Waste your powder upon me if ye will; I am beyond your reach.’ Then clap your wings, mount to heaven and there laugh them to scorn, for you have made your refuge God, and shall find a most secure abode.

III. The third thing in our text is the secret strength. ‘The arms of his hands were made strong by the hands of the mighty God of Jacob.’ First, notice concerning his strength, that it was real strength. It says, ‘the arms of his hands’, not his hands only. You know some people can do a great deal with their hands, but then it is often fictitious power; there is no might in the arm—there is no muscles, but of Joseph it is said, ‘the arms of his hands were made strong’. It was real potency, true muscle, real sinew, real nerve. It was not simply slight of hand—the power of moving his fingers very swiftly—but the arms of his hands were made strong. Now, that strength which God gives to his Josephs is real strength; it is not a boasted valour, a fiction, a thing of which men talk, an airy dream, an unsubstantial unreality, but it is real strength. I should not like to have a combat with one of God’s Josephs. I should find their blows very heavy. I fear a Christian’s strokes more than any other man’s, for he has bone and sinew, and smites hard. Let the foes of the church expect a hard struggle if they attack an heir of life. Mightier than giants are men of the race of heaven; should they once arouse themselves to battle, they could laugh at the spear and the habergeon. But they are a patient generation, enduring ills without resenting them, suffering scorn without reviling the scoffer. Their triumph is to come when their enemies shall receive the vengeance due; then shall it be seen by an assembled world that the ‘little flock’ were men of high estate, and the ‘offscouring of all things’ were verily men of real strength and dignity.

Even though the world perceive it not, the favoured Joseph has real strength, not in his hands only, but in his arms—real might, real power. O ye foes of God, ye think God’s people are despicable and powerless; but know that they have true strength from the omnipotence of their Father, a might substantial and divine. Your own shall melt away, and droop and die, like the snow upon the low mountain’s top, when the sun shines upon it, it melteth into water; but our vigour shall abide like the snow on the summit of the Alps, undiminished for ages. It is real strength.

Then observe that the strength of God’s Joseph is divine strength. His arms were made strong by God. Why does one of God’s ministers preach the gospel powerfully? Because God gives him assistance. Why does Joseph stand against temptation? Because God gives him aid. The strength of a Christian is divine strength. My brethren, I am more and more persuaded every day that the sinner has no power of himself, except that which is given him from above. I know that if I were to stand with my foot upon the golden threshold of heaven’s portal, if I could put this thumb upon the latch, I could not open that door, after having gone so far towards heaven, unless I had still supernatural power communicated to me in that moment. If I had a stone to lift, to work my own salvation, without God’s help to do that, I must be lost, even though it were so little. There is nought that we can do without the power of God. All true strength is divine. As the light cometh from the sun, as the shower from heaven, so doth spiritual strength come from the Father of lights, with whom there is neither variableness nor shadow of a turning.

Again: I would have you notice in the text in what a blessedly familiar way God gives this strength to Joseph. It says, ‘the arms of his hands were made strong by the hands of the mighty God of Jacob’. Thus it represents God as putting his hands on Joseph’s hands, placing his arms on Joseph’s arms. In old times, when every boy had to be trained up to archery, if his father were worth so many pounds a-year, you might see the father putting his hands on his boy’s hands and pulling the bow for him, saying, ‘There, my son, in this manner draw the bow.’ So the text represents God as putting his hand on the hand of Joseph, and laying his broad arm along the arm of his chosen child, that he might be made strong. Like as a father teaches his children, so the Lord teaches them that fear him. He puts his arms upon them. As Elijah laid with his mouth upon the child’s mouth, with his hand upon the child’s hand, with his foot upon the child’s foot, so does God put his mouth to his children’s mouth, his hand on his minister’s hand, his foot to his people’s foot: and so he makes us strong. Marvellous condescension! Ye stars of glory, have ye ever witnessed such stoops of love? God Almighty, Eternal, Omnipotent, stoops from his throne and lays his hand upon the child’s hand, stretching his arm upon the arm of Joseph, that he may be made strong!

One more thought, and I have done. This strength was covenant strength, for it is said, ‘The arms of his hands were made strong by the hands of the mighty God of Jacob.’ Now, wherever you read of the God of Jacob in the Bible, you may know that that respects God’s covenant with Jacob. Ah! I love to talk about God’s everlasting covenant. Some of the Arminians cannot bear it, but I love a covenant salvation—a covenant not made with my fathers, not between me and God, but between Christ and God. Christ made the covenant to pay a price, and God made the covenant that he should have the people. Christ has paid the price, and ratified the covenant, and I am quite sure that God will fulfil his part of it, by giving every elect vessel of mercy into the hands of Jesus. But, beloved, all the power, all the grace, all the blessings, all the mercies, all the comforts, all the things we have, we have through the covenant. If there were no covenant: if we could rend the everlasting charter up: if the king of hell could cut it with his knife, as the king of Israel did the roll of Baruch, then we should fail indeed: for we have no strength, except that which is promised in the covenant. Covenant mercies, covenant grace, covenant promises, covenant blessings, covenant help, covenant everything—the Christian must receive if he would enter into heaven.

Now, Christian, the archers have sorely grieved you, and shot at you, and wounded you; but your bow abides in strength, and the arms of your hands are made strong. But do you know, O believer, that you are like your Master in this?

That is our fourth point—a glorious parallel. ‘From thence is the shepherd, the stone of Israel.’ Jesus Christ was served just the same; the shepherd, the stone of Israel, passed through similar trials; he was shot at by the archers, he was grieved and wounded, but his bow abode in strength; his arms were made strong by the God of Jacob, and now every blessing rests ‘upon the crown of the head of him who was separate from his brethren’. I shall not detain you long, but I have a few things to tell you: first about Christ as the shepherd, and then about Christ the stone.

Christ came into the world as a shepherd. As soon as he made his appearance, the Scribes and Pharisees said, ‘Ah! we have been the shepherds until this hour: now we shall be driven from our honours, we shall lose all our dignity, and our authority. Consequently they always shot at him. As for the people, they were a fickle herd; I believe that many of them respected and admired Christ, though, doubtless, the vast majority hated him, for wherever he went he was a popular preacher; the multitude always thronged him and crowded round him, crying, ‘Hosannah’. I think, if you had walked up to the top of that hill of Calvary, and asked one of those men who cried out, ‘Crucify him, crucify him’, ‘What do you say that for? Is he a bad man?’ ‘No,’ he would have said, ‘he went about doing good.’ ‘Then why do you say crucify him?’ ‘Because Rabbi Simeon gave me a shekel to help the clamour.’ So the multitude were much won by the money and influence of the priests. But they were glad to hear Christ after all. It was the shepherds that hated him, because he took away their traffic, because he turned the buyers and sellers out of the temple, diminished their dignity and ignored their pretensions; therefore, they could not endure him. But the Shepherd of Israel mounted higher and higher; he gathered his sheep, carried the lambs in his bosom; and he now stands acknowledged as the great Shepherd of the sheep, who shall gather them into one flock and lead them to heaven. Rowland Hill tells a curious tale, in his Village Dialogues, about a certain Mr Tiplash, a very fine intellectual preacher, who, in one of his flights of oratory, said, ‘O Virtue, thou art so fair and lovely, if thou were to come down upon earth, all men would love thee’; with a few more pretty, beautiful things. Mr Blunt, an honest preacher, who was in the neighbourhood, was asked to preach in the afternoon, and he supplemented the worthy gentleman’s remarks, by saying, ‘O Virtue, thou didst come on earth, in all thy purity and loveliness, but, instead of being beloved and admired, the archers sorely shot at thee and grieved thee; they took thee, Virtue, and hung thy quivering limbs upon a cross; when thou didst hang there dying they hissed at thee, they mocked thee, they scorned thee; when thou didst ask for water they gave thee vinegar to drink, mingled with gall, yea, when thou diedst thou hadst a tomb from charity, and that tomb, sealed by enmity and hatred.’ The Shepherd of Israel was despised, incarnate virtue was hated and abhorred; therefore, fear not Christians, take courage, for if your Master passed through it, surely you must.

To conclude: the text calls Christ the stone of Israel. I have heard a story—I cannot tell whether it is true or not—out of some of the Jewish rabbis; it is a tale, concerning the text, ‘The stone which the builders refused, the same is become the head-stone of the corner.’ It is said that when Solomon’s temple was building, all the stones were brought from the quarry ready cut and fashioned, and there were marked on all the blocks the places where they were to be put. Amongst the stones was a very curious one; it seemed of no describable shape, it appeared unfit for any portion of the building. They tried it at this wall, but it would not fit; they tried it in another, but it could not be accommodated; so, vexed and angry, they threw it away. The temple was so many years building, that this stone became covered with moss, and grass grew around it. Everybody passing by laughed at the stone; they said Solomon was wise, and doubtless all the other stones were right; but as for that block, they might as well send it back to the quarry, for they were quite sure it was meant for nothing. Year after year rolled on, and the poor stone was still despised, the builders constantly refused it. The eventful day came when the temple was to be finished and opened, and the multitude was as assembled to see the grand sight. The builders said, ‘Where is the top-stone? Where is the pinnacle?’ they little thought where the crowning marble was, until someone said, ‘Perhaps that stone which the builders refused is meant to be the top-stone.’ They then took it, and hoisted it to the top of the house; and as it reached the summit, they found it well adapted to the place. Loud hosannas made the welkin ring, as the stone which the builders refused thus became the head-stone of the corner. So is it with Christ Jesus. The builders cast him away. He was a plebeian; he was of poor extraction; he was a man acquainted with sinners, who walked in poverty and meanness; hence the worldly-wise despised him. But when God shall gather together, in one, all things that are in heaven and that are in earth, then Christ shall be the glorious consummation of all things.

Christ reigns in heaven the topmost stone,

And well deserves the praise.

He shall be exalted; he shall be honoured; his name shall endure as long as the sun, and all nations shall be blessed in him, yea, all generations shall call him blessed.

The post Joseph Attacked by the Archers: C. H. Spurgeon Sermon appeared first on Banner of Truth UK.

DELIVERED ON SABBATH MORNING, MARCH 25, 1855, BY THE

REV. C. H. SPURGEON,

AT EXETER HALL, STRAND.

‘For, behold, he prayeth.’—Acts 9:11.

GOD has many methods of quenching persecution. He will not suffer his church to be injured by its enemies, or overwhelmed by its foes; and he is not short of means for turning aside the way of the wicked, or of turning it upside down. In two ways he usually accomplishes his end: sometimes by the confusion of the persecutor, and at others in a more blessed manner, by his conversion. Sometimes he confuses and confounds his enemies; he makes the diviner mad; he lets the man who comes against him be utterly destroyed, suffers him to drive on to his own destruction, and then at last turns round in triumphant derision upon the man who hoped to have said aha! aha! to the church of God. But at other times, as in this case, he converts the persecutor. Thus, he transforms the foe into a friend; he makes the man who was a warrior against the gospel, a soldier for it. Out of darkness he bringeth forth light; out of the eater he getteth honey; yea, out of stony hearts he raiseth up children unto Abraham.

Such was the case with Saul. A more furious bigot it is impossible to conceive. He had been bespattered with the blood of Stephen when they stoned him to death; so officious was he in his cruelty, that the men left their clothes in the charge of a young man named Saul. Living at Jerusalem, in the college of Gamaliel, he constantly came in contact with the disciples of the Man of Nazareth; he laughed at them, he reviled them as they passed along the street; he procured enactments against them, and put them to death; and now, as a crowning point, this were-wolf, having tasted blood, becomes exceeding mad, determines to go to Damascus, that he may glut himself with the gore of men and women; that he may bind the Christians, and bring them to Jerusalem, there to suffer what he considered to be a just punishment for their heresy, and departure from their ancient religion. But oh! how marvellous was the power of God! Jesus stays this man in his mad career; just as with his lance in rest he was dashing against Christ, Christ met him, unhorsed him, threw him on the ground, and questioned him, ‘Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me?’ He then graciously removed his rebellious heart—gave him a new heart and a right spirit—turned his aim and object—led him to Damascus—laid him prostrate for three days and nights—spoke to him—made mystic sounds go murmuring through his ears—set his whole soul on fire; and when at last he started up from that three days’ trance, and began to pray, then it was that Jesus from heaven descended, came in a vision to Ananias, and said, ‘Arise, and go into the street which is called Straight, and inquire in the house of Judas for one called Saul, of Tarsus: for, behold, he prayeth.’

First, our text was an announcement: ‘Behold, he prayeth.’ Secondly, it was an argument: ‘For, behold, he prayeth.’ Then, to conclude, we will try to make an application of our text to your hearts. Though application is the work of God alone, we will trust that he will be pleased to make that application while the word is preached this morning.

I. First, here was an announcement: ‘Go enquire for Saul of Tarsus: for behold, he prayeth.’ Without any preface, let me say that this was the announcement of a fact which was noticed in heaven, which was joyous to the angels, which was astonishing to Ananias, and which was a novelty to Saul himself.

It was the announcement of a fact which was noticed in heaven. Poor Saul had been led to cry for mercy, and the moment he began to pray God began to hear. Do you not notice, in reading the chapter, what attention God paid to Saul? He knew the street where he lived: ‘Go to the street that is called Straight.’ He knew the house where he resided: ‘Enquire at the house of Judas.’ He knew his name; it was Saul. He knew the place where he came from: ‘Enquire for Saul of Tarsus.’ And he knew that he had prayed. ‘Behold, he prayeth.’ Oh! it is a glorious fact that prayers are noticed in heaven. The poor broken-hearted sinner climbing up to his chamber, bends his knee, but can only utter his wailing in the language of sighs and tears. Lo! that groan has made all the harps of heaven thrill with music; that tear has been caught by God and put into the lachrymatory of heaven, to be perpetually preserved. The suppliant, whose fears prevent his words, will be well understood by the Most High. He may only shed one hasty tear; but ‘prayer is the falling of a tear’. Tears are the diamonds of heaven; sighs are a part of the music of Jehovah’s throne; for though prayers be

The simplest form of speech

That infant lips can try;

So are they likewise, the

Sublimest strains that reach

The majesty on high.

Let me dilate on this thought a moment. Prayers are noticed in heaven. Oh! I know what is the case with many of you. You think, ‘If I turn to God, if I seek him, surely I am so inconsiderable a being, so guilty and vile, that it cannot be imagined he would take any notice of me.’ My friends, harbour no such heathenish ideas. Our God is no God who sits in one perpetual dream; nor doth he clothe himself in such thick darkness that he cannot see; he is not like Baal, who heareth not. True, he may not regard battles; he cares not for the pomp and pageantry of kings; he listens not to the swell of martial music; he regards not the triumph and the pride of man; but wherever there is a heart big with sorrow, wherever there is an eye suffused with tears, wherever there is a lip quivering with agony, wherever there is a deep groan, or a penitential sigh, the ear of Jehovah is wide open; he marks it down in the registry of his memory; he puts our prayers, like rose leaves, between the pages of his book of remembrance, and when the volume is opened at last, there shall be a precious fragrance springing up therefrom. Oh! poor sinner, of the blackest and vilest character, thy prayers are heard, and even now God hath said of thee, ‘Behold, he prayeth.’ Where was it—in a barn? Where was it—in the closet? Was it at thy bedside this morning, or in this hall? Art thou now glancing thine eye to heaven? Speak, poor heart. Did I hear thy lips just now mutter out ‘God have mercy upon me, a sinner?’ I tell thee, sinner, there is one thing which doth outstrip the telegraph. You know we can now send a message and receive an answer in a few moments; but I read of something in the Bible more swift than the electric fluid. ‘Before they call I will answer, and while they are speaking I will hear.’ So then, poor sinner, thou art noticed; yea, thou art heard by him that sitteth on the throne.

Again; this was the announcement of a fact joyous to heaven. Our text is prefaced with ‘Behold’, for, doubtless, our Saviour himself regarded it with joy. Once only do we read of a smile resting on the countenance of Jesus, when lifting up his eye to heaven, he exclaimed, ‘I thank thee, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto babes: even so, Father; for so it seemed good in thy sight.’ The Shepherd of our souls rejoices in the vision of his sheep securely folded, he triumphs in spirit when he brings a wanderer home. I conceive that when he spoke these words to Ananias, one of the smiles of paradise must have shone from his eyes. ‘Behold’, I have won the heart of my enemy; I have saved my persecutor; even now he is bending the knee at my footstool; ‘Behold, he prayeth.’ Jesus himself led the song, rejoicing over the new convert with singing. Jesus Christ was glad, and rejoiced more over that lost sheep than over ninety and nine that went not astray. And angels rejoiced too. Why, when one of God’s elect is born, angels stand around his cradle. He grows up, and runs into sin, angels follow him, tracking him all his way; they gaze with sorrow upon his many wanderings; the fair Peri drops a tear whene’er that loved one sins. Presently the man is brought under the sound of the gospel. The angel says, ‘Behold, he begins to hear.’ He waits a little while, the word sinks into his heart, a tear runs down his cheek, and at last he cries from his inmost soul, ‘God have mercy upon me!’ See! the angel claps his wings, up he flies to heaven, and says, ‘Brethren angels, list to me: “Behold, he prayeth.”’ Then they set heaven’s bells ringing; they have a jubilee in glory; again they shout with gladsome voices, for verily I tell you, ‘there is joy in heaven among the angels of God over one sinner that repenteth’. They watch us till we pray, and when we pray, they say, ‘Behold, he prayeth.’

Moreover, my dear friends, there may be other spirits in heaven that rejoice, besides the angels. Those persons are our friends who have gone before us. I have not many relations in heaven, but I have one whom I dearly love, who, I doubt not, often prayed for me. For she nursed me when I was a child and brought me up during part of my infancy, and now she sits before the throne in glory—suddenly snatched away. I fancy she looked upon her darling grandson, and as she saw him in the ways of sin, of vice, and folly; she could not look with sorrow, for there are no tears in the eyes of glorified ones; she could not look with regret, because they cannot know such a feeling before the throne of God; but ah! that moment when by sovereign grace, I was constrained to pray, when all alone I bent my knee and wrestled, methinks I see her as she said, ‘Behold, he prayeth; behold, he prayeth.’ Oh! I can picture her countenance. She seemed to have two heavens for a moment, a double bliss, a heaven in me as well as in herself—when she could say, ‘Behold, he prayeth.’ Ah! young man, there is your mother walking the golden streets. She is looking down upon you this hour. She nursed you, on her breast you lay when but a child, and she consecrated you to Jesus Christ. From heaven, she has been watching you with that intense anxiety which is compatible with happiness; this morning she is looking upon you. What sayest thou, young man? Does Christ by his Spirit say in thine heart, ‘Come unto me?’ Dost thou drop the tear of repentance? Methinks I see thy mother as she cries, ‘Behold, he prayeth.’ Once more she bends before the throne of God and says, ‘I thank thee, O thou ever-gracious one, that he who was my child on earth, has now become thy child in light.’

But, if there is one in heaven who has more joy than another over the conversion of a sinner, it is a minister, one of God’s true ministers. O, my hearers, ye little think how God’s true ministers do love your souls. Perhaps ye think it is easy work to stand here and preach to you. God knows, if that were all, it were easy work; but when we think that when we speak to you, your salvation or damnation, in some measure, depends upon what we say—when we reflect that if we are unfaithful watchmen, your blood will God require at our hands—oh, good God, when I reflect that I have preached to thousands in my lifetime, many thousands, and have perhaps said many things I ought not to have said, it startles me, it makes me shake and tremble. Luther said he could face his enemies, but could not go up his pulpit stairs without his knees knocking together. Preaching is not child’s play; it is not a thing to be done without labour and anxiety; it is solemn work; it is awful work, if you view it in its relation to eternity. Ah! how God’s minister prays for you! If you might have listened under the eaves of his chamber window, you would have heard him groaning every Sunday night over his sermons because he had not spoken with more effect, you would have heard him pleading with God, ‘Who hath believed our report? To whom is the arm of the Lord revealed?’ Ah, when he observes you from his rest in heaven—when he sees you praying, how will he clap his hands and say, ‘Behold the child thou hast given me! behold, he prays.’ I am sure when we see one brought to know the Lord, we feel very much like one who has saved a fellow creature from being drowned. There is a poor man in the flood; he is going down, he is sinking, he must be drowned; but I spring in, grasp him firmly, lift him on the shore, and lay him on the ground; the physician comes; he looks at him, he puts his hand upon him, and says, ‘I am afraid he is dead.’ We apply all the means in our power, we do what we can to restore life. I feel that I have been that man’s deliverer, and oh, how I stoop down and put my ear beside his mouth! at last I say, ‘He breathes! he breathes!’ What pleasure there is in that thought! He breathes; there is life still. So when we find a man praying, we shout—he breathes; he is not dead; he is alive; for while a man prays he is not dead in trespasses and sins, but is brought to life, is quickened by the power of the Spirit. ‘Behold, he prayeth.’ This was joyful news in heaven, as well as being noticed by God.

Then in the next place, this was an event most astonishing to men. Ananias lifted up both his hands in amazement. ‘O my Lord, I should have thought anybody would pray but that man! Is it possible?’ I do not know how it is with other ministers, but sometimes I look upon such-and-such individuals in the congregation, and I say, ‘Well, they are very hopeful; I think I shall have them. I trust there is a work going on, and hope soon to hear them tell what the Lord has done for their souls.’ Soon, perhaps, I see nothing of them, and miss them altogether; but instead thereof, my good Master sends me one of whom I had no hope—an outcast, a drunkard, a reprobate, to the praise of the glory of his grace. Then I lift up my hands in astonishment, thinking, ‘I should have thought of anybody rather than you.’ I remember a circumstance which occurred a little while ago. There was a poor man about sixty years old; he had been a rough sailor, one of the worst men in the village; it was his custom to drink, and he seemed to be delighted when he was cursing and swearing. He came into the chapel, however, one Sabbath day, when one nearly related to me was preaching from the text concerning Jesus weeping over Jerusalem. And the poor man thought, ‘What! did Jesus Christ ever weep over such a wretch as I am?’ He thought he was too bad for Christ to care for him. At last he came to the minister, and said, ‘Sir, sixty years have I been sailing under the colours of the devil; it is time I should have a new owner; I want to scuttle the old ship and sink her altogether; then I shall have a new one, and I shall sail under the colours of Prince Immanuel.’ Ever since that moment that man has been a praying character, walking before God in all sincerity. Yet he was the very last man you would have thought of. Somehow God does choose the last men; he does not care for the diamond, but he picks up the pebble stones, for he is able, out of ‘stones, to raise up children unto Abraham’. God is more wise than the chemist: he not only refines gold, but he transmutes base metal into precious jewels; he takes the filthiest and the vilest, and fashions them into glorious beings, makes them saints, whereas they have been sinners, and sanctifies them, whereas they have been unholy.

The conversion of Saul was a strange thing; but, beloved, was it stranger than that you and I should have been Christians? Let me ask you if anybody had told you, a few years ago, that you would belong to a church and be numbered with the children of God, what would you have said? ‘Stuff and nonsense! I am not one of your canting methodists; I am not going to have any religion; I love to think and do as I like.’ Did not you and I say so? and how on earth did we get here? When we look at the change that has passed over us, it appears like a dream. God has left many in our families who were better than we were, and why has he chosen us? Oh! is it not strange? Might we not lift up our hands in astonishment, as Ananias did, and say, ‘Behold, behold, behold; it is a miracle on earth, a wonder in heaven’?

The last thing I have to say here, is this—this fact was a novelty to Saul himself. ‘Behold he prayeth.’ What is there novel in that? Saul used to go up to the temple twice a day, at the hour of prayer. If you could have accompanied him, you would have heard him speak beautifully, in words like these: ‘Lord, I thank thee I am not as other men are; I am not an extortioner, nor a publican; I fast twice in the week, and give tithes of all I possess’; and so on. Oh! you might have found him pouring out a fine oration before the throne of God. And yet it saith, ‘Behold, he prayeth.’ What! had he never prayed before? No, never. All he had ever done before went for nothing; it was not prayer. I have heard of an old gentleman, who was taught, when a child, to pray, ‘Pray God bless my father and mother’, and he kept on praying the same thing for seventy years, when his parents were both dead. After that it pleased God, in his infinite mercy, to touch his heart, and he was led to see that, notwithstanding his constancy to his forms, he had not been praying at all; he often said his prayers, but never prayed. So it was with Saul. He had pronounced his magniloquent orations, but they were all good for nothing. He had prayed his long prayers for a pretence; it had all been a failure. Now comes a true petition, and it is said, ‘Behold, he prayeth.’ Do you see that man trying to obtain a hearing from his Maker? How he stands! He speaks Latin and blank verse before the Almighty’s throne; but God sits in calm indifference paying no attention. Then the man tries a different style; procures a book, and bending his knee again, prays in a delightful form the best old prayer that could ever be put together; but the Most High disregards his empty formalities. At last the poor creature throws the book away, forgets his blank verse, and says, ‘O Lord, hear, for Christ’s sake.’ ‘Hear him,’ says God, ‘I have heard him.’ There is the mercy thou hast sought. One hearty prayer is better than ten thousand forms. One prayer coming from the soul is better than a myriad cold readings. As for prayers that spring from the mouth and head only, God abhors them; he loves those that come deep from the heart. Perhaps I should be impudent if I were to say that there are hundreds here this morning who never prayed once in their lives. There are some of you who never did. There is one young man over there, who told his parents when he left them, that he should always go through his form of prayer every morning and night. But he is ashamed, and he has left it off. Well, young man, what will you do when you come to die? Will you have ‘the watchword at the gates of death’? Will you ‘enter heaven by prayer’? No, you will not; you will be driven from God’s presence, and be cast away.

II. Secondly, we have here an argument. ‘For, behold he prayeth.’ It was an argument, first of all, for Ananias’ safety. Poor Ananias was afraid to go to Saul; he thought it was very much like stepping into a lion’s den. ‘If I go to his house,’ he thought, ‘the moment he sees me, he will take me to Jerusalem at once, for I am one of Christ’s disciples, I dare not go.’ God says, ‘Behold, he prayeth.’ ‘Well,’ says Ananias, ‘that is enough for me. If he is a praying man, he will not hurt me; if he is a man of real devotion, I am safe.’ Be sure you may always trust a praying man. I do not know how it is, but even ungodly men always pay a reverence to a sincere Christian. A master likes to have a praying servant after all; if he does not regard religion himself, he likes to have a pious servant, and he will trust him rather than any other. True, there are some of your professedly praying people that have not a bit of prayer in them. But whenever you find a really praying man, trust him with untold gold; for if he really prays, you need not be afraid of him. He who communes with God in secret, may be trusted in public. I always feel safe with a man who is a visitor to the mercy-seat. I have heard an anecdote of two gentlemen travelling together, somewhere in Switzerland. Presently they came into the midst of the forests; and you know the gloomy tales the people tell about the inns there, how dangerous it is to lodge in them. One of them, an infidel, said to the other, who was a Christian, ‘I don’t like stopping here at all, it is very dangerous indeed.’ ‘Well,’ said the other, ‘let us try.’ So they went into a house, but it looked so suspicious that neither of them liked it; and they thought they would prefer being at home in England. Presently the landlord said, ‘Gentlemen, I always read and pray with my family before going to bed; will you allow me to do so to-night?’ ‘Yes,’ they said, ‘with the greatest pleasure.’ When they went up stairs, the infidel said, ‘I am not at all afraid now.’ ‘Why?’ said the Christian. ‘Because our host has prayed.’ ‘Oh!’ said the other, ‘then it seems, after all, you think something of religion; because a man prays, you can go to sleep in his house.’ And it was marvellous how both of them did sleep. Sweet dreams they had, for they felt that where the house had been roofed by prayer, and walled with devotion, there could not be found a man living that would commit an injury to them. This, then, was an argument to Ananias, that he might go with safety to Saul’s house.

But more than this. Here was an argument for Paul’s sincerity. Secret prayer is one of the best tests of sincere religion. If Jesus had said to Ananias, ‘Behold, he preacheth’, Ananias would have said, ‘That he may do, and yet be a deceiver.’ If he had said, ‘He is gone to a meeting of the church’, Ananias would have said, ‘He may enter there as a wolf in sheep’s clothing.’ But when he said, ‘Behold, he prayeth’, that was argument enough. A young person comes and tells me about what he has felt and what he has been doing. At last I say, ‘Kneel down and pray.’ ‘I would much rather not.’ ‘Never mind, you shall.’ Down he falls on his knees, he has hardly a word to say; he begins groaning and crying, and there he stays on his knees till at last he stammers out, ‘Lord have mercy upon me a sinner; I am the greatest of sinners; have mercy upon me!’ Then I am a little more satisfied, and I say, ‘I did not mind all your talk, I wanted your prayers.’ But oh! if I could trace him home; if I could see him go and pray alone, then I should feel sure; for he who prays in private is a real Christian. The mere reading of a book of daily devotion will not prove you a child of God; if you pray in private, then you have a sincere religion; a little religion, if sincere, is better than mountains of pretence. Home piety is the best piety. Praying will make you leave off sinning, or sinning will make you leave off praying. Prayer in the heart proves the reality of conversion. A man may be sincere, but sincerely wrong. Paul was sincerely right. ‘Behold, he prayeth’, was the best argument that his religion was right. If any one should ask me for an epitome of the Christian religion, I should say it is in that one word—‘prayer’. If I should be asked, ‘What will take in the whole of Christian experience?’ I should answer, ‘prayer’. A man must have been convinced of sin before he could pray; he must have had some hope that there was mercy for him before he could pray. In fact, all the Christian virtues are locked up in that word, prayer. Do but tell me you are a man of prayer, and I will reply at once, ‘Sir, I have no doubt of the reality, as well as the sincerity, of your religion.’

But one more thought, and I will leave this subject. It was a proof of this man’s election, for you read directly afterwards, ‘Behold, he is a chosen vessel.’ I often find people troubling themselves about the doctrine of election. Every now and then I get a letter from somebody or other taking me to task for preaching election. All the answer I can give is, ‘There it is in the Bible; go and ask my Master why he put it there. I cannot help it. I am only a serving man, and I tell you the message from above. If I were a footman I should not alter my Master’s message at the door. I happen to be an ambassador of heaven, and I dare not alter the message I have received. If it is wrong, send up to head-quarters. There it is, and I cannot alter it.’ This much let me say in explanation. Some say, ‘How can I discover whether I am God’s elect? I am afraid I am not God’s elect.’ Do you pray? If it can be said, ‘Behold, he prayeth’, it can also be said, ‘Behold he is a chosen vessel.’ Have you faith? If so, you are elect. Those are the marks of election. If you have none of these you have no grounds for concluding that you belong to the peculiar people of God. Have you a desire to believe? Have you a wish to love Christ? Have you the millionth part of a desire to come to Christ? And is it a practical desire? Does it lead you to offer earnest, tearful supplication? If so, never be afraid of non-election; for whoever prays with sincerity, was ordained of God before the foundation of the world, that he should be holy and without blame before Christ in love.

III. Now for the application. A word or two with you, my dear friends, before I send you away this morning. I regret that I cannot better enter into the subject; but my glorious Master requires of each of us according to what we have, not according to what we have not. I am deeply conscious that I fail in urging home the truth so solemnly as I ought; nevertheless, ‘my work is with God and my judgment with my God’, and the last day shall reveal that my error lay in judgment, but not in sincere affection for souls.

First, allow me to address the children of God. Do you not see, my dear brethren, that the best mark of our being sons of God is to be found in our devotion? ‘Behold, he prayeth.’ Well then, does it not follow, as a natural consequence that the more we are found in prayer the brighter will our evidences be? Perhaps you have lost your evidence this morning; you do not know whether you are a child of God or not; I will tell you where you lost your confidence—you lost it in your closet. Whenever a Christian backslides, his wandering commences in his closet. I speak what I have felt. I have often gone back from God—never so as to fall finally, I know, but I have often lost that sweet savour of his love which I once enjoyed. I have had to cry,

Those peaceful hours I once enjoyed,

How sweet their memory still!

But they have left an aching void

The world can never fill.

I have gone up to God’s house to preach, without either fire or energy; I have read the Bible, and there has been no light upon it, I have tried to have communion with God, but all has been a failure. Shall I tell where that commenced? It commenced in my closet. I had ceased, in a measure, to pray. Here I stand, and do confess my faults; I do acknowledge that whene’er I depart from God it is there it doth begin. Oh Christians, would you be happy? Be much in prayer. Would ye be victorious? Be much in prayer.

Restraining prayer, we cease to fight;

Prayer makes the Christian’s armour bright.

Mrs Berry used to say, ‘I would not be hired out of my closet for a thousand worlds.’ Mr Jay said, ‘If the twelve apostles were living near you, and you had access to them, if this intercourse drew you from the closet, they would prove a real injury to your souls.’ Prayer is the ship which bringeth home the richest freight. It is the soil which yields the most abundant harvest. Brother, when you rise in the morning your business so presses, that with a hurried word or two, down you go into the world, and at night, jaded and tired, you give God the fag-end of the day. The consequence is, that you have no communion with him. The reason we have not more true religion now, is because we have not more prayer. Sirs, I have no opinion of the churches of the present day that do not pray. I go from chapel to chapel in this metropolis, and I see pretty good congregations; but I go to their prayer meetings on a week evening, and I see a dozen persons. Can God bless us? Can he pour out his Spirit upon us, while such things as these exist? He could, but it would not be according to the order of his dispensation, for he says, ‘When Zion travails she brings forth children.’ Go to your churches and chapels with this thought, that you want more prayer. Many of you have no business here this morning. You ought to be in your own places of worship. I do not want to steal away the people from other chapels; there are enough to hear me without them. But though you have sinned this morning, hear while you are here, as much to your profit as possible. Go home and say to your minister, ‘Sir, we must have more prayer.’ Urge the people to more prayer. Have a prayer meeting, even if you have it all to yourself; and if you are asked how many were present, you can say, ‘Four.’ ‘Four! how so?’ ‘Why, there was myself, and God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost; and we have had a rich and real communion together.’ We must have an outpouring of real devotion, or else what is to become of many of our churches. Oh! may God awaken us all, and stir us up to pray, for when we pray we shall be victorious. I should like to take you, this morning, as Samson did the foxes, tie the firebrands of prayer to you, and send you in among the shocks of corn till you burn the whole up. I should like to make a conflagration by my words, and to set all the churches on fire till the whole has smoked like a sacrifice to God’s throne. If you pray, you have a proof that you are a Christian; the less you pray, the less reason have you to believe your Christianity; and if you have neglected to pray altogether, then you have ceased to breathe, and you may be afraid that you never did breathe at all.

And now, my last word is to the ungodly. Oh, sirs! I could fain wish myself anywhere but here; for if it be solemn work to address the godly, how much more when I come to deal with you. We fear lest on the one hand we should so speak to you, as to make you trust in your own strength; while on the other hand, we tremble lest we should lull you into the sleep of sloth and security. I believe most of us feel some difficulty as to the most fit manner to preach to you—not that we doubt but that the gospel is to be preached—but our desire is so to do it, that we may win your souls. I feel like a watchman, who, while guarding a city, is oppressed with sleep; how earnestly does he strive to arouse himself, while infirmity would overcome him. The remembrance of his responsibility bestirs him. His is no lack of will, but of power; and so I hope all the watchmen of the Lord are anxious to be faithful, while at the same time they know their imperfection. Truly the minister of Christ will feel like the old keeper of Eddystone lighthouse; life was failing fast, but summoning all his strength, he crept round once more to trim the lights before he died. O may the Holy Spirit enable us to keep the beacon fire blazing, to warn you of the rocks, shoals, and quicksands, which surround you, and may we ever guide you to Jesus, and not to free-will or creature merit. If my friends knew how anxiously I have sought divine direction in the important matter of preaching to sinners, they would not feel as some of them do, when they fancy I address them wrongly. I want to do as God bids me, and if he tells me to speak to the dry bones and they shall live, I must do it, even if it does not please others; otherwise I should be condemned in my own conscience, and condemned of God. Now with all the solemnity that man can summon, let me say that a prayerless soul is a Christless soul. As the Lord liveth, you who never prayed are without God, without hope, and strangers from the commonwealth of Israel. You who never know what a groan is, or a falling tear, are destitute of vital godliness. Let me ask you, sirs, whether you have ever thought in what an awful state you are? You are far from God, and therefore God is angry with you; for ‘God is angry with the wicked every day’. Oh sinner! lift thine eyes, and behold the frowning countenance of God, for he is angry with you. And I beseech you, as you love yourselves, just for one moment contemplate what will become of you, if living as you are ye should at last die without prayer. Don’t think that one prayer on your deathbed will save you. Deathbed prayer is a deathbed farce generally, and passes for nothing; it is a coin that will not ring in heaven, but is stamped by hypocrisy, and made of base metal. Take heed, sirs. Let me ask you, if you have never prayed, what will you do? It were a good thing for you, if death were an eternal sleep; but it is not. If you find yourself in hell, oh, the racks and pains! But I will not harrow up your feelings by attempting to describe them. May God grant you never may feel the torments of the lost. Only conceive that poor wretch in the flames who is saying, ‘Oh for one drop of water, to cool my parched tongue!’ See how his tongue hangs from between his blistered lips! how it excoriates and burns the roof of his mouth, as if it were a firebrand. Behold him crying for a drop of water. I will not picture the scene. Suffice it for me to close up by saying, that the hell of hells will be to thee poor sinner, the thought, that it is to be for ever. Thou wilt look up there on the throne of God, and it shall be written ‘for ever’! When the damned jingle the burning irons of their torments, they shall say ‘for ever’! When they howl, echo cries ‘for ever’!

‘For ever’s written on their racks,

‘For ever’ on their chains;

‘For ever’ burneth in the fire,

‘For ever’ ever reigns.

Doleful thought! ‘If I could but get out, then I should be happy. If there were a hope of deliverance, then I might be peaceful; but I am here for ever!’ Sirs, if ye would escape eternal torments, if ye would be found amongst the numbers of the blessed, the road to heaven can only be found by prayer—by prayer to Jesus, by prayer for the Spirit, by supplication at his mercy-seat. ‘Turn ye, turn ye, why will ye die, O house of Israel. As I live saith the Lord, I have no pleasure in the death of him that dieth, but had rather that he should turn unto me and live.’ ‘The Lord is gracious and full of compassion.’ Let us go unto him and say, ‘He shall heal our backslidings, he shall love us freely and forgive us graciously, for his Son’s name’s sake.’ Oh! if I may but win one soul to-day, I will go home contented. If I may but gain twenty, then I will rejoice. The more I have, the more crowns I shall wear. Wear! No, I will take them all at once, and cast them at Jesus’ feet, and say, ‘Not unto me, but unto thy name be all the glory, for ever.’

Prayer was appointed to convey

The blessings God designs to give;

Long as they live, should Christians pray,

For only while they pray they live.

And wilt thou still in silence lie,

When Christ stands waiting for thy prayers?

My soul, thou hast a Friend on high,

Arise, and try thine interest there.

’Tis prayer supports the soul that’s weak,

Though thought be broken, language lame;

Pray, if thou canst, or canst not speak,

And pray with faith in Jesu’s name.

Thumbnail Photo by Joacim Bohlander on Unsplash

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DELIVERED ON SABBATH EVENING, MARCH 18, 1855, BY THE  

REV. C. H. SPURGEON,  

AT EXETER HALL, STRAND.  

‘I have written to him the great things of my law, but they were counted as a strange thing.’—Hosea 8:12. 

THIS is God’s complaint against Ephraim. It is no mean proof of his goodness, that he stoops to rebuke his erring creatures; it is a great argument of his gracious disposition, that he bows his head to notice terrestrial affairs. He might, if he pleased, wrap himself with night as with a garment; he might put the stars around his wrist for bracelets, and bind the suns around his brow for a coronet; he might dwell alone, far, far above this world, up in the seventh heaven, and look down with calm and silent indifference upon all the doings of his creatures; he might do as the heathens supposed their Jove did, sit in perpetual silence, sometimes nodding his awful head to make the Fates move as he pleased, but never taking thought of the little things of earth, disposing of them as beneath his notice, engrossed within his own being, swallowed up within himself, living alone and retired; and I, as one of his creatures might stand by night upon a mountain-top, and look upon the silent stars, and say, ‘Ye are the eyes of God, but ye look not down on me; your light is the gift of his omnipotence, but your rays are not smiles of love to me. God, the mighty Creator, has forgotten me; I am a despicable drop in the ocean of creation, a sear leaf in the forest of beings, an atom in the mountain of existence. He knows me not; I am alone, alone, alone.’ But it is not so, beloved. Our God is of another order. He notices every one of us. There is not a sparrow or a worm, but is found in his decrees. There is not a person upon whom his eye is not fixed. Our most secret acts are known to him. Whatsoever we do, or bear, or suffer, the eye of God still rests upon us, and we are beneath his smile,—for we are his people; or beneath his frown,—for we have erred from him.  

Oh! how ten-thousandfold merciful is God, that, looking down upon the race of man, he does not smile it out of existence. We see from our text that God looks upon man, for he says of Ephraim, ‘I have written to him the great things of my law, but they were counted as a strange thing.’ But see how when he observes the sin of man he does not dash him away and spurn him with his foot; he does not shake him by the neck over the gulf of hell, until his brain doth reel, and then drop him for ever; but rather, he comes down from heaven to plead with his creatures; he argues with them; he puts himself, as it were, upon a level with the sinner, states his grievances, and pleads his claim. O Ephraim, I have written unto thee the great things of my law, but they have been unto thee as a strange thing! I come here tonight in God’s stead, my friends, to plead with you as God’s ambassador, to charge many of you with a sin; to lay it to your hearts by the power of the Spirit, so that you may be convinced of sin, of righteousness, and of a judgment to come. The crime I charge you with is the sin of the text. God has written to you the great things of his law, but they have been unto you as a strange thing. It is concerning this blessed book, the Bible, that I mean to speak tonight. Here lies my text — this word of God. Here is the theme of my discourse, a theme which demands more eloquence than I possess; a subject upon which a thousand orators might speak at once; a mighty, vast, incomprehensive theme, which might engross all eloquence throughout eternity, and still it would remain unexhausted.  

Concerning the Bible, I have three things to say tonight and they are all in my text. First, its author, ‘I have written’; secondly, its subjects—the great things of God’s law; and thirdly, its common treatment—it has been accounted by most men a strange thing. 

First, then, concerning this book, who is the author? The text says that it is God. ‘I have written to him the great things of my law.’ Here lies my Bible—who wrote it? I open it, and I find it consists of a series of tracts. The first five tracts were written by a man called Moses. I turn on and I find others. Sometimes I see David is the penman, at other times, Solomon. Here I read Micah, then Amos, then Hosea. As I turn further on, to the more luminous pages of the New Testament, I see Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, Paul, Peter, James and others; but when I shut up the book, I ask myself who is the author of it? Do these men jointly claim the authorship? Are they the compositors of this massive volume? Do they between themselves divide the honour? Our holy religion answers, No! This volume is the writing of the living God: each letter was penned with an Almighty finger; each word in it dropped from the everlasting lips, each sentence was dictated by the Holy Spirit. Albeit, that Moses was employed to write his histories with his fiery pen, God guided that pen. It may be that David touched his harp and let sweet psalms of melody drop from his fingers, but God moved his hands over the living strings of his golden harp. It may be that Solomon sang canticles of love, or gave forth words of consummate wisdom, but God directed his lips, and made the Preacher eloquent. If I follow the thundering Nahum when his horses plough the waters or Habbakuk when he sees the tents of Cushan in affliction; if I read Malachi, when the earth is burning like an oven; if I turn to the smooth page of John, who tells of love, or the rugged, fiery chapters of Peter who speaks of the fire devouring God’s enemies; if I turn to Jude, who launches forth anathemas upon the foes of God, everywhere I find God speaking: it is God’s voice, not man’s; the words are God’s words, the words of the Eternal, the Invisible, the Almighty, the Jehovah of this earth. This Bible is God’s Bible; and when I see it, I seem to hear a voice springing up from it, saying, ‘I am the book of God: man, read me. I am God’s writing: open my leaf, for I was penned by God; read it, for he is my author, and you will see him visible and manifest everywhere.’ ‘I have written to him the great things of my law.’

How do you know that God wrote the book? That is just what I shall not try to prove to you. I could, if I pleased, to a demonstration, for there are arguments enough, there are reasons enough, did I care to occupy your time tonight in bringing them before you: but I shall do no such thing. I might tell you, if I pleased, that the grandeur of the style is above that of any mortal writing, and that all the poets who have ever existed, could not, with all their works united, give us such sublime poetry and such mighty language as is to be found in the Scriptures. I might insist upon it, that the subjects of which it treats are beyond the human intellect; that man could never have invented the grand doctrines of a Trinity in the Godhead; man could not have told us anything of the creation of the universe; he could never have been the author of the majestic idea of providence, that all things are ordered according to the will of one great Supreme Being, and work together for good. I might enlarge upon its honesty, since it tells the faults of its writers; its unity, since it never belies itself, its master simplicity, that he who runs may read it; and I might mention a hundred more things, which would all prove to a demonstration, that the book is of God. But I come not here to prove it. I am a Christian minister, and you are Christians, or profess to be so; and there is never any necessity for Christian ministers to make a point of bringing forth infidel arguments in order to answer them. It is the greatest folly in the world. Infidels, poor creatures, do not know their own arguments till we tell them, and then they glean their blunted shafts to shoot them at the shield of truth again. It is folly to bring forward these firebrands of hell, even if we are well prepared to quench them. Let men of the world learn error of themselves; do not let us be propagators of their falsehoods. True, there are some preachers who are short of stock, and want them to fill up! but God’s own chosen men need not do that; they are taught of God, and God supplies them with matter, with language, and with power. There may be some one here tonight who has come without faith, a man of reason, a free-thinker. With him I have no argument at all. I profess not to stand here as a controversialist, but as a preacher of things that I know and feel. But I too have been like him. There was an evil hour when once I slipped the anchor of my faith; I cut the cable of my belief; I no longer moored myself hard by the coasts of revelation; I allowed my vessel to drift before the wind; I said to reason, ‘Be thou my captain’; I said to my own brain, ‘Be thou my rudder’; and I started on my mad voyage. Thank God it is all over now; but I will tell you its brief history. It was one hurried sailing over the tempestuous ocean of free thought. I went on, and as I went the skies began to darken; but to make up for that deficiency, the waters were brilliant with coruscations of brilliancy. I saw sparks flying upwards that pleased me, and I thought, ‘If this be free thought, it is a happy thing.’ My thoughts seemed gems, and I scattered stars with both my hands; but anon, instead of these coruscations of glory, I saw grim fiends, fierce and horrible, start up from the waters, and as I dashed on they gnashed their teeth and grinned upon me; they seized the prow of my ship, and dragged me on, while I, in part, gloried at the rapidity of my motion, but yet shuddered at the terrific rate with which I passed the old landmarks of my faith. As I hurried forward with an awful speed, I began to doubt my very existence; I doubted if there were a world, I doubted if there were such a thing as myself. I went to the very verge of the dreary realms of unbelief. I went to the very bottom of the sea of infidelity. I doubted everything. But here the devil foiled himself; for the very extravagance of the doubt proved its absurdity. Just when I saw the bottom of that sea, there came a voice which said, ‘And can this doubt be true?’ At this very thought I awoke. I started from that death-dream, which, God knows might have damned my soul, and ruined this my body, if I had not awoke. When I arose faith took the helm; from that moment I doubted not. Faith steered me back; faith cried, ‘Away, away!’ I cast my anchor on Calvary; I lifted my eye to God; and here I am alive, and out of hell. Therefore, I speak what I do know. I have sailed that perilous voyage; I have come safe to land. Ask me again to be an infidel! No, I have tried it; it was sweet at first, but bitter afterwards. Now, lashed to God’s gospel more firmly than ever, standing as on a rock of adamant, I defy the arguments of hell to move me, for ‘I know in whom I have believed, and am persuaded that he is able to keep that which I have committed unto him’. But I shall neither plead nor argue this night. You profess to be Christian men, or else you would not be here. Your profession may be lies; what you say you are, may be the very contrary to what you really are; but still I suppose you all admit that this is the word of God. A thought or two then upon it. ‘I have written to him the great things of my law.’ 

First, my friends, stand over this volume, and admire its authority. This is no common book. It is not the sayings of the sages of Greece; here are not the utterances of philosophers of past ages. If these words were written by man, we might reject them; but oh, let me think the solemn thought—that this book is God’s handwriting, that these words are God’s. Let me look at its date; it is dated from the hills of heaven. Let me look at its letters: they flash glory on my eye. Let me read the chapters: they are big with meaning and mysteries unknown. Let me turn over the prophecies: they are pregnant with unthought-of wonders. Oh, book of books! And wast thou written by my God? Then will I bow before thee. Thou book of vast authority, thou art a proclamation from the Emperor of Heaven; far be it from me to exercise my reason in contradicting thee. Reason! thy place is to stand and find out what this volume means, not to tell what this book ought to say. Come thou my reason, my intellect, sit thou down and listen, for these words are the words of God. I do not know how to enlarge on this thought. Oh! if you could ever remember that this Bible was actually and really written by God! Oh! if ye had been let into the secret chambers of heaven, if ye had beheld God grasping his pen and writing down these letters, then surely ye would respect them. But they are just as much God’s handwriting as if you had seen God write them. This Bible is a book of authority; it is an authorized book, for God has written it. Oh, tremble, tremble, lest any of you despise it; mark its authority, for it is the word of God.  

Then, since God wrote it, mark its truthfulness. If I had written it, there would be worms of critics who would at once swarm on it, and would cover it with their evil spawn; had I written it, there would be men who would pull it to pieces at once, and perhaps quite right too. But this is the word of God; come, search ye critics, and find a flaw; examine it from its Genesis to its Revelations, and find an error. This is a vein of pure gold, unalloyed by quartz, or any earthy substance. This is a star without a speck; a sun without a blot; a light without darkness; a moon without its paleness; a glory without a dimness. O Bible! it cannot be said of any other book, that it is perfect and pure; but of thee we can declare all wisdom is gathered up in thee, without a particle of folly. This is the judge that ends the strife where wit and reason fail. This is the book untainted by any error; but is pure, unalloyed, perfect truth. Why? Because God wrote it. Ah! charge God with error if ye please; tell him that his book is not what it ought to be. I have heard men with prudish and mock modesty, who would like to alter the Bible; and (I almost blush to say it) I have heard minister’s alter God’s Bible, because they were afraid of it. Have you never heard a man say, ‘He that believeth and is baptized, shall be saved; but he that believeth not’,—What does the Bible say? ‘shall be damned.’ But that does not happen to be polite enough, so they say, ‘shall be condemned.’ Gentlemen! pull the velvet out of your mouths; speak God’s word; we want none of your alterations. I have heard men in prayer, instead of saying, ‘Make your calling and election sure’, say ‘Make your calling and salvation sure.’ Pity they were not born when God lived, far—far back, that they might have taught God how to write. Oh, impudence beyond all bounds! Oh! full-blown self-conceit! To attempt to dictate to the All-wise—to teach the Omniscient, and instruct the Eternal. Strange that there should be men so vile as to use the penknife of Jehoiakim, to cut passages of the word, because they are unpalatable. Oh ye who dislike certain portions of the Holy Writ, rest assured that your taste is corrupt, and that God will not stay for your little opinion. Your dislike is the very reason why God wrote it, because you ought not to be suited; you have no right to be pleased. God wrote what you do not like; he wrote the truth. Oh! let us bend in reverence before it, for God inspired it. It is pure truth. Here from this fountain gushes aqua vitae—‘the water of life’, without a single particle of earth; here from this sun there cometh forth rays of radiance, without the mixture of darkness. Blessed Bible; thou art all truth.  

Yet once more, before we leave this point let us stop and consider the merciful nature of God, in having written us a Bible at all. Ah! he might have left us without it, to grope our dark way, as blind men seek the wall; he might have suffered us to wander on with the star of reason as our only guide. I recollect a story of Mr Hume, who so constantly affirmed that the light of reason is abundantly sufficient. Being at a good minister’s house one evening, he had been discussing the question, and declaring his firm belief in the sufficiency of the light of nature. On leaving, the minister offered to hold him a candle, to light him down the steps. He said, ‘No, the light of nature would be enough; the moon would do.’ It so happened that the moon was covered with a cloud, and he fell down the steps. ‘Ah,’ said the minister, ‘you had better have had a little light from above after all, Mr Hume.’ So, supposing the light of nature to be sufficient, we had better have a little light from above too, and then we shall be sure to be right. Better have two lights than only one. The light of creation is a bright light. God may be seen in the stars, his name is written in gilt letters on the brow of night; you may discover his glory in the ocean waves, yea, in the trees of the field; but it is better to read it in two books than in one. You will find it here more clearly revealed, for he has written this book himself, and he has given you the key to understand it, if you have the Holy Spirit. Ah, beloved, let us thank God for this Bible; let us love it; let us count it more precious than much fine gold.  

But let me say one thing before I pass on to the second point. If this be the word of God, what will become of some of you who have not read it for the last month? ‘Month, sir! I have not read it for this year.’ Ay, there are some of you who have not read it at all. Most people treat the Bible very politely. They have a small pocket volume, neatly bound; they put a white pocket-handkerchief around it, and carry it to their places of worship; when they get home, they lay it up in a drawer till next Sunday morning; then it comes out again for a little bit of a treat and goes to chapel; that is all the poor Bible gets in the way of an airing. That is your style of entertaining this heavenly messenger. There is dust enough on some of your Bibles to write ‘damnation’ with your fingers. There are some of you who have not turned over your Bibles for a long, long, long while, and what think you? I tell you blunt words, but true words. What will God say at last? When you shall come before him, he shall say, ‘Did you read my Bible?’ ‘No.’ ‘I wrote you a letter of mercy; did you read it?’ ‘No.’ ‘Rebel! I have sent thee a letter inviting thee to me: didst thou ever read it?’ ‘Lord I never broke the seal; I kept it shut up.’ ‘Wretch!’ says God, ‘then thou deservest hell, if I sent thee a loving epistle and thou wouldst not even break the seal: what shall I do unto thee?’ Oh! let it not be so with you. Be Bible readers; be Bible searchers. 

Our second point is, the subjects on which the Bible treats. The words of the text are these: ‘I have written to him the great things of my law.’ The Bible treats of great things, and of great things only. There is nothing in this Bible which is unimportant. Every verse in it has a solemn meaning, and if we have not found it out yet, we hope yet to do it. You have seen mummies wrapped round and round with folds of linen. Well, God’s Bible is like that; it is a vast roll of white linen, woven in the loom of truth; so you will have to continue unwinding it, roll after roll, before you get the real meaning of it from the very depth; and when you have found, as you think, a part of the meaning, you will still need to keep on unwinding, unwinding, and all eternity you will be unwinding the words of this wondrous volume. Yet there is nothing in the Bible but great things. Let me divide, so as to be more brief. First all things in this Bible are great; but secondly, some things are the greatest of all. 

All things in the Bible are great. Some people think it does not matter what doctrines you believe; that it is immaterial what church you attend; that all denominations are alike. Well, I dislike Mrs Bigotry above almost all people in the world, and I never give her any compliment or praise: but there is another woman I hate equally as much, and that is Mrs Latitudinarianism, a well-known character, who has made the discovery that all of us are alike. Now, I believe that a man may be saved in any church. Some have been saved in the Church of Rome—a few blessed men, whose names I could mention here. I know, blessed be God, that multitudes are saved in the Church of England: she has a host of pious, praying men in her midst. I think that all sections of Protestant Christians have a remnant according to the election of grace, and they had need to have, some of them, a little salt, for otherwise they would go to corruption. But when I say that, do you imagine that I think them all on a level? Are they all alike truthful? One sect says infant baptism is right, another says it is wrong, yet you say they are both right. I cannot see that. One teaches we are saved by free grace; another says that we are not, but are saved by free will; and yet you believe they are both right. I do not understand that. One says that God loves his people, and never leaves off loving them; another says that he did not love his people before they loved him: that he often loves them, and then ceases to love them and turns them away. They may be both right in the main; but can they be both right when one says ‘Yes’, and the other says ‘No’. I must have a pair of spectacles to enable me to look backwards and forwards at the same time, before I can see that. It cannot be, sirs, that they are both right. But some say they differ upon non-­essentials. This text says, ‘I have written to him the great things of my law.’ There is nothing in God’s Bible which is not great. Did ever any of you sit down to see which was the purest religion? ‘Oh,’ say you, ‘we never took the trouble. We went just where our father and mother went.’ Ah! that is a profound reason indeed. You went where your father and mother did. I thought you were sensible people; I didn’t think you went where other people pulled you, but went of your ownselves. I love my parents above all that breathe, and the very thought that they believed a thing to be true, helps me to think it is correct; but I have not followed them; I belong to a different denomination, and I thank God I do. I can receive them as Christian brethren and sisters; but I never thought that because they happened to be one thing I was to be the same. No such thing. God gave me brains, and I will use them; and if you have any intellect, use it too. Never say it doesn’t matter. It does matter. Whatever God has put here is of eminent importance: he would not have written a thing that was indifferent. Whatever is here is of some value; therefore, search all questions, try all by the word of God. I am not afraid to have what I preach tried by this book. Only give me a fair field and no favour, and this book; if I say anything contrary to it, I will withdraw it the next Sabbath day. By this I stand, by this I fall. Search and see but don’t say, ‘It does not matter.’ If God says a thing, it must always be of importance.  

But while all things in God’s word are important, all are not equally important. There are certain fundamental and vital truths which must be believed, or otherwise no man would be saved. If you want to know what you must believe if ye would be saved, you will find the great things of God’s law between these two covers; they are all contained here. As a sort of digest or summary of the great things of the law, I remember an old friend of mine once saying, ‘Ah! you preach the three R’s, and God will always bless you.’ I said, ‘What are the three R’s?’ And he answered, ‘Ruin, redemption, and regeneration.’ They contain the sum and substance of divinity. R for ruin. We were all ruined in the fall; we were all lost when Adam sinned, and we are all ruined by our own transgressions; we are all ruined by our own evil hearts, and our own wicked wills; and we all shall be ruined unless grace saves us. Then there is a second R for redemption. We are ransomed by the blood of Christ, a lamb without blemish and without spot; we are rescued by his power; we are ransomed by his merits; we are redeemed by his strength. Then there is R for regeneration. If we would be pardoned, we must also be regenerated; for no man can partake of redemption unless he is regenerate. Let him be as good as he pleases; let him serve God, as he imagines, as much as he likes; unless he is regenerate, and has a new heart, a new birth, he will still be in the first R, that is ruin. These things contain an epitome of the gospel. I believe there is a better epitome in the five points of Calvinism:—Election according to the foreknowledge of God; the natural depravity and sinfulness of man; particular redemption by the blood of Christ; effectual calling by the power of the Spirit; and ultimate perseverance by the efforts of God’s might. I think all those need to be believed, in order to salvation; but I should not like to write a creed like the Athanasian, beginning with ‘Whosoever shall be saved, before all things it is necessary that he should hold the Catholic faith, which faith is this’,—when I got so far, I should stop, because I should not know what to write. I hold the Catholic faith of the Bible, the whole Bible, and nothing but the Bible. It is not for me to draw up creeds; but I ask you to search the Scriptures, for this is the word of life.  

God says, ‘I have written to him the great things of my law.’ Do you doubt their greatness? Do ye think they are not worth your attention? Reflect a moment, man. Where art thou standing now?  

Lo, on a narrow neck of land, 

’Twixt two unbounded seas I stand; 

An inch of time, a moment’s space, 

May lodge me in yon heavenly place, 

Or shut me up in hell. 

I recollect standing on a seashore once, upon a narrow neck of land, thoughtless that the tide might come up. The tide kept continually washing up on either side, and wrapped in thoughts I still stood there, until at last there was the greatest difficulty in getting on shore; the waves had washed between me and the shore. You and I stand each day on a narrow neck, and there is one wave coming up there; see, how near it is to your foot; and lo, another follows at every tick of the clock: ‘our hearts, like muffled drums, are beating funeral marches to the tomb’. We are always tending downwards to the grave each moment that we live. This Book tells me that if I am converted, when I die there is a heaven of joy and love to receive me; it tells me that angels’ pinions shall be stretched, and I, borne by strong cherubic wings, shall out-soar the lightning, and mount beyond the stars, up to the throne of God, to dwell for ever, 

Far from a world of grief and sin 

With God eternally shut in. 

Oh! it makes the hot tear start from my eye, it makes my heart too big for this my body, and my brain whirls at the thought of  

Jerusalem, my happy home, 

Name ever dear to me. 

Oh! that sweet scene beyond the clouds; sweet fields arrayed in living green, and rivers of delight. Are not these great things? But then, poor unregenerate soul, the Bible says, if thou art lost, thou art lost forever; it tells thee, that if thou diest without Christ, without God, there is no hope for thee, that there is a place without a gleam of hope, where thou shalt read in burning letters, ‘Ye knew your duty, but ye did it not’; it tells you that ye shall be driven from his presence with a ‘depart ye cursed’. Are not these great things? Yes, sirs, as heaven is desirable, as hell is terrible, as time is short, as eternity is infinite, as the soul is precious, as pain is to be shunned, as heaven is to be sought, as God is eternal, and as his words are sure, these are great things, things ye ought to listen to. 

Our last point is the treatment which the poor Bible receives in this world. It is accounted a strange thing. What does that mean—the Bible accounted a strange thing? In the first place, it means that it is very strange to some people, because they never read it. I remember reading, on one occasion, the sacred story of David and Goliath, and there was a person present, positively grown up to years of maturity, who said to me, ‘Dear me! what an interesting story; what book is that in?’ And I recollect a person once coming to me in private; I spoke to her about her soul, she told me how deeply she felt, how she had a desire to serve God, but she found another law in her members. I turned to a passage in Romans, and read to her, ‘The good that I would I do not; and the evil which I would not that I do!’ She said, ‘Is that in the Bible? I did not know it.’ I did not blame her because she had no interest in the Bible till then; but I did wonder that there could be found persons who knew nothing about such a passage. Ah! you know more about your ledgers than your Bible; you know more about your day-books than what God has written. Many of you will read a novel from beginning to end, and what have you got? A mouthful of froth when you have done. But you cannot read the Bible; that solid, lasting, substantial, and satisfying food goes uneaten, locked up in the cupboard of neglect; while anything that man writes, a catch of the day, is greedily devoured. ‘I have written unto him the great things of my law, but they were counted as a strange thing.’ Ye have never read it. I bring the broad charge against you.  Perhaps ye say, I ought not to charge you with any such thing. I always think it better to have a worse opinion of you than too good an one. I charge you with this: you do not read your Bibles. Some of you never have read it through. I know I speak what your heart must say is honest truth. You are not Bible readers. You say you have the Bible in your houses: do I think you are such heathens as not to have a Bible? But when did you read it last? How do you know that your spectacles, which you have lost, have not been there for the last three years? Many people have not turned over its pages for a long time, and God might say unto them, ‘I have written unto you the great things of my law, but they have been accounted unto you a strange thing.’ 

Others there be who read the Bible, but when they read it, they say it is so horribly dry. That young man over there says it is a ‘bore’; that is the word he uses. He says, ‘My mother said to me, when you go up to town, read a chapter every day. Well, I thought I would please her, and I said I would. I am sure I wish I had not. I did not read a chapter yesterday or the day before. We were so busy. I could not help it.’ You do not love the Bible, do you? ‘No, there is nothing in it which is interesting.’ Ah! I thought so. But a little while ago I could not see anything in it. Do you know why? Blind men cannot see, can they? But when the Spirit touches the scales of the eyes they fall off, and when he puts eye-salve on, then the Bible becomes precious. I remember a minister who went to see an old lady, and he thought he would give her some precious promises out of the word of God. Turning to one he saw written in the margin, ‘P’, and he asked, ‘What does this mean?’ ‘That means precious, sir.’ Further down he saw ‘T. and P.’, and he asked what the letters meant. ‘That,’ she said, ‘means tried and proved, for I have tried and proved it.’ If you have tried God’s word and proved it; if it is precious to your souls, then you are Christians; but those persons who despise the Bible, have ‘neither part nor lot in the matter’. If it is dry to you, you will be dry at last in hell. If you do not esteem it as better than your necessary food, there is no hope for you, for you lack the greatest evidence of your Christianity. 

Alas! alas! the worst case is to come. There are some people who hate the Bible, as well as despise it. Is there such an one stepped in here? Some of you said, ‘Let us go and hear what the young preacher has to say to us.’ This is what he hath to say to you: ‘Behold ye despisers, and wonder and perish.’ This is what he hath to say to you: ‘The wicked shall be turned into hell, and all that forget God.’ And this, again he has to say to you: ‘Behold there shall come in the last days, mockers like yourselves, walking after your own lusts.’ But more: he tells you tonight that if you are saved, you must find salvation here. Therefore, despise not the Bible, but search it, read it, and come unto it. Rest thee well assured, O scorner, that thy laughs cannot alter truth, thy jests cannot avert thine inevitable doom. Though in thy hardihood thou shouldst make a league with death, and sign a covenant with hell—yet swift justice shall o’ertake thee, and strong vengeance strike thee low. In vain dost thou jeer and mock, for eternal verities are mightier than thy sophistries: nor can thy smart sayings alter the divine truth of a single word of this volume of revelation. Oh! why dost thou quarrel with thy best friend, and ill-treat thy only refuge? There yet remains hope even for the scorner. Hope in a Saviour’s veins. Hope in the Father’s mercy. Hope in the Holy Spirit’s omnipotent agency. 

I have done when I have said one word. My friend, the philosopher, says it may be very well for me to urge people to read the Bible; but he thinks there are a great many sciences far more interesting and useful than theology. Extremely obliged to you for your opinion, sir. What science do you mean? The science of dissecting beetles, and arranging butterflies? ‘No,’ you say, ‘certainly not.’ The science, then, of arranging stones, and telling us of the strata of the earth? ‘No, not exactly that.’ Which science then? ‘Oh, all sciences,’ say you, ‘are better than the science of the Bible.’ Ah! sir, that is your opinion; and it is because you are far from God, that you say so. But the science of Jesus Christ is the most excellent of sciences. Let no one turn away from the Bible, because it is not a book of learning and wisdom. It is. Would ye know astronomy? It is here: it tells you of the Sun of Righteousness and the Star of Bethlehem. Would you know botany? It is here: it tells you of the plant of renown—the Lily of the Valley and the Rose of Sharon. Would you know geology and mineralogy? You shall learn it here: for you may read of the Rock of Ages, and the white stone with a name graven thereon, which no man knoweth, saving he that receiveth it. Would ye study history? Here is the most ancient of all the records of the history of the human race. Whate’er your science is, come and bend o’er this book; your science is here. Come and drink out of this fair fount of knowledge and wisdom, and ye shall find yourselves made wise unto salvation. Wise and foolish, babes and men, grey-headed sires, youths and maidens,—I speak to you, I plead with you, I beg of you respect your Bibles and search them out, for in them ye think ye have eternal life, and these are they which testify of Christ. 

I have done. Let us go home and practise what we have heard. I have heard of a woman, who, when she was asked what she remembered of the minister’s sermon, said, ‘I don’t recollect anything of it. It was about short weights and bad measures, and I didn’t recollect anything but to go home and burn the bushel.’ So if you will remember to go home and burn the bushel, if you will recollect to go home and read your Bibles, I shall have said enough. And may God, in his infinite mercy, when you read your Bibles, pour into your soul, the illuminating rays of the Sun of Righteousness, by the agency of the ever-adorable Spirit; then you will read to your profit and to your soul’s salvation. We may say of the Bible:— 

God’s cabinet of revealed counsel ’tis!  

Where weal and woe, are ordered so 

That every man may know which shall be his; 

Unless his own mistake, false application make. 

It is the index to eternity. 

He cannot miss of endless bliss, 

That takes this chart to steer by, 

Nor can he be mistook, that speaketh by this book. 

It is the book of God. What if I should  

Say, God of books, let him that looks 

Angry at that expression, as too bold, 

His thoughts in silence smother, till he find such another.  

The post The Bible: C. H. Spurgeon Sermon appeared first on Banner of Truth UK.

DELIVERED ON SABBATH MORNING, MARCH 18, 1855, BY THE

REV. C. H. SPURGEON,

AT EXETER HALL, STRAND.

‘For whatsoever is born of God overcometh the world; and this is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith.’—1 John 5:4.

THE epistles of John are perfumed with love. The word is continually occurring, while the Spirit enters into every sentence. Each letter is thoroughly soaked and impregnated with this heavenly honey. If he speaks of God, his name must be love; are the brethren mentioned, he loves them; and even of the world itself, he writes, ‘God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son.’ From the opening to the conclusion, love is the manner, love the matter, love the motive, and love the aim. We stand, therefore, not a little astonished, to find such martial words in so peaceful a writing; for I hear a sound of war. It is not the voice of love, surely, that says, ‘He that is born of God overcometh the world.’ Lo, here are strife and battle. The word ‘overcometh’ seems to have in it something of the sword and warfare; of strife and contention; of agony and wrestling; so unlike the love which is smooth and gentle, which hath no harsh words within its lips; whose mouth is lined with velvet; whose words are softer than butter; whose utterances are more easily flowing than oil. Here we have war—war to the knife; for I read, ‘Whatsoever is born of God overcometh the world’; strife until death; battle throughout life; fighting with a certainty of victory. How is it that the same gospel which always speaks of peace, here proclaims a warfare? How can it be? Simply because there is something in the world which is antagonistic to love; there are principles abroad which cannot bear light, and, therefore, before light can come, it must chase the darkness. Ere summer reigns, you know, it has to do battle with old winter, and to send it howling away in the winds of March, and shedding its tears in April showers. So also, before any great or good thing can have the mastery of this world, it must do battle for it. Satan has seated himself on his blood-stained throne, and who shall get him down, except by main force, and fight, and war? Darkness broods o’er the nations; nor can the sun establish his empire of light until he has pierced night with the arrowy sunbeams, and made it flee away. Hence we read in the Bible that Christ did not come to send peace on earth, but a sword; he came to set ‘the father against the son, and the son against the father; the mother against the daughter, and the daughter against the mother; the mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law’; not intentionally, but as a means to an end; because there must always be a struggle ere truth and righteousness can reign. Alas! for that earth is the battle-field where good must combat with evil. Angels look on and hold their breath, burning to mingle in the conflict, but the troops of the Captain of Salvation may be none but the soldiers of the cross; and that slender band must fight alone, and yet shall triumph gloriously. Enough shall they be for conquest, and the motto of their standard is enough. Enough by the arm of the helping Trinity.

As God shall help me, I shall speak to you of three things to be found in the text. First, the text speaks of a great victory: it says, ‘This is the victory’. Secondly, it mentions a great birth: ‘Whatsoever is born of God’. And, thirdly, it extols a great grace, whereby we overcome the world, ‘even our faith’.

I. First, the text speaks of a GREAT VICTORY—the victory of victories—the greatest of all. We know there have been great battles where nations have met in strife, and one has overcome the other; but who has read of a victory that overcame the world? Some will say that Alexander was its conqueror; but I answer, nay. He was himself the vanquished man, even when all things were in his possession. He fought for the world, and won it; and then mark how it mastered its master, conquered its conqueror, and lashed the monarch who had been its scourge. See the royal youth weeping, and stretching out his hands with idiotic cries, for another world which he might ravage. He seemed, in outward show, to have overcome old earth; but, in reality, within his inmost soul, the earth had conquered him, had overwhelmed him, had wrapped him in the dream of ambition, girdled him with the chains of covetousness, so that when he had all, he was still dissatisfied; and, like a poor slave, was dragged on at the chariot wheels of the world, crying, moaning, lamenting, because he could not win another.

Who is the man that ever overcame the world? Let him stand forward: he is a Triton among the minnows; he shall outshine Caesar; he shall outmatch even our own lately departed Wellington, if he can say he has overcome the world. It is so rare a thing, a victory so prodigious, a conquest so tremendous, that he who can claim to have won it may walk among his fellows, like Saul, with head and shoulders far above them. He shall command our respect; his very presence shall awe us into reverence; his speech shall persuade us to obedience; and, yielding honour to whom honour is due, we’ll say when we listen to his voice, ‘’Tis even as if an angel shook his wings.’

I shall now attempt to expand the idea I have suggested, showing you in what varied senses the Christian overcomes the world. A tough battle, sirs, I warrant you: not one which carpet knights might win: no easy skirmish that he might win, who dashed to battle on some sunshiny day, looked at the host, then turned his courser’s rein, and daintily dismounted at the door of his silken tent—not one which he shall gain, who, but a raw recruit today, puts on his regimentals, and foolishly imagines that one week of service will ensure a crown of glory. Nay, sirs, it is a life-long war—a fight needing the power of all these muscles, and this strong heart; a contest which shall want all our strength, if we are to be triumphant; and if we do come off more than conquerors, it shall be said of us, as Hart said of Jesus Christ: ‘He had strength enough and none to spare’; a battle at which the stoutest heart might quail; a fight at which the braves might shake, if he did not remember that the Lord is on his side, and therefore, whom shall he fear? He is the strength of his life; of whom shall he be afraid?

This fight with the world is not one of main force, or physical might; if it were, we might soon win it; but it is all the more dangerous from the fact that it is a strife of mind, a contest of heart, a struggle of the spirit, a strife of the soul. When we overcome the world in one fashion, we have not half done our work; for the world is a Proteus, changing its shape continually; like the chameleon, it hath all the colours of the rainbow; and when you have worsted the world in one shape, it will attack you in another. Until you die, you will always have fresh appearances of the world to wrestle with. Let me just mention some of the forms in which the Christian overcomes the world.

1. He overcomes the world when it sets up itself as a legislator, wishing to teach him customs. You know the world has its old massive law book of customs, and he who does not choose to go according to the fashion of the world, is under the ban of society. Most of you do just as everybody else does, and that is enough for you. If you see so-and-so do a dishonest thing in business, it is sufficient for you that everybody does it. If ye see that the majority of mankind have certain habits, ye succumb, ye yield. Ye think, I suppose, that to march to hell in crowds, will help to diminish the fierce heat of the burning of the bottomless pit, instead of remembering that the more faggots the fiercer will be the flame. Men usually swim with the stream like a dead fish; it is only the living fish that goes against it. It is only the Christian who despises customs, who does not care for conventionalisms, who only asks himself the question, ‘Is it right or is it wrong? If it is right, I will be singular. If there is not another man in this world who will do it, I will do it; should a universal hiss go up to heaven, I will do it still; should the very stones of earth fly up, and stone me to death, I will do it still; though they bind me to the stake, yet I must do it; I will be singularly right; if the multitude will not follow me, I will go without them; I will be glad if they will all go and do right as well, but if not, I will despise their customs; I care not what others do; I shall not be weighed by other men; to my own Master I stand or fall. Thus I conquer and overcome the customs of the world.’ Fair world! she dresseth herself in ermine, she putteth on the robes of a judge, and she solemnly telleth you, ‘Man, you are wrong. Look at your fellows; see how they do. Behold my laws. For hundreds of years have not men done so? Who are you, to set yourself up against me?’ And she pulls out her worm-eaten law-book, and turning over the musty pages, says, ‘See, here is an act passed in the reign of Nebuchadnezzar, and here is another law enacted in the days of Pharaoh. These must be right, because antiquity has enrolled them among her standard authorities. Do you mean to set yourself up and stand against the opinions of the multitude?’ Yes, we do; we take the law book of the world, and we burn it, as the Ephesians did their magic rolls; we take her deeds, and make them into waste paper; we rend her proclamation from the walls; we care not what others do; custom to us is a cobweb; we count it folly to be singular; but when to be singular is to be right, we count it the proudest wisdom; we overcome the world; we trample on her customs; we walk as a distinct people, a separate race, a chosen generation, a peculiar people. The Christian behaves in his dealings not as the laughing infidel insinuates, when he sneeringly describes Mawworm, as saying, ‘Boy, have you sanded the sugar?’ ‘Yes, sir.’ ‘Have you put the sloe-leaves in the tea?’ ‘Yes, sir.’ ‘Have you put red lead in the pepper?’ ‘Yes, sir.’ ‘Then come to prayers.’ Christians do not do so; they say, ‘We know better; we cannot conform to the customs of the world. If we pray, we will also act, or else we are hypocrites, confounded hypocrites. If we go to the house of God, and profess to love him, we love him everywhere; we take our religion with us into the shop, behind the counter; into our offices, we must have it everywhere, or else God knows it is not religion at all.’ Ye must stand up then, against the customs of mankind. Albeit, this may be a three-million peopled city, ye are to come out and be separate, if ye would overcome the world.

2. We rebel against the world’s customs. And if we do so, what is the conduct of our enemy? She changes her aspect. ‘That man is a heretic; that man is a fanatic; he is a cant, he is a hypocrite’, says the world directly. She grasps her sword, she putteth frowns upon her brow, she scowleth like a demon, she girdeth tempests round about her, and she saith, ‘The man dares defy my government; he will not do as others do. Now I will persecute him. Slander! come from the depths of hell and hiss at him. Envy! sharpen up thy tooth and bite him.’ She fetches up all false things, and she persecutes the man. If she can, she does it with the hand; if not, by the tongue. She afflicts him wherever he is. She tries to ruin him in business; or, if he standeth forth as the champion of the truth why then she laugheth, and mocketh, and scorneth. She lets no stone be unturned whereby she may injure him. What is then the behaviour of the Lord’s warrior, when he sees the world take up arms against him, and when he sees all earth, like an army, coming to chase him, and utterly destroy him? Does he yield? Does he yield? Does he bend? Does he cringe? Oh, no! Like Luther, he writes ‘Cedo nulli’ on his banner—‘I yield to none’; and he goes to war against the world, if the world goes to war against him.

Let earth be all in arms abroad,

He dwells in perfect peace.

Ah! some of you, if you had a word spoken against you, would at once give up what religion you have; but the true-born child of God cares little for man’s opinion. ‘Ah,’ says he, ‘let my bread fail me, let me be doomed to wander penniless the wide world o’er; yea, let me die: each drop of blood within these veins belongs to Christ, and I am ready to shed it for his name’s sake.’ He counts all things but loss, that he may win Christ—that he may be found in him; and when the world’s thunders roars, he smiles at the uproar, while he hums his pleasant tune: —

Jerusalem my happy home,

Name ever dear to me;

When shall my labours have an end,

In joy, and peace, and thee?

When her sword comes out, he looketh at it. ‘Ah’, saith he, ‘just as the lightning leapeth from its thunder lair, splitteth the clouds, and affrighteth the stars, but is powerless against the rock-covered mountaineer, who smiles at its grandeur, so now the world cannot hurt me, for in the time of trouble my Father hides me in his pavilion, in the secret of his tabernacle doth he hide me, and set me up upon a rock.’ Thus, again, we conquer the world, by not caring for its frowns.

3. ‘Well,’ saith the world, ‘I will try another style,’ and this believe me, is the most dangerous of all. A smiling world is worse than a frowning one. She saith, ‘I cannot smite the man low with my repeated blows, I will take off my mailed glove, and showing him a fair white hand, I’ll bid him kiss it. I will tell him I love him: I will flatter him, I will speak good words to him.’ John Bunyan well describes this Madam Bubble: she has a winning way with her; she drops a smile at the end of each of her sentences; she talks much of fair things, and tries to win and woo. Oh, believe me, Christians are not so much in danger when they are persecuted as when they are admired. When we stand upon the pinnacle of popularity, we may well tremble and fear. It is not when we are hissed at, and hooted, that we have any cause to be alarmed; it is when we are dandled on the lap of fortune, and nursed upon the knees of the people; it is when all men speak well of us that woe is unto us. It is not in the cold wintry wind that I take off my coat of righteousness, and throw it away; it is when the sun comes, when the weather is warm, and the air balmy, that I unguardedly strip off my robes, and become naked. Good God! how many a man has been made naked by the love of this world! The world has flattered and applauded him; he has drunk the flattery; it was an intoxicating draught, he has staggered, he has reeled, he has sinned, he has lost his reputation; and as a comet that erst flashed across the sky, doth wander far into space, and is lost in darkness, so doth he; great as he was, he falls; mighty as he was, he wanders, and is lost. But the true child of God is never so; he is as safe when the world smiles, as when it frowns; he cares as little for her praise as for her dispraise. If he is praised, and it is true, he says, ‘My deeds deserves praise, but I refer all honour to my God.’ Great souls know what they merit from their critic; to them it is nothing more than the giving of their daily income. Some men cannot live without a large amount of praise; and if they have no more than they deserve, let them have it. If they are children of God, they will be kept steady; they will not be ruined or spoiled; but they will stand with feet like hinds’ feet upon high places.—‘This is the victory that overcometh the world.’

4. Sometimes, again, the world turns jailer to a Christian. God sends affliction and sorrow, until life is a prison-house, the world its jailer—and a wretched jailer too. Have you ever been in trials and troubles, my friends? and has the world never come to you and said ‘Poor prisoner, I have a key that will let you out. You are in pecuniary difficulties; I will tell you how you may get free. Put that Mr Conscience away. He asks you whether it is a dishonest act. Never mind about him; let him sleep; think about the honesty after you have got the money, and repent at your leisure.’ So saith the world; but you say, ‘I cannot do the thing.’ ‘Well,’ says the world, ‘then groan and grumble: a good man like you locked up in this prison!’ ‘No,’ says the Christian, ‘my Father sent me into want, and in his own time he will fetch me out; but if I die here I will not use wrong means to escape. My Father put me here for my good, I will not grumble; if my bones must lie here—if my coffin is to be under these stones—if my tombstone shall be in the wall of my dungeon—here will I die, rather than so much lift a finger to get out by unfair means.’ ‘Ah,’ says the world, ‘then thou art a fool.’ The scorner laughs and passes on, saying, ‘The man has no brain, he will not do a bold thing; he hath no courage; he will not launch upon the sea; he wants to go in the old beaten track of morality.’ Ay, so he does; for thus he overcomes the world.

Oh! I might tell you of some battles that have been fought. There has been many a poor maiden, who has worked, worked, worked, until her fingers were worn to the bone, to earn a scanty living out of the things which we wear upon us, knowing not that ofttimes we wear the blood, and bones, and sinews of poor girls. That poor girl has been tempted a thousand times, the evil one has tried to seduce her, but she has fought a valiant battle; stern in her integrity, in the midst of poverty she still stands upright, ‘Clear as the sun, fair as the moon, and terrible as an army with banners’, a heroine unconquered by the temptations and enticements of vice. In other cases: many a man has had the chance of being rich in an hour, affluent in a moment, if he would but clutch something which he dare not look at, because God within him said, ‘No’. The world said, ‘Be rich, be rich’; but the Holy Spirit said, ‘No! be honest; serve thy God.’ Oh, the stern contest and the manly combat carried on within the heart! But he said, ‘No; could I have the stars transmuted into worlds of gold, I would not for those globes of wealth belie my principles, and damage my soul’: thus he walks a conqueror. ‘This is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith.’

II. But my text speaks of a GREAT BIRTH. A very kind friend has told me that while I was preaching in Exeter Hall I ought to pay deference to the varied opinions of my hearers; that albeit I may be a Calvinist and a Baptist, I should recollect that there are a variety of creeds here. Now, if I were to preach nothing but what would please the whole lot of you, what on earth should I do? I preach what I believe to be true; and if the omission of a single truth that I believe, would make me king of England throughout eternity, I would not leave it out. Those who do not like what I say have the option of leaving it. They come here, I suppose, to please themselves; and if the truth does not please them, they can leave it. I will never be afraid that an honest British audience will turn away from the man who does not stick, and stutter, and stammer in speaking the truth. Well, now, about this great birth. I am going to say perhaps a harsh thing, but I heard it said by Mr Jay first of all. Some say a new birth takes place in an infant baptism, but I remember that venerable patriarch saying, ‘Popery is a lie, Puseyism is a lie, baptismal regeneration is a lie.’ So it is. It is a lie so palpable that I can scarcely imagine the preachers of it have any brains in their heads at all. It is so absurd upon the very face of it, that a man who believes it put himself below the range of a common-sense man. Believe that every child by a drop of water is born again! Then that man that you see in the ring as a prize-fighter is born again, because those sanctified drops once fell upon his infant forehead! Another man swears—behold him drunk and reeling about the streets. He is born again! A pretty born again that is! I think he wants to be born again another time. Such a regeneration as that only fits him for the devil; and by its deluding effect, may even make him sevenfold more the child of hell. But the men who curse, and swear, and rob and steal, and those poor wretches who are hanged, have all been born again, according to the fiction of this beautiful Puseyite church. Out upon it! out upon it! Ah, God sends something better than that into men’s hearts, when he sends them a new birth.

However, the text speaks of a great birth. ‘Whatsoever is born of God overcometh the world.’ This new birth is the mysterious point in all religion. If you preach anything else except the new birth you will always get on well with your hearers; but if you insist that in order to enter heaven there must be a radical change, though this is the doctrine of the Scripture, it is so unpalatable to mankind in general that you will scarcely get them to listen. Ah! now ye turn away if I begin to tell you, that ‘except ye be born of water and of the Spirit, ye cannot enter the kingdom of heaven’. If I tell you that there must be a regenerating influence exerted upon your minds by the power of the Holy Ghost, then I know ye will say ‘It is enthusiasm.’ Ah! but it is the enthusiasm of the Bible. There I stand; by this I will be judged. If the Bible does not say we must be born again, then I give it up; but if it does then, sirs, do not distrust that truth on which your salvation hangs.

What is it to be born again, then? Very briefly, to be born again is to undergo a change so mysterious, that human words cannot speak of it. As we cannot describe our first birth, so it is impossible for us to describe the second. ‘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.’ But while it is so mysterious, it is a change which is known and felt. People are not born again when they are in bed and asleep, so that they do not know it. They feel it; they experience it. Galvanism, or the power of electricity, may be mysterious; but they produce a feeling—a sensation. So does the new birth. At the time of the new birth the soul is in great agony—often drowned in seas of tears. Sometimes it drinks bitters, now and then mingled with sweet drops of hope. Whilst we are passing from death unto life, there is an experience which none but the child of God can really understand. It is a mysterious change; but, at the same time, it is a positive one. It is as much a change as if this heart were taken out of me, and the black drops of blood wrung from it, then washed and cleansed and put into my soul again. It is ‘a new heart and a right spirit’: a mysterious but yet an actual and real change!

Let me tell you, moreover, that this change is a supernatural one. It is not one that a man performs upon himself. It is not leaving off drinking and becoming sober; it is not turning from a Roman Catholic to a Protestant; it is not veering round from a Dissenter to a Churchman, or a Churchman to a Dissenter. It is vast deal more than that. It is a new principle infused which works in the heart, enters the very soul, and moves the entire man. Not a change of my name, but a renewal of my nature, so that I am not the man I used to be, but a new man in Christ Jesus. It is a supernatural change—something which man cannot do, and which only God can effect; which the Bible itself cannot accomplish without the attendant Spirit of God; which no minister’s eloquence can bring about—something so mighty and wondrous, that it must be confessed to be the work of God, and God alone. Here is the place to observe that this new birth is an enduring change. Arminians tell us that people are born again, then fall into sin, pick themselves up again, and become Christians again—fall into sin, lose the grace of God, then come back again—fall into sin a hundred times in their lives, and so keep on losing grace and recovering it. Well, I suppose it is a new version of the Scripture where you read of that. But I read in my Bible that if true Christians could fall away, it would be impossible to renew them again unto repentance. I read, moreover, that wherever God has begun a good work he will carry it on even to the end; and that whom he once loves, he loves to the end. If I have simply been reformed, I may be a drunkard yet, or you may see me acting on the stage. But if I am really born again, with that real supernatural change, I shall never fall away, I may fall into a sin, but I shall not fall finally; I shall stand while life shall last, constantly secure; and when I die it shall be said—

Servant of God, well done!

Rest from thy blest employ;

The battle’s fought, the victory’s won;

Enter thy rest of joy.

Do not deceive yourselves, my beloved. If you imagine that you have been regenerated, and having gone away from God, will be once more born again, you do not know anything about the matter; for ‘he that is born of God sinneth not’. That is, he does not sin so much as to fall away from grace; ‘for he keepeth himself; that the evil one toucheth him not’. Happy is the man who is really and actually regenerate, and passed from death unto life!

III. To conclude. There is a GREAT GRACE. Persons who are born again really do overcome the world. How is this brought about? The text says, ‘This is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith.’ Christians do not triumph over the world by reason. Not at all. Reason is a very good thing, and nobody should find fault with it. Reason is a candle: but faith is a sun. Well, I prefer the sun, though I do not put out the candle. I use my reason as a Christian man; I exercise it constantly: but when I come to real warfare, reason is a wooden sword; it breaks, it snaps; while faith, that sword of true Jerusalem metal, cuts to the dividing of soul and body. My text says, ‘This is the victory which overcometh the world, even our faith.’ Who are the men that do anything in the world? Are they not always men of faith? Take it even as natural faith. Who wins the battle? Why, the man who knows he will win it, and vows that he will be victor. Who never gets on in the world? The man who is always afraid to do a thing, for fear he cannot accomplish it. Who climbs the top of the Alps? The man who says, ‘I will do it, or I will die.’ Let such a man make up his mind that he can do a thing, and he will do it, if it is within the range of possibility. Who have been the men who have lifted the standard, and grasping it with firm hand, have upheld it in the midst of stormy strife and battle? Why, men of faith. Who have done great things? Not men of fear and trembling, men who are afraid; but men of faith, who had bold fronts, and foreheads made of brass—men who never shook, and never trembled, but believing in God, lifted their eyes to the hills, whence cometh their strength.

Never was a marvel done upon the earth, but it had sprung of faith; nothing noble, generous, or great, but faith was the root of the achievement; nothing comely, nothing famous, but its praise is faith. Leonidas fought in human faith as Joshua in divine. Xenophon trusted to his skill, and the sons of Matthias to their cause. Faith is mightiest of the mighty. It is the monarch of the realms of the mind; there is no being superior to its strength, no creature which will not bow to its divine prowess. The want of faith makes a man despicable, it shrivels him up so small that he might live in a nutshell. Give him faith, and he is a leviathan that can dive into the depths of the sea; he is a war horse, that cries, aha! aha! in the battle; he is a giant who takes nations and crumbles them in his hand, who encounters hosts, and at a sword they vanish; he binds up sheaves of sceptres, and gathers up all the crowns at his own. There is nothing like faith, sirs. Faith makes you almost as omnipotent as God, by the borrowed might of its divinity. Give us faith and we can do all things.

I want to tell you how it is that faith helps Christians to overcome the world. It always does it homœopathically. You say, ‘That is a singular idea.’ So it may be. The principle is that, ‘like cures like’. So does faith overcome the world by curing like with like. How does faith trample upon the fear of the world? By the fear of God. ‘Now’, says the world, ‘if you do not do this I will take away your life. If you do not bow down before my false god, you shall be put in yon burning fiery furnace.’ ‘But,’ says the man of faith, ‘I fear him who can destroy both body and soul in hell. True, I may dread you, but I have a greater fear than that. I fear lest I should displease God; I tremble lest I should offend my Sovereign.’ So the one fear counterbalances the other. How does faith overthrow the world’s hopes? ‘There,’ says the world, ‘I will give thee this, I will give thee that, if thou wilt be my disciple. There is a hope for you; you shall be rich, you shall be great.’ But, faith says, ‘I have a hope laid up in heaven; a hope which fadeth not away, eternal, incorrupt, amaranthine hope, a golden hope, a crown of life’; and the hope of glory overcomes all the hopes of the world. ‘Ah!’ says the world, ‘Why not follow the example of your fellows?’ ‘Because,’ says faith, ‘I will follow the example of Christ.’ If the world puts one example before us, faith puts another. ‘Oh, follow the example of such an one; he is wise, and great, and good,’ says the world. Says faith, ‘I will follow Christ; he is the wisest, the greatest, and the best.’ It overcomes example by example. ‘Well,’ says the world, ‘since thou wilt not be conquered by all this, come, I will love thee; thou shalt be my friend.’ Faith says, ‘He that is the friend of this world, cannot be the friend of God. God loves me.’ So he puts love against love; fear against fear; hope against hope; dread against dread; and so faith overcomes the world by like curing like.

In closing my discourse, men and brethren, I am but a child; I have spoken to you as I could this morning. Another time, perhaps I might be able to launch more thunders, and to proclaim better the word of God; but this I am sure of—I tell you all I know, and speak right on. I am no orator; but just tell you what springs up from my heart. But before I have done, O that I may have a word with your souls. How many are there here who are born again? Some turn a deaf ear, and say, ‘It is all nonsense; we go to our place of worship regularly; put our hymn books and Bibles under our arm! and we are very religious sort of people.’ Ah, soul! if I meet you at the bar of judgment, recollect I said—and said God’s word—‘Except ye be born again ye shall not enter the kingdom of heaven.’ Others of you say, ‘We cannot believe that being born again is such a change as you speak of, I am a great deal better than I used to be; I do not swear now, and I am very much reformed.’ Sirs, I tell you it is no little change. It is not mending the pitcher, but it is breaking it up and having a new one; it is not patching the heart, it is having a new heart and a right spirit. There is nothing but death unto sin, and life unto righteousness, that will save your souls.

I am preaching no new doctrine. Turn to the articles of the Church of England, and read it there. Church people come to me sometimes to unite with our church; I show them our doctrines in their prayer book, and they have said they never knew they were there. My dear hearers, why cannot you read your own articles of faith? Why, positively, you do not know what is in your own prayer book. Men, nowadays, do not read their Bibles, and they have for the most part no religion. They have a religion, which is all outside show, but they do not think of searching to see what its meaning really is. Sirs, it is not the cloak of religion that will do for you, it is a vital godliness you need; it is not a religious Sunday, it is a religious Monday; it is not a pious church, it is a pious closet; it is not a sacred place to kneel in, it is a holy place to stand in all day long. There must be a change of heart, real, radical, vital, entire. And now, what say you? Has your faith overcome the world? Can you live above it? or do you love the world and the things thereof? If so, sirs, ye must go on your way and perish, each one of you, unless ye turn from that, and give your hearts to Christ. Oh! what say you, is Jesus worthy of your love? Are the things of eternity and heaven worth the things of time? Is it so sweet to be a worldling, that for that you can lie down in torment? Is it so good to be a sinner, that for this you can risk your soul’s eternal welfare? O, my friends, is it worth your while to run the risk of an eternity of woe for a hour of pleasure? Is a dance worth dancing in hell with howling fiends forever? Is one dream, with a horrid waking, worth enjoying, when there are the glories of heaven for those who follow God? Oh! if my lips would let me speak to you, my heart would run over at my eyes, and I would weep myself away, until ye had pity on your own poor souls. I know I am, in a measure, accountable for your souls. If the watchmen warn them not, they shall perish, but their blood shall be required at the watchman’s hands. ‘Turn ye, turn ye, why will ye die, O house of Israel?’ thus saith the Lord. Besotted, filled with your evil wills, inclined to evil; still the Holy Ghost speaks by me this morning, ‘If ye turn unto the Lord, with full purpose of heart, he will have mercy upon you, and to our God, he will abundantly pardon.’ I cannot bring you; I cannot fetch you. My words are powerless, my thoughts are weak! Old Adam is too strong for this young child to draw or drag; but God speak to you, dear hearts; God send the truth home, and then we shall rejoice together, both he that soweth and he that reapeth, because God has given us the increase. God bless you! may you all be born again, and have that faith that overcometh the world!

Have I that faith which looks to Christ,

O’ercomes the world and sin—

Receives him Prophet, Priest, and King,

And makes the conscience clean?

If I this precious grace possess,

All praise is due to thee;

If not, I seek it from thy hands;

Now grant it, Lord, to me.

Thumbnail Photo by Jeremy Bishop on Unsplash

The post The Victory of Faith: C. H. Spurgeon Sermon appeared first on Banner of Truth UK.

DELIVERED ON SABBATH MORNING, MARCH 11, 1855, BY THE

REV. C. H. SPURGEON,

AT EXETER HALL, STRAND.

‘For as the sufferings of Christ abound in us, so our consolation also aboundeth by Christ.’—2 Corinthians 1:5.

SEEK ye rest from your distresses ye children of woe and sorrow? This is the place where ye may lighten your burden, and lose your cares. Oh, son of affliction and misery, wouldst thou forget for a time thy pains and griefs? This is the Bethesda, the house of mercy; this is the place where God designs to cheer thee, and to make thy distresses stay their never ceasing course; this is the spot where his children love to be found, because here they find consolation in the midst of tribulation, joy in their sorrows, and comfort in their afflictions. Even worldly men admit that there is something extremely comforting in the sacred Scriptures, and in our holy religion; I have even heard it said of some, that after they had, by their logic, as they thought, annihilated Christianity, and proved it to be untrue, they acknowledged that they had spoilt an excellently comforting delusion, and that they could almost sit down and weep to think it was not a reality. Ay, my friends, if it were not true, ye might weep. If the Bible were not the truth of God—if we could not meet together around his mercy seat, then ye might put your hands upon your loins and walk about as if ye were in travail. If ye had not something in the world beside your reason, beside the fleeting joys of earth—if ye had not something which God had given to you, some hope beyond the sky, some refuge that should be more than terrestrial, some deliverance which should be more than earthly, then ye might weep;—ah! weep your heart out at your eyes, and let your whole bodies waste away in one perpetual tear. Ye might ask the clouds to rest on your head, the rivers to roll down in streams from both your eyes, for your grief would ‘have need of all the watery things that nature could produce’. But, blessed be God, we have consolation, we have joy in the Holy Ghost. We find it nowhere else. We have raked the earth through, but we have discovered ne’er a jewel; we have turned this dunghill-world o’er and o’er a thousand times, and we have found nought that is precious; but here, in this Bible, here in the religion of the blessed Jesus we the sons of God, have found comfort and joy; while we can truly say, ‘As our afflictions abound, so our consolations also abound by Christ.’

There are four things in my text to which I invite your attention: the first is the sufferings to be expected—‘The sufferings of Christ abound in us’; secondly, the distinction to be noticed—they are the sufferings of Christ; thirdly, a proportion to be experienced—as the sufferings of Christ abound, so our consolations abound; and fourthly, the person to be honoured—‘So our consolation aboundeth by Christ.”

I. Our first division then is, the sufferings to be expected. Our holy Apostle says ‘The sufferings of Christ abound in us.’ Before we buckle on the Christian armour we ought to know what that service is which is expected of us. A recruiting sergeant often slips a shilling into the hand of some ignorant youth, and tells him that Her Majesty’s Service is a fine thing, that he has nothing to do but walk about in his flaming colours, that he will have no hard service—in fact, that he has nothing to do but to be a soldier, and go straight on to glory. But the Christian sergeant, when he enlists a soldier of the cross, never deceives him like that. Jesus Christ himself said, ‘Count the cost.’ He wished to have no disciple who was not prepared to go all the way—‘to bear hardness as a good soldier’. I have sometimes heard religion described in such a way that its high colouring has displeased me. It is true ‘her ways are ways of pleasantness’; but it is not true that a Christian never has sorrow or trouble. It is true that light-eyed cheerfulness, and airy-footed love, can go through the world without much depression and tribulation: but it is not true that Christianity will shield a man from trouble; nor ought it to be so represented. In fact, we ought to speak of it in the other way. Soldier of Christ, if thou enlisteth, thou wilt have to do hard battle. There is no bed of down for thee; there it no riding to heaven in a chariot; the rough way must be trodden; mountains must be climbed, rivers must be forded, dragons must be fought, giants must be slain, difficulties must be overcome, and great trials must be borne. It is not a smooth road to heaven, believe me; for those who have gone but a very few steps therein have found it to be a rough one. It is a pleasant one; it is the most delightful in all the world, but it is not easy in itself; it is only pleasant because of the company, because of the sweet promises on which we lean, because of our Beloved who walks with us through all the rough and thorny brakes of this vast wilderness. Christian, expect trouble: ‘Count it not strange concerning the fiery trial, and as though some strange thing had happened unto thee’; for as truly as thou art a child of God, thy Saviour hath left thee for his legacy,—‘In the world, ye shall have tribulation; in me ye shall have peace.’ If I had no trouble I would not believe myself one of the family. If I never had a trial I would not think myself a heir of heaven. Children of God must not, shall not, escape the rod. Earthly parents may spoil their children but the heavenly Father ne’er shall his. ‘Whom he loveth he chasteneth’, and scourgeth every son whom he hath chosen. His people must suffer; therefore, expect it Christian; if thou art a child of God believe it, look for it, and when it comes, say, ‘Well suffering, I foresaw thee; thou art no stranger; I have looked for thee continually.’ You cannot tell how much it will lighten your trials, if you await them with resignation. In fact, make it a wonder if you get through a day easily. If you remain a week without persecution, think it a remarkable thing; and if you should, perchance, live a month without heaving a sigh from your inmost heart, think it a miracle of miracles. But when the trouble comes, say, “Ah! this is what I looked for; it is marked in the chart to heaven; the rock is put down; I will sail confidently by it; my Master has not deceived me.’

Why should I complain of want or distress,

Temptation or pain? He told me no less.

But why must the Christian expect trouble? Why must he expect the sufferings of Christ to abound in him? Stand here a moment, my brother, and I will show thee four reasons wherefore thou must endure trial. First look upward, then look downward, then look around thee, and then look within thee; and thou wilt see four reasons why the sufferings of Christ should abound in thee.

Look upward. Dost thou see thy heavenly Father, a pure and holy being, spotless, just, perfect? Dost thou know that thou art one day to be like him? Thinkest thou that thou wilt easily come to be conformed to his image? Wilt thou not require much furnace work, much grinding in the mill of trouble, much breaking with the pestle in the mortar of affliction, much being broken under the wheels of agony? Thinkest thou it will be an easy thing for thy heart to become as pure as God is? Dost thou think thou canst so soon get rid of thy corruptions, and become perfect, even as thy Father which is in heaven is perfect?

Lift up thine eye again; dost thou discern those bright spirits clad in white, purer than alabaster, more chaste, more fair than Parian marble? Behold them as they stand in glory. Ask them whence their victory came. Some of them will tell you they swam through seas of blood. Behold the scars of honour on their brows; see, some of them lift up their hands and tell you they were once consumed in fire; while others were slain by the sword, rent in pieces by wild beasts; were destitute, afflicted, tormented. O ye noble army of martyrs, ye glorious hosts of the living God. Must ye swim through seas of blood, and shall I hope to ride to heaven wrapped in furs and ermine? Did ye endure suffering, and shall I be pampered with the luxuries of this world? Did ye fight and then reign, and must I reign without a battle? Oh, no. By God’s help I will expect that as ye suffered so must I, and as through much tribulation ye entered the kingdom of heaven, so shall I.

Next, Christian, turn thine eyes downward. Dost thou know what foes thou hast beneath thy feet? There are hell and its lions against thee. Thou wast once a servant of Satan and no king will willingly lose his subjects. Dost thou think that Satan be pleased with thee? Why, thou hast changed thy country. Thou wast once a liege servant of Apollyon, but now thou art become a good soldier of Jesus Christ; and dost thou think the devil is pleased with thee? I tell thee nay. If thou hadst seen Satan the moment thou wast converted, thou wouldst have beheld a wondrous scene. As soon as thou gavest thy heart to Christ, Satan spread his bat-like wings: down he flew into hell, and summoning all his counsellors, he said ‘Sons of the pit, true heirs of darkness; ye who erst were clad in light, but who fell with me from high dignities, another of my servants has forsaken me; I have lost another of my family; he is gone over to the side of the Lord of hosts. Oh ye, my compeers, ye fellow-helpers of the powers of darkness, leave no stone unturned to destroy him. I bid you all hurl all your fiercest darts at him; plague him; let hell-dogs bark at him; let fiends besiege him; give him no rest, harass him to the death; let the fumes of our corrupt and burning lake ever rise in his nostrils; persecute him; the man is a traitor; give him no peace; since I cannot have him here to bind him in chains of adamant, since I ne’er can have him here to torment and afflict him, as long as ye can, till his dying day, I bid you howl at him; until he crosses the river, afflict him, grieve him, torment him; for the wretch has turned against me, and become a servant of the Lord.’ Such may have been the scene in hell, that very day when thou didst love the Lord. And dost thou think Satan loves thee better now? Ah! no. He will always be at thee, for thine enemy, ‘like a roaring lion, goeth about seeking whom he may devour’. Expect trouble therefore, Christian, when thou lookest beneath thee.

Then, man of God, look around thee. Do not be asleep. Open thine eyes, and look around thee. Where art thou? Is that man a friend next to thee? No; thou art in an enemy’s country. This is a wicked world. Half the people, I suppose, profess to be irreligious, and those who profess to be pious, often are not. ‘Cursed is he that trusteth in man and maketh flesh his arm.’—‘Blessed is he that trusteth in the Lord, and whose hope the Lord is.’—‘As for men of low degree, they are vanity’; the voice of the crowd is not worth having; and as for ‘men of high degree, they are a lie’, which is worse still. The world is not to be trusted in, not to be relied upon. The true Christian treads it beneath his feet, with ‘all that earth calls good or great’. Look around thee my brother; thou wilt see some good hearts, strong and valiant; thou wilt see some true souls, sincere and honest; thou wilt see some faithful lovers of Christ; but I tell thee, O child of light, that where thou meetest one sincere man, thou wilt meet twenty hypocrites; where thou wilt find one that will lead thee to heaven, thou wilt find a score who would push thee to hell. Thou art in a land of enemies, not of friends. Never believe the world is good for much. Many people have burned their fingers by taking hold of it. Many a man has been injured by putting his hand into a nest of the rattlesnake—the world; thinking that the dazzling hues of the sleeping serpent were securities from harm. O Christian! the world is not thy friend. If it is, then thou art not God’s friend; for he who is the friend of the world is the enemy of God; and he who is despised of men, is often loved of Jehovah. Thou art in an enemy’s country, man: therefore, expect trouble; expect that the man who ‘eats thy bread will lift up his heel against thee’; expect that thou shalt be estranged from those that love thee; be assured that since thou art in the land of the foe, thou shalt find foemen everywhere. When thou sleepest, think that thou sleepest on the battlefield; when thou walkest believe that there is an ambush in every hedge. Oh! take heed, take heed: this is no good world to shut thine eyes in. Look around thee, man; and when thou art upon the watchtower, reckon surely that trouble cometh.

But then, look within thee. There is a little world in here, which is quite enough to give us trouble. A Roman once said he wished he had a window to his heart, that all people might see what was going on there. I am very glad I have not; if I had I would shut it up as closely as Apsley House used to be; I would take care to have all the shutters up. Most of us would have great need of shutters if we had such a window. However, for one moment, peep into the window of thine heart, to observe what is there. Sin is there—original sin and corruption; and what is more, self is still within. Ah! if thou hadst no devil to tempt thee, thou wouldest tempt thyself; if there were no enemies to fight thee, thyself would be thy worst foe; if there were no world, still thyself would be bad enough; for ‘the heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked’. Look within thee, believer; know that thou bearest a cancer in thy very vitals; that thou carriest within thee a bombshell, ready to burst at the slightest spark of temptation; know that thou hast inside thy heart an evil thing, a coiled-up viper, ready to sting thee and bring thee into trouble, and pain, and misery unutterable. Take heed of your heart, Christian; and when thou findest sorrow, trouble, and care, look within and say, ‘Verily, I may well receive this, considering the evil heart of unbelief which I carry about with me.’ Now dost thou see, brother Christian? No hope to escape trouble, is there. What shall we do then? There is no chance for us. We must bear suffering and affliction; therefore, let us endure it cheerfully. Some of us are the officers in God’s regiments, and we are the mark of all the riflemen of the enemy. Standing forward, we have to bear all the shots. What a mercy it is that not one of God’s officers ever falls in battle! God always keeps them. When the arrows fly fast, the shield of faith catches them all; and when the enemy is most angry, God is most pleased. So, for aught we care, the world may go on, the devil may revile, flesh may rise; ‘for we are more than conquerors through him that hath loved us’. Therefore, all honour be unto God alone. Expect suffering—this is our first point.

II. Now, secondly, there is a distinction to be noticed. Our sufferings are said to be the sufferings of Christ. Now, suffering in itself is not an evidence of Christianity. There are many people who have trials and troubles who are not children of God. I have heard some poor whining people come and say, ‘I know I am a child of God because I am in debt, because I am in poverty, because I am in trouble.’ Do you indeed? I know a great many rascals in the same condition; and I don’t believe you are a child of God any the more because you happen to be in poor circumstances. There are abundance who are in trouble and distress besides God’s children. It is not the peculiar lot of God’s family; and if I had no other ground of my hope as a Christian, except my experience of trials, I should have but very poor ground indeed. But there is a distinction to be noticed. Are these sufferings the sufferings of Christ, or are they not? A man is dishonest, and is put in jail for it; a man is a coward and men hiss at him for it; a man is insincere, and, therefore, persons avoid him. Yet he says he is persecuted. Persecuted! Not at all; it serves him right. He deserves it. But such persons will comfort themselves with the thought, that they are ‘the dear people of God’, because other people avoid them; when it so happens that they just deserve it. They do not live as they ought to do; therefore the world’s punishment is their desert. Take heed, beloved, that your sufferings are the sufferings of Christ; be sure they are not your own sufferings; for if they are, you will get no relief. It is only when they are the sufferings of Jesus that we may take comfort.

‘Well,’ you say, ‘what is meant by our sufferings being the sufferings of Christ?’ You know the word ‘Christ’ in the Bible sometimes means the whole church with Christ, as in 1 Corinthians 12:12, and several other passages which I cannot just now remember; but you will call to mind a scripture where it says, ‘I fill up that which is behind of the sufferings of Christ, for his body’s sake, which is the church.’ Now, as Christ, the head, had a certain amount of suffering to endure, so the body must also have a certain weight laid upon it. Our afflictions are the sufferings of Christ mystical, the sufferings of Christ’s body, the sufferings of Christ’s church; for you know that if a man could be so tall as to have his head in heaven and his feet at the bottom of the sea, it would be the same body, and the head would feel the sufferings of the feet. So, though my head is in heaven, and I am on earth, my griefs are Christ’s griefs; my trials are Christ’s trials, my afflictions, he suffers.

I feel at My heart all thy sighs and thy groans,

For thou art most near Me, My flesh and My bones;

In all thy distresses, thy Head feels the pain,

Yet all are most needful, not one is in vain.

The trials of a true Christian are as much the sufferings of Christ, as the agonies of Calvary.

Still you say, ‘We want to discern whether our troubles are the trials of Christ.’ Well, they are the trials of Christ, if you suffer for Christ’s sake. If you are called to endure hardness for the sake of the truth, then those are the sufferings of Christ. If you suffer for your own sake, it may be a punishment for your own sins; but if you endure for Christ’s sake, then they are the trials of Christ. ‘But,’ say some, ‘is there any persecution nowadays? Do any Christians have to suffer for Christ’s sake now?’ Suffer, sirs! Yes. ‘I could a tale unfold’ this morning, if I pleased, of bigotry insufferable, of persecution well nigh as bad as that in the days of Mary; only our foes have not the power and the law on their side. I could tell you of some who, from the simple fact, that they choose to come and hear this despised young man, this ranting fellow, are to be looked upon as the offscouring of all things. Many are the persons who come to me, who have to lead a miserable and unhappy life, simply because from my lips they heard the word of truth. Still, despite of all that is said, they will hear it now. I have, I am sure, many before me, whose eyes would drop with tears, if I were to tell their history—some who have privately sent me word of how they have to suffer for Christ’s sake, because they choose to hear whom they please. Why, is it not time that men should choose to do as they like. If I do not care to do just as other ministers do, have not I a right to preach as I please? If I havn’t I will—that is all. And have not other parties a right to hear me if they like, without asking the lords and governors of the present day, whether the man is really clerical or not. Liberty! liberty! Let persons do as they please. But liberty—where is it? Ye say it is in Britain. It is, in a measure, but not thoroughly. However, I rejoice that there are some who say, ‘Well, my soul is profited: and let men say what they will, I will hold hard and fast to truth, and to the place where I hear the word to my soul’s edification.’ So, dear hearts, go on, go on; and if ye suffer for Christ’s sake, they are Christ’s sufferings. If ye came here simply because ye gained anything by it, then your sufferings would be your own; but since there is nothing to gain but the profit of your own souls, still hold on; and whate’er is said, your persecution will but win you a brighter crown in glory.

Ah! Christian, this ennobles us. My brethren, this makes us proud and happy to think that our trials are the trials of Jesus. Oh! I think it must have been some honour to the old soldier, who stood by the Iron Duke in his battles, to be able to say, ‘We fight under the good old Duke, who has won so many battles: and when he wins, part of the honour will be ours.’ Christian, thou fightest side by side with Jesus; Christ is with thee; every blow is a blow aimed at Christ; every slander is a slander on Christ; the battle is the Lord’s; the triumph is the Lord’s; therefore, still on to victory! I remember a story of a great commander, who, having won many glorious victories, led his troops into a defile, and when there, a large body of the enemy entirely surrounded him. He knew a battle was inevitable on the morning; he therefore went round to all the tents, to hear in what condition his soldier’s minds were—whether they were dispirited or not. He came to one tent, and as he listened, he heard a man say, ‘There is our general; he is very brave, but he is very unwise this time; he has led us into a place where we are sure to be beaten; there are so many of the enemy’s cavalry, so many infantry’: and then the man counted up all the troops on their own side, and made them only so many. Then the commander, after he had heard the tale, gently drew aside a part of the tent, and said, ‘How many do you count me for? You have counted the infantry and cavalry; but how many do you count me for—me, your mighty captain, who has won so many victories.’ Now, Christian, I say, how many do you count Christ for? How many do you put him down for? Hast thou put him down for one? He is not one, nor a thousand: he is the ‘chief among ten thousand’. But he is more than that. Oh! put him down for a high figure; and when thou countest up thine aids and auxiliaries, put down Christ for all in all, for in him victory is certain—the triumph is secure.

III. Our third point is, a proportion to be experienced. As the sufferings of Christ abound in us so the consolations of Christ abound. Here is a blessed proportion. God always keeps a pair of scales—in this side he puts his people’s trials and in that he puts their consolations. When the scale of trial is nearly empty, you will always find the scale of consolation in nearly the same condition; and when the scale of trials is full, you will find the scale of consolation just as heavy, for as the sufferings of Christ abound in us, even so shall consolation abound by Christ. This is a matter of pure experience. Some of you do not know anything at all about it. You are not Christians, you are not born again, you are not converted; ye are unregenerate, and, therefore, ye have never realized this wonderful proportion between the sufferings and the consolations of a child of God. Oh! it is mysterious that, when the black clouds gather most, the light within us is always the brightest. When the night lowers and the tempest is coming on, the heavenly captain is always closest to his crew. It is a blessed thing, when we are most cast down, then it is that we are most lifted up by the consolations of Christ. Let me show you how.

The first reason is, because trials make more room for consolation. There is nothing makes a man have a big heart like a great trial. I always find that little, miserable people, whose hearts are about the size of a grain of mustard seed, never have had much to try them. I have found that those people who have no sympathy for their fellows—who never weep for the sorrows of others—very seldom have had any woes of their own. Great hearts can only be made by great troubles. The spade of trouble digs the reservoir of comfort deeper, and makes more room for consolation. God comes into our heart—he finds it full—he begins to break our comforts and to make it empty; then there is more room for grace. The humbler a man lies, the more comfort he will always have. I recollect walking with a ploughman one day—a man who was deeply taught, although he was a ploughman; and really ploughmen would make a great deal better preachers than many college gentlemen—and he said to me, ‘Depend upon it, my good brother, if you or I ever get one inch above the ground, we shall get just that inch too high.’ I believe it is true; for the lower we lie, the nearer to the ground we are—the more our troubles humble us—the more fit we are to receive comfort; and God always gives us comfort when we are most fit for it. That is one reason why consolations increase in the same ratio as our trials.

Then again, trouble exercises our graces, and the very exercise of our graces tends to make us more comfortable and happy. Where showers fall most, there the grass is greenest. I suppose the fogs and mists of Ireland make it ‘the Emerald Isle’; and wherever you find great fogs of trouble, and mists of sorrow, you always find emerald green hearts: full of the beautiful verdure of the comfort and love of God. O Christian, do not thou be saying, ‘Where are the swallows gone? they are gone: they are dead.’ They are not dead; they have skimmed the purple sea, and gone to a far-off land; but they will be back again by-and-by. Child of God, say not the flowers are dead; say not the winter has killed them, and they are gone. Ah! no; though winter hath coated them with the ermine of its snow; they will put up their heads again, and will be alive very soon. Say not, child of God, that the sun is quenched, because the cloud hath hidden it. Ah! no; he is behind there, brewing summer for thee; for when he cometh out again, he will have made the clouds fit to drop in April showers, all of them mothers of the sweet May flowers. And oh! above all, when thy God hides his face, say not, that he has forgotten thee. He is but tarrying a little while to make thee love him better; and when he cometh, thou shalt have joy in the Lord, and shalt rejoice with joy unspeakable. Waiting, exercises our grace; waiting, tries our faith; therefore, wait on in hope; for though the promise tarry, it can never come too late.

Another reason why we are often most happy in our troubles is this—then we have the closest dealings with God. I speak from heart knowledge and real experience. We never have such close dealings with God as when we are in tribulation. When the barn is full, man can live without God; when the purse is bursting with gold, we somehow can do without so much prayer. But once take your gourds away, you want your God; once cleanse away the idols out of the house, then you must go and honour Jehovah. Some of you do not pray half as much as you ought. If you are the children of God, you will have the whip, and when you have that whip, you will run to your Father. It is a fine day, and the child walks before its father; but there is a lion in the road, now he comes and takes his father’s hand. He could run half-a-mile before him when all was fine and fair; but once bring the lion, and it is ‘father! father!’ as close as he can be. It is even so with the Christian. Let all be well, and he forgets God. Jeshurun waxes fat, and he begins to kick against God; but take away his hopes, blast his joys, let the infant lie in the coffin, let the crops be blasted, let the herd be cut off from the stall, let the husband’s broad shoulder lie in the grave, let the children be fatherless—then it is that God is a God indeed. Oh, strip me naked; take from me all I have; make me poor, a beggar, penniless, helpless: dash that cistern in pieces; crush that hope; quench the stars; put out the sun; shroud the moon in darkness, and place me all alone in space, without a friend, without a helper; still, ‘Out of the depths will I cry unto thee, O God.’ There is no cry so good as that which comes from the bottom of the mountains; no prayer half so hearty as that which comes up from the depths of the soul, through deep trials and afflictions. Hence they bring us to God, and we are happier; for that is the way to be happy—to live near to God. So that while troubles abound, they drive us to God, and then consolations abound.

Some people call troubles weights. Verily they are so. A ship that has large sails and a fair wind, needs ballast. Troubles are the ballast of a believer. The eyes are the pumps which fetch out the bilge-water of his soul, and keep him from sinking. But if trials be weights I will tell you of a happy secret. There is such a thing as making a weight lift you. If I have a weight chained to me, it keeps me down; but give me pulleys and certain appliances, and I can make it lift me up. Yes, there is such a thing as making troubles raise me towards heaven. A gentlemen once asked a friend, concerning a beautiful horse of his, feeding about in the pasture with a clog on its foot, ‘Why do you clog such a noble animal?’ ‘Sir,’ said he, ‘I would a great deal sooner clog him than lose him: he is given to leap hedges.’ That is why God clogs his people. He would rather clog them than lose them; for if he did not clog them, they would leap the hedges and be gone. They want a tether to prevent their straying, and their God binds them with afflictions, to keep them near to him, to preserve them, and have them in his presence. Blessed fact—as our troubles abound, our consolations also abound.

IV. Now we close up with our last point; and may the Holy Ghost once more strengthen me to speak a word or two to you. There is a person to be honoured. It is a fact that Christians can rejoice in deep distress; it is a truth, that put them in prison, and they still will sing; like many birds, they sing best in their cages. It is true that when waves roll over them, their soul never sinks. It is true they have a buoyancy about them which keeps their heads always above the water, and helps them to sing in the dark, dark night, ‘God is with me still.’ But to whom shall we give the honour? To whom shall the glory be given? Oh! to Jesus, to Jesus; for the text says it is all by Jesus. It is not because I am a Christian that I get joy in my trouble—not necessarily so; it is not always the fact that troubles bring their consolations; but it is Christ who comes to me. I am sick in my chamber; Christ cometh upstairs, he sitteth by my bedside, and he talketh sweet words to me. I am dying; the chilly cold waters of Jordan have touched my foot, I feel my blood stagnate and freeze. I must die; Christ puts his arms around me, and says, ‘Fear not, beloved; to die is to be blessed; the waters of death have their fountainhead in heaven; they are not bitter, they are sweet as nectar, for they flow from the throne of God.’ I wade in the stream, the billows gather around me, I feel that my heart and my flesh fail but there is the same voice in my ears, ‘Fear not, I am with thee! be not dismayed; I am thy God.’ Now, I come to the borders of the infinite unknown, that country ‘from whose bourne no traveller returns’; I stand almost affrighted to enter the realm of shades; but a sweet voice says, ‘I will be with thee whithersoever thou goest; if thou shouldst make thy bed in Hades I will be with thee’; and I still go on, content to die, for Jesus cheers me; he is my consolation and my hope. Ah! ye who know not that matchless name, Jesus, ye have lost the sweetest note which e’er can give melody. Ah! ye who have never been entranced by the precious sonnet contained in that one word Jesu, ye who know not that Jesu means, I-ES-U, (‘I ease you’); ye have lost the joy and comfort of your lives, and ye must live miserable and unhappy. But the Christian can rejoice, since Christ will never forsake him, never leave him, but will be with him.

A word or two to characters—First, I have a word with you who are expecting troubles, and are very sad because you are looking forward to them. Take the advice of the common people, and ‘never cross a bridge till you get to it’. Follow my advice: never bring your troubles nearer than they are, for they will be sure to come down upon you soon enough. I know that many persons fret themselves about their trials before they come. What on earth is the good of it? If you will show me any benefit in it, I will say go on; but to me it seems quite enough for the Father to lay the rod on the child without the child chastising itself. Why should you do so? You, who are afraid of trouble, why should you be so? The trial may never overtake you; and if it does come, strength will come with it. Therefore, up with thee, man, who are sitting down groaning, because of forebodings.

‘Religion never was designed

To make our pleasures less.’

Out on thee! Up! up! Why wilt thou sit down and be frozen to death? When trouble comes, then fight it; with manful heart and strong, plunge into the stream, accoutred as thou art, and swim it through; but oh! do not fear it before it comes.

Then Christian in trouble, I have a word to say with thee. So my brother, thou art in trouble; thou art come into the waves of affliction, art thou? No strange thing, is it brother? Thou hast been there many times before. ‘Ah,’ but sayest thou, ‘this is the worst I ever had. I have come up here this morning with a millstone round my neck; I have a mine of lead in my heart: I am miserable, I am unhappy, I am cast down exceedingly.’ Well, but brother, as thy troubles abound, so shall thy consolation. Brother, hast thou hung thy harp upon the willows? I am glad thou hast not broken the harp altogether. Better, to hang it on the willows than to break it; be sure not to break it. Instead of being distressed about thy trouble, rejoice in it; thou wilt then honour God, thou wilt glorify Christ, thou wilt bring sinners to Jesus, if thou wilt sing in the depths of trouble, for then they will say, ‘There must be something in religion after all, otherwise the man would not be so happy.’

Then one word with you who are almost driven to despair. I would stretch my hands out, if I could, this morning—for I believe a preacher ought to be a Briareus, with a thousand hands to fetch out his hearers one by one, and speak to them. There is a man here quite despairing—almost every hope gone. Brother, shall I tell thee what to do? Thou hast fallen off the main deck, thou art in the sea, the floods surround thee; thou seemest to have no hope; thou catchest at straws; what shalt thou do now? Do? why lie upon the sea of trouble, and float upon it; be still, and know that God is God, and thou wilt never perish. All thy kicking and struggling will sink thee deeper; but lie still, for behold the lifeboat cometh; Christ is coming to thy help; soon he will deliver thee, and fetch thee out of all thy perplexities.

Lastly, some of you have no interest in this sermon at all. I never try to deceive my hearers by making them believe that all I say belongs to all who hear me. There are different characters in God’s word; it is yours to search your own hearts this day, and see whether ye are God’s people, or not. As the Lord liveth, before whom I stand, there are two classes here. I do not own the distinction of aristocratic and democratic; in my sight, and in God’s sight, every man is alike. We are made of one flesh and blood; we do not have china gentlemen and earthenware poor people; we are all made of the same mould of fashion. There is one distinction, and only one. Ye are all either the children of God, or children of the devil; ye are all either born again, or dead in trespasses and sins. It is yours to let the question ring in your ears: ‘Where am I? Is yon black tyrant, with his fiery sword, my king; or do I own Jehovah-Jesus as my strength, my shield, my Saviour?’ I shall not force you to answer it; I shall not say anything to you about it. Only answer it yourselves; let your hearts speak; let your souls speak. All I can do is to propose the question. God apply it to your souls! I beseech him to send it home! and make the arrow stick fast!

Is Jesus mine! I am now prepared,

To meet with what I thought most hard;

Yes, let the winds of trouble blow,

And comforts melt away like snow,

No blasted trees, nor failing crops,

Can hinder my eternal hopes;

Tho’ creatures change, the Lord’s the same;

Then let me triumph in His name.

Thumbnail photo by Jack Sharp on Unsplash

The post Consolation Proportionate to Spiritual Sufferings appeared first on Banner of Truth UK.

‘For so he giveth to his beloved sleep.’—Psalm 127:2.

THE sleep of the body is the gift of God. So said Homer of old, when he described it as descending from the clouds, and resting on the tents of the warriors around old Troy. And so sang Virgil, when he spoke of Palinurus falling asleep upon the prow of the ship. Sleep is the gift of God. We think that we lay our heads upon our pillows, and compose our bodies in a peaceful posture, and that, therefore, we naturally and necessarily sleep. But it is not so. Sleep is the gift of God; and not a man would close his eyes, did not God put his fingers on his eyelids; did not the Almighty send a soft and balmy influence over his frame which lulled his thoughts into quiescence, making him enter into that blissful state of rest which we call sleep. True, there be some drugs and narcotics whereby men can poison themselves well nigh to death, and then call it sleep; but the sleep of the healthy body is the gift of God. He bestows it; he rocks the cradle for us every night; he draws the curtain of darkness; he bids the sun shut up his burning eyes; and then he comes and says, ‘Sleep, sleep, my child; I give thee sleep.’ Have you not known what it is at times to lie upon your bed and strive to slumber? and as it is said of Darius, so might it be said of you: ‘The king sent for his musicians, but his sleep went from him.’ You have attempted it, but you could not do it; it is beyond your power to procure a healthy repose. You imagine if you fix your mind upon a certain subject until it shall engross your attention, you will then sleep; but you find yourself unable to do so. Ten thousand things drive through your brain as if the whole earth were agitated before you. You see all things you ever beheld dancing in a wild phantasmagoria before your eyes. You close your eyes, but still you see; and there be things in your ear, and head, and brain, which will not let you sleep. It is God alone, who alike seals up the sea boy’s eyes upon the giddy mast, and gives the monarch rest: for with all appliances and means to boot, he could not rest without the aid of God. It is God who steeps the mind in lethe, and bids us slumber, that our bodies may be refreshed, so that for tomorrow’s toil we may rise recruited and strengthened. O my friends, how thankful should we be for sleep. Sleep is the best physician that I know of. Sleep hath healed more pains of wearied bones than the most eminent physicians upon earth. It is the best medicine; the choicest thing of all the names which are written in all the lists of pharmacy. There is nothing like to sleep! What a mercy it is that it belongs alike to all! God does not make sleep the boon of the rich man, he does not give it merely to the noble, or the rich, so that they can keep it as a peculiar luxury for themselves; but he bestows it upon all. Yea, if there be a difference, the sleep of the labouring man is sweet, whether he eat little or much. He who toils, sleeps all the sounder for his toil. While luxurious effeminacy cannot rest, tossing itself from side to side upon a bed of eider down, the hard-working labourer, with his strong and powerful limbs, worn out and tired, throws himself upon his hard couch and sleeps: and waking, thanks God that he has been refreshed. Ye know not, my friends, how much ye owe to God, that he gives you rest at night. If ye had sleepless nights, ye would then value the blessing. If for weeks ye lay tossing on your weary bed, ye then would thank God for this favour. But as it is the gift of God, it is a gift most precious, one that cannot be valued until it is taken away; yea, even then we cannot appreciate it as we ought.

The Psalmist says there are some men who deny themselves sleep. For purposes of gain, or ambition, they rise up early and sit up late. Some of us who are here present may have been guilty of the same thing. We have risen early in the morning that we might turn over the ponderous volume, in order to acquire knowledge; we have sat at night until our burned-out lamp has chidden us, and told us that the sun was rising; while our eyes have ached, our brain has throbbed, our heart has palpitated. We have been weary and worn out; we have risen up early, and sat up late, and have in that way come to eat the bread of sorrow. Many of you business men are toiling in that style. We do not condemn you for it; we do not forbid rising up early and sitting up late; but we remind you of this text:—‘It is vain for you to rise up early, to sit up late, to eat the bread of sorrows: for so he giveth his beloved sleep.’ And it is of this sleep, that God gives to his beloved, that we mean to speak this morning, as God shall help us—a sleep peculiar to the children of God—a sleep which he gives to ‘his beloved’.

Sleep is sometimes used in a bad sense in the word of God, to express the condition of carnal and worldly men. Some men have the sleep of carnal ease and sloth: of whom Solomon tells us, they are unwise sons that slumber in the harvest, causing shame; so that when the harvest is spent, and the summer is ended, they are not saved. Sleep often expresses a state of sloth, of deadness, of indifference, in which all ungodly men are found, according to the words, ‘It is time for us to awake out of sleep.’ ‘Let us not sleep as do others, but let us who are of the day be sober.’ There be many who are sleeping the sluggard’s sleep, who are resting upon the bed of sloth; but an awful waking shall it be to them, when they shall find that the time of their probation has been wasted; that the golden sands of their life have dropped unheeded from the hour-glass; and that they have come into that world where there are no acts of pardon passed, no hope, no refuge, no salvation.

In other places you find sleep used as the figure of carnal security, in which so many are found. Look at Saul, lying asleep in fleshly security—not like David, when he said, ‘I will lay me down and sleep, for thou Lord makest me to dwell in safety.’ Abner lay there, and all the troops lay around him, but Abner slept. Sleep on, Saul, sleep on. But there is an Abishai standing at thy pillow, and with a spear in his hand he says, ‘Let me smite him even to the earth at once.’ Still he sleeps; he knows it not. Such are many of you, sleeping in jeopardy of your soul; Satan is standing, the law is ready, vengeance is eager, and all saying, ‘Shall I smite him? I will smite him this once, and he shall never wake again.’ Christ says, ‘Stay, vengeance, stay.’ Lo, the spear is even now quivering—‘Stay, spare it yet another year, in the hope that he may yet wake from the long sleep of his sin.’ Like Sisera, I tell thee, sinner, thou art sleeping in the tent of the destroyer; thou mayest have eaten butter and honey out of a lordly dish; but thou art sleeping on the doorstep of hell; even now the enemy is lifting up the hammer and the nail, to smite thee through thy temples, and fasten thee to the earth, that there thou mayest lie for ever in the death of everlasting torment—if it may be called a death.

Then there is also mentioned in Scripture, a sleep of lust, like that which Samson had when he lost his locks, and such sleep as many have when they indulge in sin, and wake to find themselves stripped, lost, and ruined. There is also the sleep of negligence, such as the virgins had, when it is said, ‘they all slumbered and slept’; and the sleep of sorrow, which overcame Peter, James, and John. But none of these are the gifts of God. They are incident to the frailty of our nature; they come upon us because we are fallen men; they creep over us because we are the sons of a lost and ruined parent. These sleeps are not the benisons of God; nor does he bestow them on his beloved. We now come to tell you what those sleeps are, which he does bestow.

I. First, there is a miraculous sleep which God has sometimes given to his beloved—which he does not now vouchsafe. Into that kind of miraculous sleep, or rather trance, fell Adam, when he slept sorrowfully and alone; but when he awoke he was no more so, for God had given him that best gift which he had then bestowed on man. The same sleep Abram had, when it is said that a deep sleep came on him, and he laid him down, and saw a smoking furnace and a burning lamp, while a voice said to him, ‘Fear not, Abram; I am thy shield, and thy exceeding great reward.’ Such a hallowed sleep also was that of Jacob, when, with a stone for his pillow, the hedges for his curtains, the heavens for his canopy, the winds for his music, and the beasts for his servants, he laid him down and slumbered. Dreaming, he saw a ladder set upon the earth, the top of which reached to heaven, the angels of God ascending and descending upon it. Such a sleep had Joseph, when he dreamed that the other sheaves made obeisance to his sheaf, and that the sun, moon, and seven stars were subject unto him. So ofttimes did David rest, when his sleep was sweet unto him, as we have just read. And such a sleep was that of Daniel, when he said, ‘I was asleep upon my face, and behold the Lord said unto me, Arise, and stand upon thy feet.’ And such, moreover, was the sleep of the reputed father of our blessed Lord, when in a vision of the night, an angel said unto him, ‘Arise, Joseph, and take the young child and his mother, and flee into Egypt, for Herod will seek the young child to destroy him.’ These are miraculous slumbers. God’s angel hath touched his servants with the magic wand of sleep, and they have slept, not simply as we do, but slept a wondrous sleep; they have dived into the tenfold depths of slumber; they have plunged into a sea of sleep, where they have seen the invisible, talked with the unknown, and heard mystic and wondrous sounds: and when they have awoke, they have said, ‘What a sleep! Surely, my sleep was sweet unto me.’ ‘So he giveth his beloved sleep.’

But, now-a-days, we do not have such sleeps as these. Many persons dream very wonderful things, but most people dream nonsense. Some persons put faith in dreams: and, certainly God doth warn us in dreams and visions even now. I am sure he does. There is not a man but can mention one or more instances of a warning, or a benefit, he has received in a dream. But we never trust dreams. We remember what Rowland Hill said to a lady, who knew she was a child of God, because she dreamed such-and-such a thing: ‘Never mind, ma’am, what you did when you were asleep; let us see what you will do when you are awake.’ That is my opinion of dreams. I never will believe a man to be a Christian merely because he has dreamed himself one; for a dreamy religion will make a man a dreamer all his life—and such dreamers will have an awful waking at last, if that is all they have to trust to.

II. He gives his beloved, in the second place, the sleep of a quiet conscience. I think most of you saw that splendid picture, in the Exhibition of the Royal Academy—the Sleep of Argyle—where he lay slumbering on the very morning before his execution. You saw some noblemen standing there, looking at him, almost with compunction; the jailer is there, with his keys rattling; but positively the man sleeps, though to-morrow morning his head shall be severed from his body, and a man shall hold it up, and say, ‘This was the head of a traitor.’ He slept because he had a quiet conscience: for he had done no wrong. Then look at Peter. Did you ever notice that remarkable passage, where it is said that Herod intended to bring out Peter on the morrow; but, behold, as Peter was sleeping between two guards, the angel smote him? Sleeping between two guards, when on the morrow he was to be crucified or slain! He cared not, for his heart was clear; he had committed no ill. He could say, ‘If it be right to serve God or man, judge ye’; and, therefore, he laid him down and slept. O sirs! do ye know what the sleep of a quiet conscience is? Have you ever stood out and been the butt of calumny—pelted by all men; the object of scorn—the laugh, the song of the drunkard? And have ye known what it is, after all, to sleep, as if you cared for nothing, because your heart was pure? Ah! ye who are in debt—ah! ye who are dishonest—ah! ye who love not God, and love not Christ—I wonder ye can sleep, for sin doth put pricking thorns in the pillow. Sin puts a dagger in a man’s bed, so that whichever way he turns it pricks him. But a quiet conscience is the sweetest music that can lull the soul to sleep. The demon of restlessness does not come to that man’s bed who has a quiet conscience—a conscience right with God—who can sing—

With the world, myself, and thee,
I, ere I sleep, at peace shall be.
‘So he giveth his beloved sleep.’

But let me tell you who have no knowledge of your election in Christ Jesus, no trust in the ransom of a Saviour’s blood—you, who have never been called by the Holy Ghost—you, who never were regenerated and born again—let me tell you that you do not know this slumber. You may say your conscience is quiet; you may say, you do no man any wrong, and that you believe at the bar of God you shall have little to account for. But, sirs, you know you have sinned; and your virtues cannot atone for your vices. You know that the soul that sinneth, if it sins, but once, must die. If the picture has a single flaw, it is not a perfect one. If ye have sinned but once, ye shall be damned for it, unless ye have something to take away that one sin. Ye do not know this sleep, but the Christian does, for all his sins were numbered on the ‘scape-goat’s head of old’. Christ has died for all his sins, however great or enormous; and there is not now a sin written against him in the Book of God. ‘I, even I’, says God, ‘am he that blotteth out thy transgressions for my name’s sake, and I will not remember thy sins.’ Now thou mayest sleep; for ‘so he giveth his beloved sleep’.

III. Again: there is the sleep of contentment which the Christian enjoys. How few people in this world are satisfied. No man ever need fear offering a reward of a thousand pounds to a contented man; for if any one came to claim the reward, he would of course prove his discontent. We are all in a measure, I suspect, dissatisfied with our lot; the great majority of mankind are always on the wing; they never settle; they never light on any tree to build their nest; but they are always fluttering from one to the other. This tree is not green enough, that is not high enough, this is not beautiful enough, that is not picturesque enough; so they are ever on the wing, and never build a peaceful nest at all. The Christian builds his nest; and as the noble Luther said, ‘Like yon little bird upon the tree, he hath fed himself to-night—he knoweth not where his breakfast is to-morrow. He sitteth there while the winds rock the tree; he shuts his eyes, puts his head under his wing, and sleeps; and, when he awakes in the morning sings,

“Mortals cease from toil and sorrow; God provideth for the morrow.”’

How few there are who have that blessed contentment—who can say, ‘I want nothing else; I want but little here below—yea, I long for nothing more—I am satisfied—I am content.’ You sung a beautiful hymn just now; but I suspect that many of you had no right to it, because you did not feel it.

With thy will I leave the rest,
Grant me but this one request;
Both in life and death to prove
Tokens of thy special love.

Could you say there was nothing you wanted on earth, save Jesus? Did you mean that you are perfectly content—that you had the sleep of contentment? Ah! no. You, who were apprentices, are sighing till you shall be journeymen; you who are journeymen, are groaning to be masters; masters are longing till they shall retire from business, and when they have retired, they are longing that all their children shall be settled in life. Man always looks for a yet-beyond; he is a mariner who never gets to port; an arrow which never reaches the target. Ah! the Christian hath sleep. One night I could not rest, and in the wild wanderings of my thoughts I met this text and communed with it:—‘So he giveth his beloved sleep.’ In my reverie, as I was on the border of the land of dreams, methought I was in a castle. Around its massive walls there ran a deep moat. Watchmen paced the walls both day and night. It was a fine old fortress, bidding defiance to the foe; but I was not happy in it. I thought I lay upon a couch; but scarcely had I closed my eyes, ere a trumpet blew, ‘To arms! To arms!’ and when the danger was overpast I lay me down again. ‘To arms! To arms!’ once more resounded, and again I started up. Never could I rest. I thought I had my armour on, and moved about perpetually clad in mail, rushing each hour to the castle top, aroused by some fresh alarm. At one time a foe was coming from the west; at another, from the east. I thought I had a treasure somewhere down in some deep part of the castle, and all my care was to guard it. I dreaded, I feared, I trembled lest it should be taken from me. I awoke, and I thought I would not live in such a tower as that for all its grandeur. It was the castle of discontent, the castle of ambition, in which man never rests. It is ever ‘To arms! To arms! To arms!’ There is a foe here or a foe there. His dear-loved treasure must be guarded. Sleep never crossed the drawbridge of the castle of discontent.

Then I thought I would supplant it by another reverie. I was in a cottage. It was in what poets call a beautiful and pleasant place, but I cared not for that. I had no treasure in the world, save one sparkling jewel on my breast; and I thought I put my hand on that and went to sleep, nor did I wake till morning light. That treasure was a quiet conscience and the love of God—‘the peace that passeth all understanding’. I slept, because I slept in the house of content, satisfied with what I had. Go ye, overreaching misers! Go ye, grasping ambitious men! I envy not your life of inquietude. The sleep of statesmen is often broken; the dream of the miser is always evil; the sleep of the man who loves gain is never hearty; but God ‘giveth’, by contentment, ‘his beloved sleep’.

IV. Once more: God giveth his beloved the sleep of quietness of soul as to the future. O that dark future! that future! that future! The present may be well; but ah! the next wind may wither all the flowers, and where shall I be? Clutch thy gold, miser; for ‘riches make to themselves wings and flee away’. Hug that babe to thy breast, mother; for the rough hand of death may rob thee of it. Look at thy fame and wonder at it, O thou man of ambition! But one slight report shall wound thee to the heart, and thou shalt sink as low as e’er thou hast been lifted high by the voices of the multitude. The future! All persons have need to dread the future, except the Christian. God giveth to his beloved a happy sleep with regard to the events of coming time.

What may be my future lot,
High or low concerns me not;
This doth set my heart at rest,
What my God appoints is best.

Whether I am to live or die is no matter to me; whether I am to be the ‘offscouring of all things’, or ‘the man whom the king delighteth to honour’, matters not to me. All is alike, provided my Father doth but give it. ‘So he giveth his beloved sleep.’ How many of you have arrived at that happy point that you have no wish of your own at all? It is a sweet thing to have but one wish; but it is a better thing to have no wish at all—to be all lost in the present enjoyment of Christ and the future anticipation of the vision of his face. O my soul! what would the future be to thee, if thou hadst not Christ? If it be a bitter and a dark future, what matters it, so long as Christ thy Lord sanctifies it, and the Holy Ghost still gives thee courage, energy, and strength? It is a blessed thing to be able to say with Madame Guyon—

To me ’tis equal, whether love ordained,
My life or death, appoint me pain or ease;
My soul perceives no real ill in pain,
In ease or health, no real good she sees.
One good she covets, and that good alone,
To choose thy will, from selfish bias free,
And to prefer a cottage to a throne,
And grief to comfort, if it pleases thee.
That we should bear the cross is thy command—
Die to the world, and live to sin no more;
Suffer unmoved beneath the rudest hand,
As pleased when shipwrecked, as when safe on shore.

It is a happy condition to attain. ‘So he giveth his beloved sleep.’ Ah! if you have a self-will in your hearts, pray to God to uproot it. Have you self-love? Beseech the Holy Spirit to turn it out; for if you will always will to do as God wills, you must be happy. I have heard of some good old woman in a cottage, who had nothing but a piece of bread and a little water, and lifting up her hands, she said, as a blessing, ‘What! all this, and Christ too?’ It is ‘all this’, compared with what we deserve. And I have read of some one dying, who was asked if he wished to live or die; and he said, ‘I have no wish at all about it.’ ‘But if you might wish, which would you choose?’ ‘I would not choose at all.’ ‘But if God bade you choose?’ ‘I would beg God to choose for me, for I should not know which to take.’ Happy state! happy state! to be perfectly acquiescent—

To lie passive in his hand,
And know no will but his.
‘So he giveth his beloved sleep.’

V. In the fifth place: there is the sleep of security. Solomon slept with armed men round his bed, and thus slumbered securely; but Solomon’s father slept one night on the bare ground—not in a palace—with no moat round his castle wall,—but he slept quite as safely as his son, for he said, ‘I laid me down and slept, and I awaked, for the Lord sustained me.’ Now, some persons never feel secure in this world at all; I query whether one half of my hearers feel themselves so. Suppose I burst out in a moment, and sing this—

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.

You would say, that is too high doctrine; and I would reply, very likely it is for you, but it is the truth of God, and it is sweet doctrine for me. I love to know, that if I am predestinated according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, I must be saved; if I was purchased by the Son’s blood, I cannot be lost, for it would be impossible for Jesus Christ to lose one whom he has redeemed, otherwise he would be dissatisfied with his labours. I know that where he has begun the good work he will carry it on. I never fear that I shall fall away, or be lost; my only fear is, lest I should not have been right at first; but, provided I am right, if I be really a child of God, I might believe that the sun would be smitten with madness, and go reeling through the universe like a drunken man—I might believe that the stars would run from their courses, and instead of marching with their measured tramp, as now they do, whirl on in wild courses like the dance of Bacchanals—I could even conceive that this great universe might all subside in God, ‘even as a moment’s foam subsides again upon the wave that bears it’; but neither reason, heresy, logic, eloquence, nor a conclave of divines, shall make me pay a moment’s attention to the vile suggestion that a child of God may ever perish. Hence I tread this earth with confidence. Arguing a little while ago with an Arminian, he said, ‘Sir, you ought to be a happy man; for if what you say be true, why you are as secure of being in heaven as if you were there.’ I said, ‘Yes, I know it.’ ‘Then you ought to live above cares and tribulations, and sing happily from morning to night.’ I said, ‘So I ought, and so I will, God helping me.’ This is security. ‘He giveth his beloved sleep.’ To know that if I died I should enter heaven—to be as sure as I am of my own existence that God, having loved me with an everlasting love, and he being immutable, will never hate me if he has once loved me—to know that I must enter the kingdom of glory—is not this enough to make all burdens light, and give me the hind’s feet wherewith I may stand upon my high places. Happy state of security! ‘So he giveth his beloved sleep.’

And there is a sleep, my dear friends, of security, which is enjoyed on earth even in the midst of the greatest troubles. Do you remember that passage in the book of Ezekiel, where it is said, ‘They shall dwell securely in the wilderness and sleep in the woods?’ A queer place to sleep in! ‘In the woods.’ There is a wolf over yonder; there is a tiger in the jungle; an eagle is soaring in the air; a horde of robbers dwell in the dark forest. ‘Never mind’, says the child of God:

He that hath made his refuge God,
Shall find a most secure abode;
Shall walk all day beneath his shade,
And there at night shall rest his head.

I have often admired Martin Luther, and wondered at his composure. When all men spoke so ill of him, what did he say? Turn to that Psalm—‘God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in time of trouble; therefore we will not fear, though the earth be removed, and though the mountains be carried into the midst of the sea.’ In a far inferior manner, I have been called to stand up in the position of Martin Luther, and have been made the butt of slander, a mark for laughter and scorn; but it has not broken my spirit yet; nor will it, while I am enabled to enjoy that quiescent state of—‘So he giveth his beloved sleep.’ But thus far I beg to inform all those who choose to slander or speak ill of me, that they are very welcome to do so till they are tired of it. My motto is cedo nulli—I yield to none. I have not courted any man’s love; I asked no man to attend my ministry; I preach what I like, and when I like, and as I like. Oh! happy state—to be bold, though downcast and distressed—to go and bend my knee and tell my Father all, and then to come down from my chamber, and say—

If on my face, for thy dear name,
Shame and reproach shall be;
I’ll hail reproach, and welcome shame,
For thou’lt remember me.

VI. The last sleep God giveth his beloved is the sleep of a happy dismission. I have stood by the graves of many servants of the Lord. I have buried some of the excellent of the earth; and when I bid farewell to my brother down below there slumbering in his coffin, I usually commence my speech with those words, ‘So he giveth his beloved sleep.’ Dear servants of Jesus! There I see them! What can I say of them, but that ‘so he giveth his beloved sleep’? Oh! happy sleep! This world is a state of tossing to and fro; but in that grave they rest. No sorrows there; no sighs, no groans, to mingle with the songs that warble from immortal tongues. Well may I address the dead thus:—‘My brother, oftentimes hast thou fought the battles of this world; thou hast had thy cares, thy trials, and thy troubles; but now thou art gone—not to worlds unknown, but to yonder land of light and glory. Sleep on, brother! Thy soul sleepeth not, for thou art in heaven; but thy body sleepeth. Death hath laid thee in thy last couch; it may be cold, but it is sanctified; it may be damp, but it is safe; and on the resurrection morning, when the archangel shall set his trumpet to his mouth, thou shalt rise. “Blessed are the dead that die in the Lord: yea, saith the Spirit, for they rest from their labours, and their works do follow them.” Sleep on in thy grave, my brother, for thou shalt rise to glory.’ ‘So he giveth his beloved sleep.’

Some of you fear to die, and have good reason to do so, for death for you would be the beginning of sorrows; and on its approach ye might hear the voice of the angel of the Apocalypse: ‘One woe is past, but behold two woes more are to come.’ If, sirs, ye were to die unprepared, and unconverted, and unsaved, ‘There remaineth nothing but a fearful looking for of judgment and fiery indignation.’ I need not speak like a Boanerges, for it is to you a well-known truth, that without God, without Christ, ‘strangers from the commonwealth of Israel’, your portion must be amongst the damned—the fiends—the tortured—the shrieking ghosts—the wandering souls who find no rest—

On waves of burning brimstone toss’d,
For ever, O for ever lost!
‘The wrath to come!’ ‘The wrath to come!’ ‘The wrath to come!’

But, beloved Christian brother, wherefore dost thou fear to die? Come let me take thy hand:

To you and me by grace ’tis given,
To know the Saviour’s precious name;
And shortly we shall meet in heaven,
Our end, our hope, our way the same.

Do you know that heaven is just across that narrow stream? Are you afraid to plunge in and swim across? Do you fear to be drowned? I feel the bottom—it is good. Dost thou think thou shalt sink? Hear the voice of the Spirit: ‘Fear not, I am with thee; be not dismayed, I am thy God: when thou passest through the river, I will be with thee, and the floods shall not overflow thee.’ Death is the gate of endless joys, and dost thou dread to enter there? What! fear to be emancipated from corruption? Oh! say not so! but rather, gladly lay down and sleep in Jesus, and be blessed.

I have finished expounding my subject. There is only one question I want to ask of you before you pass out of those doors. Do you seriously and solemnly believe that you belong to the ‘beloved’ here mentioned? I may be impertinent in asking such a question; I have been accused of that before now, but I have never denied it. I rather take the credit of it than not. But seriously and solemnly I ask you—Do you know yourselves to be amongst the beloved? And if it happens that you want a test, allow me to give you three tests, very briefly, and I have done. It has been said that there are three kinds of preachers—doctrinal preachers, experimental preachers, and practical preachers. Now I think there are three things that make up a Christian—true doctrine, real experience, and good practice.

Now, then, as to your doctrine. You may tell whether you are the Lord’s beloved partly by that. Some think it matters not what a man believes. Excuse me: truth is always precious, and the least atom of truth is worth searching out. Now-a-days the sects do not clash so much as they did. Perhaps that is good; but there is one evil about it. People do not read their Bibles so much as they did. They think we are all right. Now, I believe we may be all right in the main, but we cannot be all right where we contradict one another; and it becomes every man to search the Bible to see which is right. I am not afraid to submit my Calvinism, or my doctrine of believer’s baptism, to the searching of the Bible. A learned lord, an infidel, once said to Whitefield, ‘Sir I am an infidel, I do not believe the Bible, but if the Bible be true, you are right, and your Arminian opponents are wrong. If the Bible be the word of God, the doctrines of grace are true’; adding that if any man would grant him the Bible to be the truth, he would challenge him to disprove Calvinism. The doctrines of original sin, election, effectual calling, final perseverance, and all those great truths which are called Calvinism—though Calvin was not the author of them, but simply an able writer and preacher upon the subject—are, I believe, the essential doctrines of the Gospel that is in Jesus Christ. Now, I do not ask you whether you believe all this—it is possible you may not; but I believe you will before you enter heaven. I am persuaded, that as God may have washed your hearts, he will wash your brains before you enter heaven. He will make you right in your doctrines. But I must enquire whether you read your Bibles. I am not finding fault with you this morning for differing from me, I may be wrong; but I want to know whether you search the Scriptures to find what is truth. And, if you are not a reader of the Bible, if you take doctrines second-hand, if you go to chapel, and say, ‘I do not like that’: what matters your not liking it, provided it is in the Bible? Is it Biblical truth, or is it not? If it is God’s truth, let us have it exalted. It may not suit you; but let me remind you, that the truth that is in Jesus never was palatable to carnal men, and I believe never will be. The reason you love it not, is because it cuts too much at your pride; it lets you down too low. Search yourselves, then, in doctrine.

Then take care that you remember the experimental test. I am afraid there is very little experimental religion amongst us; but where there is true doctrine, there ought always to be a vital experience. Sirs, try yourselves by the experimental test. Have you ever had an experience of your wretchedness, of your depravity, your inability, your death in sin? Have you ever felt life in Christ, an experience of the light of God’s countenance, of wrestling with corruption? Have you had a grace-given Holy Ghost-implanted experience of a communion with Christ? If so, then you are right on the experimental test.

And, to conclude, take care of the practical test. ‘Faith without works is dead, being alone.’ He that walketh in sin is a child of the devil; and he that walketh in righteousness is a child of light. Do not think, because you believe the right doctrines, therefore you are right. There are many that believe right, act wrong, and they perish. ‘Be not deceived; God is not mocked; whatsoever a man soweth that shall he also reap.’

I have done. Now let me beseech you, by the frailty of your own lives—by the shortness of time—by the dreadful realities of eternity—by the sins you have committed—by the pardon that you need—by the blood and wounds of Jesus—by his second coming to judge the world in righteousness—by the glories of heaven—by the awful horrors of hell—by time—by eternity—by all that is good—by all that is sacred—let me beg of you, as you love your own souls, to search and see whether ye are amongst the beloved, to whom he giveth sleep. God bless you.

Thumbnail image by Dakota Corbin on Unsplash

The post The Peculiar Sleep of the Beloved appeared first on Banner of Truth UK.

‘I have exalted one chosen out of the people.’—Psalm 79:19.

ORIGINALLY, I have no doubt, these words referred to David. He was chosen out of the people. His lineage was respectable, but not illustrious. His family were holy, but not exalted: the names of Jesse, Obed, Boaz, and Ruth awoke no royal recollections, and stirred up no remembrances of ancient nobility or glorious pedigree. As for himself, his only occupation had been that of a shepherd boy, carrying lambs in his bosom, or gently leading the ewes great with young—a simple youth of a right royal soul and undaunted courage, but yet a plebeian—one of the people. But this was no disqualification for the crown of Judah. In God’s eyes the extraction of the young hero was no barrier to his mounting the throne of the holy nation, nor shall the proudest admirer of descent and lineage dare to insinuate a word against the valour, wisdom, and the justice of the government of this monarch of the people!
We do not believe that Israel or Judah ever had a better ruler than David; and we are bold to affirm that the reign of the man ‘chosen out of the people’ outshines in glory the reigns of high-bred emperors and princes with the blood of a score of kings running in their veins! Yea, more, we will assert that the humility of his birth and education, so far from making him incompetent to rule, rendered him, in a great degree, more fit for his office and able to discharge its mighty duties. He could legislate for the many, for he was one of themselves—he could rule the people, as the people should be ruled, for he was ‘bone of their bone’ and ‘flesh of their flesh’—their friend, their brother, as well as their king.

However, in this sermon we shall not speak of David, but of the Lord Jesus Christ; for David, as referred to in the text, is an eminent type of Jesus Christ, our Lord and Saviour, who was chosen out of the people; and of whom his Father can say ‘I have exalted one chosen out of the people.’

Before I enter into the illustration of this truth I wish to make one statement, so that all objections may be avoided as to the doctrine of my sermon. Our Saviour Jesus Christ, I say, was chosen out of the people; but this merely respects his manhood. As ‘very God of very God’ he was not chosen out of the people; for there was none save him. He was his Father’s only-begotten Son, ‘begotten of the Father before all worlds’. He was God’s fellow, co-equal and co-eternal; consequently when we speak of Jesus as being chosen out of the people, we must speak of him as a man. We are, I conceive, too forgetful of the real manhood of our Redeemer, for a man he was to all intents and purposes, and I love to sing,

A Man there was, a real Man
Who once on Calvary died.

He was not man and God amalgamated—the two natures suffered no confusion—he was very God without the diminution of his essence or attributes; and he was equally, verily, and truly, man. It is as a man I speak of Jesus this morning; and it rejoices my heart when I can view the human side of that glorious miracle of incarnation and can deal with Jesus Christ as my brother—inhabitant of the same mortality, wrestler with the same pains and ills, companion in the march of life, and, for a little while, a fellow-sleeper in the cold chamber of death!

There are three things spoken of in the text: first of all, Christ’s extraction—he was one of the people; secondly, his election—he was chosen out of the people; and thirdly, Christ’s exaltation—he was exalted. You see I have chosen three words all commencing with the letter E, to ease your memories that you may be able to remember them the better—extraction, election, exaltation!

I. We will commence with our Saviour’s extraction. We have had many complaints this week, and for some weeks past, in the newspapers concerning the families. We are governed—and, according to the firm belief of a great many of us, very badly governed,—by certain aristocratic families. We are not governed by men chosen out of the people, as we ought to be; and this is a fundamental wrong in our government,—that our rulers, even when elected by us, can scarcely ever be elected from us. Families, where certainly there is not a monopoly of intelligence or prudence, seem to have a patent for promotion; while a man, a commoner, a tradesman, of however good sense, cannot rise to the government. I am no politician, and I am about to preach no political sermon; but I must express my sympathy with the people, and my joy that we, as Christians, are governed by ‘one chosen out of the people’. Jesus Christ is the people’s man; he is the people’s friend—ay, one of themselves. Though he sits high on his Father’s throne, he was ‘one chosen out of the people’. Christ is not to be called the aristocrat’s Christ, he is not the noble’s Christ, he is not the king’s Christ; but he is ‘one chosen out of the people’. It is this thought which cheers the hearts of the people, and ought to bind their souls in unity to Christ, and the holy religion of which he is the Author and Finisher.

Let us now beat out this wedge of gold into leaf, and narrowly inspect its truthfulness.

Christ, by his very birth, was one of the people. True, he was born of a royal ancestry. Mary and Joseph were both of them descendants of a kingly race but the glory had departed; a stranger sat on the throne of Judah; while the lawful heir grasped the hammer and the adze. Mark ye well the place of his nativity. Born in a stable—cradled in a manger where the horned oxen fed—his only bed was their fodder, and his slumbers were often broken by their lowings. He might be a prince by birth; but certainly he had not a princely retinue to wait upon him. He was not clad in purple garments, neither wrapped in embroidered clothing; the halls of kings were not trodden by his feet, the marble palaces of monarchs were not honoured by his infant smiles. Take notice of the visitors who came around his cradle. The shepherds came first of all. We never find that they lost their way. No, God guides the shepherds, and he did direct the wise men, too, but they lost their way. It often happens, that while shepherds find Christ wise men miss him. But, however, both of them came, the magi and the shepherds; both knelt round that manger, to show us that Christ was the Christ of all men; that he was not merely the Christ of the magi, but that he was the Christ of the shepherds—that he was not merely the Saviour of the peasant shepherd, but also the Saviour of the learned, for

None are excluded hence, but those
Who do themselves exclude;
Welcome the learned and polite,
The ignorant and rude.

In his very birth he was one of the people. He was not born in a populous city; but in the obscure village of Bethlehem, ‘the house of bread’, the Son of Man made his advent, unushered by pompous preparations, and unheralded by the blast of courtly trumpets.

His education, too, demands our attention. He was not taken as Moses was, from his mother’s breast, to be educated in the halls of a monarch; he was not brought up with all those affected airs which are given to persons who have golden spoons in their mouths, at their births. He was not brought up as the lordling, to look with disdain on everyone; but his father, being a carpenter, doubtless he toiled in his father’s workshop. ‘Fit place’, a quaint author says, ‘for Jesus; for he had to make a ladder that should reach from earth to heaven. And why should he not be the son of a carpenter?’ Full well he knew the curse of Adam: ‘in the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread’. Had you seen the holy child Jesus, you would have beheld nothing to distinguish him from other children, save that unsullied purity which rested in his very countenance. When our Lord entered into public life, still he was the same. What was his rank? Did he array himself in scarlet and purple? Oh! no: he wore the simple garb of a peasant—that robe ‘without seam from the top to the bottom’, one simple piece of stuff, without ornament or embroidery. Did he dwell in state and make a magnificent show in his journey through Judea? No; he toiled his weary way, and sat down on the curb-stone of the well of Sychar. He was like others, a poor man; he had not courtiers around him; he had fishermen for his companions; and when he spoke, did he speak with smooth and oily words? Did he walk with dainty footsteps, like the king of Amalek? No, he often spoke like the rough Elijah; he spoke what he meant and he meant what he said. He spoke to the people as the people’s man. He never cringed before great men; he knew not what it was to bow or stoop; but he stood and cried, ‘Woe unto you, Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! Woe unto you, whitewashed sepulchres.’ He spared no class of sinners: rank and fortune made no difference to him. He uttered the same truths to the rich men of the Sanhedrim, as to the toiling peasants of Galilee. He was ‘one of the people’.

Notice his doctrine. Jesus Christ was one of the people in his doctrine. His gospel was never the philosopher’s gospel, for it is not abstruse enough. It will not consent to be buried in hard words and technical phrases: it is so simple that he who can spell over, ‘He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved’, may have a saving knowledge of it! Hence, worldly-wise men scorn the science of truth, and sneeringly say, ‘Why, even a blacksmith can preach nowadays, and men who were at the plough tail may turn preachers’, while priestcraft demands, ‘What right have they to do any such thing, unauthorized by us?’ Oh! sad case, that gospel truth should be slighted because of its plainness, and that my Master should be despised because he will not be exclusive—will not be monopolised by men of talent and erudition! Jesus is the ignorant man’s Christ as much as the learned man’s Christ; for he hath chosen ‘the base things of the world and the things that are despised’. Ah! much as I love true science and real education, I mourn and grieve that our ministers are so much diluting the word of God with philosophy, desiring to be intellectual preachers, delivering model sermons, well fitted for a room full of college students and professors of theology, but of no use to the masses, being destitute of simplicity, warmth, earnestness, or even solid gospel matter. I fear our college training is but a poor gain to our churches, since it often serves to wean the young man’s sympathies from the people and wed them to the few, the intellectual and wealthy of the church. It is good to be a fellow-citizen in the republic of letters, but better far to be an able minister of the kingdom of heaven. It is good to be able, like some great minds, to attract the mighty; but the more useful man will still be he, who, like Whitefield, uses ‘market language’, for it is a sad fact that high places and the gospel seldom well agree; and, moreover, be it known that the doctrine of Christ is the doctrine of the people. It was not meant to be the gospel of a caste, a clique, or any one class of the community. The covenant of grace is not ordered for men of one peculiar grade, but some of all sorts are included. A few there were of the rich followed Jesus in his own day, and it is so now. Mary, and Martha, and Lazarus were well to do, and there was the wife of Herod’s steward, with some more of the nobility. These, however, were but a few: his congregation was made up of the lower orders—the masses—the multitude. ‘The common people heard him gladly’; and his doctrine was one which did not allow of distinction, but put all men as sinners naturally, on an equality in the sight of God. One is your father, ‘one is your Master, even Christ and all ye are brethren’. These were words which he taught to his disciples, while in his own person he was the mirror of humility and proved himself the friend of earth’s poor sons, and the lover of mankind. O ye purse proud! O ye who cannot touch the poor even with your white gloves! Ah! ye with your mitres and your croziers! Ah! ye with your cathedrals and splendid ornaments! This is the man whom ye call Master—the people’s Christ—one of the people! And yet ye look down with scorn upon the people—ye despise them! What are they in your opinion? The common herd—the multitude. Out on ye! Call yourselves no more the ministers of Christ. How can ye be, unless, descending from your pomp and your dignity, ye come amongst the poor and visit them—ye walk amongst our teeming population and preach to them the gospel of Christ Jesus? We believe you to be the descendants of the fishermen? Ah! no, until ye doff your grandeur, and, like the fishermen, come out, the people’s men, and preach to the people, speak to the people, instead of lolling on your splendid seats, and making yourselves rich at the expense of your pluralities! Christ’s ministers should be the friends of manhood at large, remembering that their Master was the people’s Christ. Rejoice! O rejoice! ye multitudes. Rejoice! rejoice! for Christ was one of the people!

II. Our second point was election. God says, ‘I have exalted one chosen out of the people.’ Jesus Christ was elected—chosen. Somehow or other, that ugly doctrine of election will come out. Oh! there be some, the moment they hear that word, election, put their hands upon their foreheads and mutter, ‘I will wait till that sentence is over; there will be something I shall like better, perhaps.’ Some others say, ‘I shall not go to that place again; the man is a hyper-Calvinist.’ But the man is not a hyper-Calvinist; the man said what was in his Bible—that is all. He is a Christian, and you have no right to call him by those ill-names, if indeed an ill-name it be, for we never blush at whatever men do call us. Here it is: ‘one chosen out of the people’. Now, what does that mean, but that Jesus Christ is chosen? Those who do not like to believe that the heirs of heaven were elect, cannot deny the truth proclaimed in this verse,—that Jesus Christ is the subject of election—that his Father chose him, and that he chose him out of the people. As a man, he was chosen out of the people, to be the people’s Saviour, and the people’s Christ!

And now let us gather up our thoughts and try to discover the transcendent wisdom of God’s choice. Election is no blind thing. God chooses sovereignly, but he always chooses wisely. There is always some secret reason for his choice of any particular individual; though that motive does not lie in ourselves, or in our own merits, yet there is always some secret cause far more remote than the doings of the creature; some mighty reason unknown to all but himself. In the case of Jesus, the motives are apparent; and without pretending to enter the cabinet council of Jehovah, we may discover them.

1. First, we see that justice is thereby fully satisfied by the choice of one out of the people. Suppose God had chosen an angel to make satisfaction for our sins—imagine that an angel were capable of bearing that vast amount of suffering and agony which was necessary to our atonement; yet after the angel had done it all, justice would never have been satisfied, for this one simple reason, that the law declares,—‘The soul that sinneth it shall die.’ Now, man sins, and therefore man must die! Justice required, that as by man came death, by man also should come the resurrection and the life. The law required, that as man was the sinner, man should be the victim—that as in Adam all died, even so in another Adam should all be made alive. Consequently, it was necessary that Jesus Christ should be chosen out of the people; for had yon blazing angel near the throne, that lofty Gabriel, laid aside his splendours, descended to our earth, endured pain, suffered agonies, entered the vault of death, and groaned out a miserable existence in an extremity of woe, after all that, he would not have satisfied inflexible justice, because it is said, a man must die, and otherwise the sentence is not executed!

2. But there is another reason why Jesus Christ was chosen out of the people. It is because thereby the whole race receives honour. Do you know I would not be an angel if Gabriel would ask me. If he would beseech me to exchange places with him, I would not; I should lose so much by the exchange, and he would gain so much. Poor, weak and worthless though I am, yet I am a man, and being a man, there is a dignity about manhood—a dignity lost one day in the garden of the fall but regained in the garden of resurrection. It is a fact, that a man is greater than an angel—that in heaven humanity stands nearer the throne than angelic existence. You will read in the Book of the Revelation, of the four-and-twenty elders who stood around the throne, and in the outer circle stood the angels. The elders, who are the representatives of the whole church, were honoured with a greater nearness to God than the ministering spirits. Why man—elect man—is the greatest being in the universe, except God. Man sits up there; look! at God’s right hand, radiant with glory, there sits a man! Ask me who governs Providence, and directs its awfully mysterious machinery; I tell you it is a man—the man Christ Jesus. Ask me who has, during the past month, bound up the rivers in chains of ice, and who now has loosed them from the shackles of winter, I tell you a man did it—Christ. Ask me who shall come to judge the earth in righteousness, and I say a man. A real, veritable man is to hold the scales of judgment, and to call all nations around him. And who is the channel of grace? Who is the emporium of all the Father’s mercy? Who is the great gathering up of all the love of the covenant? I reply a man—the man Christ Jesus. And Christ, being a man, has exalted you, and exalted me, and put us into the highest ranks. He made us, originally, a little lower than the angels, and now despite our fall in Adam, he hath crowned us, his elect, with glory and honour, and hath set us at his right hand in heavenly places, in Christ Jesus, that in the ages to come he might show the exceeding riches of his grace in his kindness towards us through Christ Jesus.

3. But, my brethren, let us take a sweeter view than that. Why was he chosen out of the people? Speak, my heart! What is the first reason that rushes up to thyself? for heart thoughts are best thoughts. Thoughts from the head are often good for nothing; but thoughts of the heart, deep musings of the soul, these are priceless as pearls of Ormuz. If it be a humbler poet, provided that his songs gush from his heart, they shall better strike the cords of my soul than the lifeless emanations of a mere brain. Here, Christian: what dost thou think is the sweet reason for the election of thy Lord, he being one of the people? Was it not this—that he might be able to be thy brother, in the blest tie of kindred blood? Oh! what relationship there is between Christ and the believer! The believer can say

One there is above all others
Well deserves the name of friend;
His is love beyond a brother’s,
Faithful, free and knows no end.

I have a great brother in heaven. I have heard boys say sometimes in the street that they would tell their brother; and I have often said so when the enemy has attacked me—‘I will tell my brother in heaven.’ I may be poor, but I have a brother who is rich; I have a brother who is a king; I am brother to the prince of the kings of the earth; and will he suffer me to starve, or want, or lack, while he is on his throne? Oh! no; he loves me; he has fraternal feelings towards me; he is my brother. But more than that: think, O believer! Christ is not merely thy brother, but he is thy husband! ‘Thy maker is thy husband; the Lord of hosts is his name.’ It rejoices the wife to lean her head on the broad breast of her husband, in full assurance that his arms will be strong to labour for her, or defend her; that his heart ever throbs with love to her, and that all he has, and is, belongs to her, as the sharer of his existence. Oh! to know by the influence of the Holy Ghost, that the sweet alliance is made between my soul and the ever precious Jesus; sure, tis enough to quicken all my soul to music, and make each atom of my frame a grateful songster to the praise of Christ. Come, let me remember when I lay like an infant in my blood, cast out in the open field; let me recollect the notable moment when he said, ‘Live!’ and let me never forget that he has educated me, trained me up, and one day will espouse me to himself in righteousness, crowning me with a nuptial crown in the palace of his Father. Oh! it is bliss unspeakable! I wonder not that the thought doth stagger my words to utter it!—that Christ is one of the people, that he might be nearly related to you and to me, that he might be the goel, or kinsman, next of kin.

In ties of blood with sinners one,
Our Jesus is to glory gone;
Hath all his foes to ruin hurled—
Sin, Satan, earth, death, hell, the world.

Saint, wrap this blessed thought, like a necklace of diamonds, around the neck of thy memory; put it, as a golden ring, on the finger of recollection; and use it as the king’s own seal, stamping the petitions of thy faith with confidence of success.

4. But now another idea suggests itself. Christ was chosen out of the people—that he might know our wants and sympathize with us. You know the old tale, that one half the world does not know how the other half lives; and that is very true. I believe some of the rich have no notion whatever of what the distress of the poor is. They have no idea of what it is to labour for their daily food. They have a very faint conception of what a rise in the price of bread means. They do not know anything about it; and when we put men in power who never were of the people, they do not understand the art of governing us. But our great and glorious Jesus Christ is one chosen out of the people; and therefore, he knows our wants. Temptation and pain he suffered before us; sickness he endured, for when hanging upon the cross, the scorching of that broiling sun brought on a burning fever; weariness—he has endured it, for weary he sat by the well; poverty—he knows it, for sometimes he had not bread to eat, save that bread of which the world knows nothing; to be houseless—he knew it, for the foxes had holes, and the birds of the air had nests, but he had not where to lay his head. My brother Christian, there is no place where thou canst go, where Christ has not been before thee, sinful places alone excepted. In the dark valley of the shadow of death thou mayest see his bloody footsteps—footprints marked with gore; ay, and even at the deep waters of the swelling Jordan, thou shalt, when thou comest hard by the side, say, ‘There are the footprints of a man: whose are they?’ Stooping down, thou shalt discern a nail-mark, and shalt say, ‘Those are the footsteps of the blessed Jesus.’ He hath been before thee; he hath smoothed the way; he hath entered the grave, that he might make the tomb the royal bedchamber of the ransomed race, the closet where they lay aside the garments of labour, to put on the vestments of eternal rest. In all places, whithersoever we go, the angel of the covenant has been our forerunner; each burden we have to carry, has once been laid on the shoulders of Immanuel.

His way was much rougher and darker than mine;
Did Christ my Lord suffer, and shall I repine?

I am speaking to those in great trial. Dear fellow-traveller! take courage: Christ has consecrated the road, and made the narrow way the King’s own road to life.

One thought more, and then I will pass on to my third point. There is a poor soul over there, who is desirous of coming to Jesus, but he is in very great trouble, lest he should not come right; and I know many Christians who say, ‘Well, I hope I have come to Christ; but I am afraid I have not come right.’ There is a little footnote to one of the hymns in dear Mr Denham’s collection, in which he says, ‘Some people are afraid they do not come right. Now, no man can come except the Father draw him; so I apprehend, if they come at all, they cannot come wrong.’ So do I apprehend, if men come at all, they must come right. Here is a thought for thee, poor coming sinner. Why art thou afraid to come? ‘Oh!’ sayest thou, ‘I am so great a sinner, Christ will not have mercy upon me.’ Oh! you do not know my blessed Master; he is more loving than you think him to be. I was once wicked enough to think the same; but I have found him ten thousand times more kind than I thought. I tell you, he is so loving, so gracious, so kind, there ne’er was one half so good as he. He is kinder than ever you can think; his love is greater than your fears, and his merits are more prevalent than your sins. But still you say, ‘I am afraid I shall not come aright; I think I shall not use acceptable words.’ I tell you why that is: because you do not remember that Christ was taken out of the people. If Her Majesty were to send for me tomorrow morning, I dare say I should feel very anxious about what kind of dress I should wear, and how I should walk in, and how I should observe court etiquette, and so on; but if one of my friends here were to send for me, I should go straight off and see him, because he is one of the people, and I like him. Some of you say, ‘How can I go to Christ? What shall I say? What words shall I use?’ If thou wert going to one above thee, thou mightest say so: but he is one of the people. Go as thou art, poor sinner—just in thy rags, just in thy filth—in all thy wickedness, just as thou art. O conscience-stricken sinner, come to Jesus! He is one of the people. If the Spirit has given thee a sense of sin, do not study how thou art to come; come anyhow; come with a groan, come with a sigh, come with a tear,—any come, if thou dost but come, will do, for he is one of the people. ‘The Spirit and the Bride say, Come; let him that heareth say, Come.’ Here I cannot resist giving an illustration. I have heard, that in the deserts, when the caravans are in want of water, and they are afraid they shall not find any, they are accustomed to send on a camel, with its rider, some distance in advance, then after a little space follows another: and then, at a short interval, another: as soon as the first man finds water, almost before he stoops down to drink, he shouts aloud, ‘Come!’ The next one, hearing the voice, repeats the word, ‘Come!’ while the nearest again takes up the cry, ‘Come!’ until the whole wilderness echoes with the word ‘Come!’ So in that verse, ‘the Spirit and the Bride say, first of all, Come: then, let him that heareth say, Come: and whosoever is athirst, let him come, and take of the water of life freely.’ With this picture I leave our survey of the reasons for the election of Christ Jesus.

III. And now I am to close up with his exaltation. ‘I have exalted one chosen out of the people.’ You will recollect, whilst I am speaking upon this exaltation, that it is really the exaltation of all the elect in the person of Christ; for all that Christ is, and all that Christ has, is mine. If I am a believer, whatever he is in his exalted person, that I am, for I am made to sit together with Christ in heavenly places.

1. First, dear friends, it was exaltation enough for the body of Christ to be exalted into union with the divinity. That was honour which none of us can ever receive. We never hope to have this body united with a God. It cannot be. Once has incarnation been done—never but once. Of no other man can it be said, ‘He was one with the Father, and the Father was one with him.’ Of no other man shall it be said that the Deity tabernacled in him, and that God was manifest in his flesh, seen of angels, justified of the Spirit, and carried up to glory.

2. Again: Christ was exalted by his resurrection. Oh! I should have liked to have stolen into that tomb of our Saviour. I suppose it was a large chamber; within it lay a massive marble sarcophagus, and very likely a ponderous lid was laid upon it. Then outside the door there lay a mighty stone, and guards kept watch before it. Three days did that sleeper slumber there! Oh! I could have wished to lift the lid of that sarcophagus, and look upon him. Pale he lay; blood-streaks there were upon him, not all quite washed away by those careful women who had buried him. Death, exulting, cries, ‘I have slain him: the seed of the woman who is to destroy me is now my captive!’ Ah! how grim death laughed! Ah! how he stared through his bony eyelids, as he said, ‘I have the boasted victor in my grasp.’ ‘Ah!’ said Christ, ‘but I have thee!’ And up he sprang, the lid of the sarcophagus started up; and he, who has the keys of death and hell, seized death, ground his iron limbs to powder, dashed him to the ground and said, ‘O death, I will be thy plague; O hell, I will be thy destruction.’ Out he came, and in turn the watchmen fled away. Startling with glory, radiant with light, effulgent with divinity, he stood before them. Christ was then exalted in his resurrection.

3. But how exalted was he in his ascension! He went out from the city to the top of the hill, his disciples attending him while he waited the appointed moment. Mark his ascension! Bidding farewell to the whole circle, up he went gradually ascending, like the exaltation of a mist from the lake, or the cloud from the steaming river. Aloft he soared: by his own mighty buoyancy and elasticity he ascended up on high—not like Elijah, carried up by fiery horses; nor like Enoch of old, it could not be said he was not, for God took him. He went himself; and as he went, I think I see the angels looking down from heaven’s battlements and crying, ‘See the conquering hero comes!’ while at his nearer approach, again they shouted, ‘See the conquering hero comes!’ So his journey through the plains of ether is complete—he nears the gates of heaven—attending angels shout, ‘Lift up your heads, ye everlasting gates; and be ye lift up, ye everlasting doors!’ The glorious hosts within scarce ask the question, ‘Who is the king of glory?’, when from ten thousand, thousand tongues there rolls an ocean of harmony, beating in mighty waves of music on the pearly gates and opening them at once, ‘The Lord strong and mighty, the Lord mighty in battle!’ Lo! heaven’s barriers are thrown wide open and cherubim are hastening to meet their monarch.

They brought his chariot from afar,
To bear him to his throne;
Clapp’d their triumphant wings and said,
‘The Saviour’s work is done.’

Behold he marches through the streets! See how kingdoms and powers fall down before him! Crowns are laid at his feet, and his Father says, ‘Well done, my Son, well done!’ while heaven echoes with the shout, ‘Well done! Well done!’ Up he climbs to that high throne, side by side with the Paternal Deity. ‘I have exalted one chosen out of the people.’

4. The last exaltation of Christ which I shall mention is that which is to come, when he shall sit upon the throne of his father David, and shall judge all nations. You will observe I have omitted that exaltation which Christ is to have as the king of this world during the millennium. I do not profess to understand it, and therefore I leave that alone. But I believe Jesus Christ is to come upon the throne of judgment, ‘and before him shall be gathered all nations; and he shall separate them one from another, as a shepherd divideth his sheep from the goats’. Sinner! thou believest that there is a judgment; thou knowest that the tares and wheat cannot always grow together—that the sheep and the goats shall not always feed in one pasture; but dost thou know of that man who is to judge thee—that he who is to judge thee is a man? I say a man—a man once despised and rejected.

The Lord shall come, but not the same
As once in lowliness he came:
A humble man before his foes;
A weary man and full of woes.

Ah! no. Rainbows shall be about his head; he shall hold the sun in his right hand as the token of his government; he shall put the moon and stars beneath his feet, as the dust of the pedestal of his throne, which shall be of solid clouds of light. The books shall be opened—those massive books, which contain the deeds of both quick and dead. Ah! how shall the despised Nazarene sit triumphant over all his foes. No more the taunt, the jeer, the scoff; but one hideous cry of misery, ‘Hide us from the face of him that sitteth on the throne.’ Oh ye, my hearers, who now look with contempt on Jesus and his cross, I tremble for you. Oh, fiercer than a lion on his prey, is love when once incensed. Oh, despisers! I warn ye of that day when the placid brow of the Man of Sorrows shall be knit with frowns; when the eye which once was moistened by dew-drops of pity, shall flash lightning on its enemies; and the hand, which once was nailed to the cross for our redemption, shall grasp the thunderbolt for your damnation; while the mouth which once said, ‘Come unto me, ye weary’, shall pronounce in words louder and more terrible than the voice of the thunder, ‘Depart ye cursed!’ Sinners! ye may think it a trifle to sin against the Man of Nazareth, but ye shall find that in so doing ye have offended the Man who shall judge the earth in righteousness; and for your rebellion ye shall endure waves of torment in the eternal ocean of wrath. From that doom may God deliver you! But I warn you of it. You have all read the story of the lady, who, on her marriage-day stepped up stairs, and seeing an old chest, in her fun and frolic stepped inside, thinking to hide herself an hour, that her friends might hunt for her; but a spring lock lay in ambush there, and fastened her down forever; nor did they ever find her, until years had passed, when moving that old lumbering chest, they found the bones of a skeleton, with here and there a jewelled ring and some fair thing. She had sprung in there in pleasantry and mirth, but was locked down forever. Young man! take heed that you are not locked down forever by your sins! One jovial glass—it is all. ‘One moment’s step.’ So said she. But there’s a secret lock lays in ambush. One turn into that house of ill-fame—one wandering from the paths of rectitude—that is all. Oh, sinner! it is all. But dost thou know what that all is? To be fastened down forever? Oh! if thou wouldst shun this, list to me, whilst—for I have but one moment more—I tell thee yet again of the Man who was ‘chosen out of the people’.

Ye proud ones! I have a word for you. Ye delicate ones, whose footsteps must not touch the ground! ye who look down in scorn upon your fellow mortals—proud worms despising your fellow worms, because ye are somewhat more showily dressed! What think ye of this? The man of the people is to save you, if you are saved at all. The Christ of the crowd—the Christ of the mass—the Christ of the people—he is to be your Saviour! Thou must stoop, proud man! Thou must bow, proud lady! Thou must lay aside thy pomp, or else thou wilt ne’er be saved; for the Saviour of the people must be thy Saviour!

But to the poor trembling sinner, whose pride is gone, I repeat the comforting assurance. Wouldst thou shun sin? Wouldst thou avoid the curse? My Master tells me to say this morning—‘Come unto me all ye that are weary and heavy laden, and I will give you rest.’ I remember the saying of a good old saint. Someone was talking about the mercy and love of Jesus, and concluded by saying, ‘Ah, is it not astonishing?’ She said, ‘No, not at all.’ But they said it was. ‘Why,’ she said, ‘It is just like him; it is just like him!’ You say, can you believe such a thing of a person? ‘Oh yes!’ it may be said, ‘that is just his nature.’ So you, perhaps, cannot believe that Christ would save you, guilty creature as you are. I tell you it is just like him. He saved Saul—he saved me—he may save you. Yea, what is more, he will save you. For whosoever cometh unto him, he will in no wise cast out.

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‘And hast made us unto our God kings and priests: and we shall reign on the earth.’—Revelation 5:10.

‘MUSIC hath charms.’ I am sure sacred music has; for I have felt something of its charms whilst we have been singing that glorious hymn just now. There is a potency in harmony, there is a magic power in melody, which either melts the soul to pity, or lifts it up to joy unspeakable. I do not know how it may be with some minds; they possibly may resist the influence of singing; but I cannot. When the saints of God, in full chorus, ‘chaunt the solemn lay,’ and when I hear sweet syllables fall from their lips, keeping measure and time, then I feel elevated; and, forgetting for a time everything terrestrial, I soar aloft towards heaven. If such be the sweetness of the music of the saints below, where there is much of discord and sin to mar the harmony, how sweet must it be to sing above, with cherubim and seraphim. Oh, what songs must those be which the Eternal ever hears upon his throne! What seraphic sonnets must those be which are thrilled from the lips of pure immortals, untainted by a sin, ­unmingled with a groan: where they warble ever hymns of joy and gladness, never intermingled with one sigh, or groan, or worldly care. Happy songsters! When shall I your chorus join? There is one of your hymns that runs—

‘Hark! how they sing before the throne!’

and I have sometimes thought I could ‘hark! how they sing before the throne.’ I have imagined that I could hear the full burst of the swell of the chorus, when it pealed from heaven like mighty thunders, and the sound of many waters, and have almost heard those full-toned strains, when the harpers harped with their harps before the throne of God; alas, it was but imagination. We cannot hear it now; these ears are not fitted for such music; these souls could not be contained in the body, if we were once to hear some stray note from the harps of angels. We must wait till we get up yonder. Then, purified, like silver seven times, from the defilement of earth, washed in our Saviour’s precious blood, sanctified by the purifying influence of the Holy Spirit—

‘We shall, unblemished and complete,
Appear before our Father’s throne,
With joys divinely great.’
‘Then loudest of the crowd we’ll sing,
Whilst heaven’s resounding mansions ring
With shouts of sovereign grace.’

Our friend John, the highly favoured apostle of the Apocalypse, has given us just one note from heaven’s song; we shall strike that note, and sound it again and again. I shall strike this tuning-fork of heaven, and let you hear one of the key notes. ‘And hast made us unto our God kings and priests: and we shall reign on the earth.’ May the great and gracious Spirit, who is the only illumination of darkness, light up my mind whilst I attempt, in a brief and hurried manner, to speak from this text. There are three things in it: first, the Redeemer’s doings—‘and hast made us’; secondly, the saints’ honours—‘and hast made us kings and priests unto our God;’ and, thirdly, the world’s future—‘and we shall reign upon the earth.’

I. First, then, we have THE REDEEMER’S DOINGS. They who stand before the throne sing of the Lamb—the Lion of the tribe of Judah, who took the book and broke the seals thereof—‘Thou hast made us kings and priests unto our God.’ In heaven they do not sing

‘Glory, honour, praise, and power
Be unto ourselves for ever;
We have been our own Redeemers;—Hallelujah!’

They never sing praise to themselves; they glorify not their own strength; they do not talk of their own free-will and their own might; but they ascribe their salvation, from beginning to end, to God. Ask them how they were saved, and they reply; ‘The Lamb hath made us what we are.’ Ask them whence their glories came, and they tell you, ‘They were bequeathed to us by the dying Lamb.’ Ask whence they obtained the gold of their harps, and they say, ‘It was dug in mines of agony and bitterness by Jesus.’ Inquire who stringed their harps, and they will tell you that Jesus took each sinew of his body to make them. Ask them where they washed their robes and made them white, and they will say—

‘In yonder “fountain filled with blood,
Drawn from Immanuel’s veins.”’

Some persons on earth do not know where to put the crown; but those in heaven do. They place the diadem on the right head; and they ever sing—‘And he hath made us what we are.’

Well, then, beloved, would not this note well become us here? For ‘what have we that we have not received?’ Who hath made us to differ? I know, this morning, that I am a justified man; I have the full assurance that

‘The terrors of law and of God,
With me can have nothing to do;
My Saviour’s obedience and blood
Hide all my transgressions from view.’

There is not a sin against me in God’s book: they have all been for ever obliterated by the blood of Christ, and cancelled by his own right hand. I have nothing to fear; I cannot be condemned. ‘Who shall lay anything to the charge of God’s elect?’ Not God, for he hath justified; not Christ, for he hath died. But if I am justified, who made me so? I say—‘And hath made me what I am.’ Justification from first to last, is of God. Salvation is of the Lord alone.
Many of you are sanctified persons, but you are not perfectly sanctified; you are not redeemed altogether from the dross of earth; you have still another law in your members, warring against the law of your mind, and you always will have that law while you tabernacle in faith; you never will be perfect in your sanctification until you get up yonder before the solemn throne of God, where even this imperfection of your soul will be taken away, and your carnal depravity rooted out. But yet, beloved, there is an inward principle imparted; you are growing in grace—you are making progress in holiness. Well, but who made you have that progress? Who redeemed you from that lust? Who ransomed you from that vice? Who bade you say farewell to that practice in which you indulged? Cannot you say of Jesus, ‘And hath made us!’ It is Christ who hath done it all, and to his name be honour, and glory, and praise, and dominion.

Let us dwell one moment on this thought, and show you how it is that it can be said that Christ hath made us this. When did Christ make his people kings and priests? When could it be said, ‘And hath made us kings and priests unto our God?’

1. First of all, he made us kings and priests, virtually, when he signed the covenant of grace. Far, far back in eternity, the Magna Charta of the saints was written by the hand of God, and it needed one signature to make it valid. There was a stipulation in that covenant that the Mediator should become incarnate, should live a suffering life, and at last endure a death of ignominy; and it needed but one signature, the signature of the Son of God, to make that covenant valid, eternal, and ‘ordered in all things and sure.’ Methinks I see him now, as my imagination pictures the lofty Son of God grasping the pen. See how his fingers write the name; and there it stands in everlasting letters—‘THE SON!’ O sacred ratification of the treaty; it is stamped and sealed with the great seal of our Father in heaven. O glorious covenant, then for ever made secure! At the moment of the signature of this wondrous document, the spirits before the throne—I mean the angels—might have taken up the song, and said of the whole body of the elect, ‘And hast made you kings and priests unto your God;’ and could all the chosen company have started into existence, they could have clapped their hands and sung, ‘Here we are by that very signature constituted kings and priests unto our God.’

2. But he did not stop there. It was not simply agreeing to the terms of the treaty; but in due time he filled it all—yes, to its ­utmost jot and tittle. Jesus said, ‘I will take the cup of salvation’ and he did take it—the cup of our deliverance. Bitter were its drops; gall lay in its depths; there were groans, and sighs, and tears, within the red mixture, but he took it all, and drank it to its dregs, and swallowed all the awful draught. All was gone. He drank the cup of salvation, and he ate the bread of affliction. See him, as he drinks the cup in Gethsemane, when the fluid of that cup did mingle with his blood, and make each drop a scalding poison. Mark how the hot feet of pain did travel down his veins. See how each nerve is twisted and contorted with his agony. Behold his brow covered with sweat, witness the agonies as they follow each other into the very depths of his soul. Speak, ye lost, and tell what hell’s torment means; but ye cannot tell what the torments of Gethsemane were. Oh! the deep unutterable! There was a depth which couched beneath, when our Redeemer bowed his head, when he placed himself betwixt the upper and nether millstones of his Father’s vengeance, and when his whole soul was ground to powder. Ah! that wrestling man-God—that suffering man of Gethsemane! Weep o’er him, saints—weep o’er him; when ye see him rising from that prayer in the garden, marching forth to his cross; when ye picture him hanging on his cross four long hours in the scorching sun, overwhelmed by his Father’s passing wrath—when ye see his side streaming with gore—when ye hear his death-shriek, ‘It is finished,’—and see his lips all parched, and moistened by nothing save the vinegar and the gall,—ah! then prostrate yourselves before that cross, bow down before that sufferer, and say, ‘Thou hast made us—thou hast made us what we are; we are nothing without thee.’ The cross of Jesus is the foundation of the glory of the saints; Calvary is the birth-place of heaven; heaven was born in Bethlehem’s manger; had it not been for the sufferings and agonies of Golgotha we should have had no blessing. Oh, saint! in every mercy see the Saviour’s blood; look on this Book—it is sprinkled with his blood; look on this house of prayer—it is sanctified by his sufferings; look on your daily food—it is purchased with his groans. Let every mercy come to you as a blood-bought treasure; value it because it comes from him; and evermore say, ‘Thou hast made us what we are.’

3. Beloved, our Saviour Jesus Christ finished the great work of making us what we are, by his ascension into heaven. If he had not risen up on high and led captivity captive, his death would have been insufficient. He ‘died for our sins,’ but he ‘rose again for our justification.’ The resurrection of our Saviour, in his majesty when he burst the bonds of death, was to us the assurance that God had accepted his sacrifice; and his ascension up on high, was but as a type and a figure of the real and actual ascension of all his saints, when he shall come in the clouds of judgment, and shall call all his people to him. Mark the man-God, as he goes upward towards heaven; behold his triumphal march through the skies, whilst stars sing his praises, and planets dance in solemn order; behold him traverse the unknown fields of ether till he arrives at the throne of God in the seventh heaven. Then hear him say to his Father, ‘I have finished the work which thou gavest me to do; behold me and the children thou hast given me; I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course; I have done all; I have accomplished every type; I have finished every part of the covenant; there is not one iota I have left unfulfilled, or one tittle that is left out; all is done.’ And hark, how they sing before the throne of God when thus he speaks: ‘Thou hast made us unto our God kings and priests: and we shall reign on the earth.’

Thus have I briefly spoken upon the dear Redeemer’s doings. Poor lips cannot speak better; faint heart will not rise up to the height of this great argument. Oh! that these lips had language eloquent and lofty, that they might speak more of the wondrous doings of our Redeemer!

Crown him! crown him!
Crowns become the Saviour’s brow.

II. Now, secondly, THE SAINT’S HONOURS: ‘and hast made us unto our God kings and priests.’ The most honourable of all monarchs have ever been esteemed to be those who had a right not only to royal, but to sacerdotal supremacy—those kings who could wear at one time the crown of loyalty, and at another the mitre of the priesthood, who could both use the censer and hold the sceptre—who could offer intercession for the people, and then govern the nations. Those who are kings and priests are great indeed; and here you behold the saint honoured, not with one title, or one office, but with two. He is made not a king merely, but a king and a priest; not a priest merely, but a priest and a king. The saint has two offices conferred upon him at once, he is made a priestly monarch and a regal priest.

I shall take, first of all, the royal office of the saints. They are KINGS. They are not merely to be kings in heaven, but they are also kings on earth; for if my text does not say so, the Bible declares it in another passage: ‘Ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood.’ We are kings even now. I want you to understand that, before I explain the idea. Every saint of the living God, not merely has the prospect of being a king in heaven, but positively, in the sight of God, he is a king now; and he must say, with regard to his brethren and himself, ‘And hast made us,’ even now, ‘unto our God kings and priests; and we shall reign upon the earth.’ A Christian is a king. He is not simply like a king, but he is a king, actually and truly. However I shall try and show you how he is like a king.

Remember his royal ancestry. What a fuss some people make about their grandfathers and grandmothers, and distant ancestors. I remember seeing in Trinity College, the pedigree of some great lord that went back just as far as Adam, and Adam was there digging the ground—the first man. It was traced all the way up. Of course I did not believe it. I have heard of some pedigrees that go back further. I leave that to your own common sense, to believe it or not. A pedigree in which shall be found dukes, marquises, and kings, and princes. Oh! what would some give for such a pedigree? I believe, however, that it is not what our ancestors were, but what we are, that will make us shine before God; that it is not so much in knowing that we have royal or priestly blood in our veins, as knowing that we are an honour to our race—that we are walking in the ways of the Lord, and reflecting credit upon the church and upon the grace that makes us honourable. But since some men will glory in their descent, I will glory that the saints have the proudest ancestry in all the world. Talk of Caesars, or of Alexanders, or tell me even of our own good Queen: I say that I am of as high descent as her majesty, or the proudest monarch in the world. I am descended from the King of kings. The saint may well speak of his ancestry—he may exult in it, he may glory in it—for he is the son of God, positively and actually. His mother, the Church, is the Bride of Jesus; he is a twice-born child of heaven: one of the blood royal of the universe. The poorest woman or man on earth, loving Christ, is of a royal line. Give a man the grace of God in his heart, and his ancestry is noble. I can turn back the roll of my pedigree, and I can tell you that it is so ancient, that it has no beginning; it is more ancient than all the rolls of mighty men put together; for, from all eternity my Father existed: and, therefore, I have indeed a right royal and ancient ancestry.

And then, again, the saints, like monarchs, have a splendid retinue. Kings and monarchs cannot travel without a deal of state. In olden times, they had far more magnificence than they have now; but even in these days we see much of it when royalty is abroad. There must be a peculiar kind of horse, and a splendid chariot, and outriders, with all the etceteras of gorgeous pomp. Ay! and the kings of God, whom Jesus Christ has made kings and priests unto their God, have also a royal retinue ‘Oh!’ say you, ‘but I see some of them in rags; they are walking through the earth alone, sometimes without a helper or a friend.’ Ah! but there is a fault in your eyes. If you had eyes to see, you would perceive a body-guard of angels always attending every one of the blood-bought family. You remember Elijah’s servant could not see anything around Elijah, till his master opened his eyes; then he could see that there were horses and chariots round about Elijah. Lo! there are horses and chariots about me. And thou, saint of the Lord: where’er thou art there are horses and chariots. In that bed-chamber, where I was born, angels stood to announce my birth on high. In seas of trouble, when wave after wave seems to go over me, angels are there to lift up my head; when I come to die, when sorrowing friends shall, weeping, carry me to the grave, angels shall stand by my bier; and, when put into the grave, some mighty angel shall stand and guard my dust, and contend for its possession with the devil. Why should I fear? I have a company of angels about me; and whenever I walk abroad, the glorious cherubim march in front. Men see them not, but I see them; for ‘faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.’ We have a royal retinue: we are kings, not merely by ancestry, but by our retinue.

Now, notice the insignia and regalia of the saints. Kings and princes have certain things that are theirs by perspective right. For instance, Her Majesty has her Buckingham Palace, and her other palaces, her crown royal, her sceptre, and so on. But, has a saint a palace? Yes. I have a palace! and its walls are not made of marble, but of gold; its borders are carbuncles and precious gems; its windows are of agates; its stones are laid with fair colours; around it there is a profusion of every costly thing; rubies sparkle here and there, yea, pearls are but common stones within it. Some call it a mansion; but I have a right to call it a palace too, for I am a king. It is a mansion when I look at God, it is a palace when I look at men, because it is the habitation of a prince. Mark where this palace is. I am not a prince of Inde—I have no inheritance in any far-off land that men dream of—I have no El Dorado, or Home of Prester John; but yet I have a substantial palace. Yonder, on the hills of heaven it stands; I know not its position among the other mansions of heaven, but there it stands; and ‘I know that if the earthly house of this tabernacle be dissolved, I have a building of God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens.’

Have Christians a crown too? O yes; but they do not wear it every day. They have a crown, but their coronation day is not yet arrived. They have been anointed monarchs, they have some of the authority and dignity of monarchs; but they are not crowned monarchs yet. But the crown is made. God will not have to order heaven’s goldsmiths to fashion it in after-time; it is made already hanging up in glory. God hath ‘laid up for me a crown of righteousness.’ Oh, saint, if thou didst just open some secret door in heaven, and go into the treasure chamber, thou couldst see it filled with crowns. When Cortes entered the palace of Montezuma, he found a secret chamber bricked up, and he thought the wealth of all the world was there, so many different things were there stowed away. Could you enter God’s secret treasure-house, what wealth would you see! ‘Are there so many monarchs,’ you would say, ‘so many crowns, so many princes?’ Yes, and some bright angel would say, ‘Mark you that crown? It is yours;’ and if you were to look within, you would read ‘Made for a sinner saved by grace, whose name was—;’ and then you would hardly believe your eyes, as you saw your own name engraved upon it. You are indeed a king before God, for you have a crown laid up in heaven. Whatever other insignia belong to monarchs, saints shall have. They shall have robes of whiteness; they shall have harps of glory; they shall have all things that become their regal state, so that we are indeed monarchs, you see; not mock-monarchs, clothed in purple garments of derision, and scoffed at with ‘Hail, king of the Jews;’ but we are real monarchs. ‘He hath made us kings and priests unto our God.’

There is another thought here. Kings are considered the most honourable amongst men. They are always looked up to and respected. If you should say, ‘a monarch is here!’ a crowd would give way. I should not command much respect if I were to attempt to move about in a crowd; but if anyone should shout, ‘here is the Queen!’ everyone would step aside and make room for her. A monarch generally commands respect. Ah! beloved, we think that worldly princes are the most honourable of the earth, but if you were to ask God, he would reply, ‘my saints, in whom I delight, these are the honourable ones.’ Tell me not of tinsel and gewgaw; tell me not of gold and silver; tell me not of diamonds and pearls; tell me not of ancestry and rank; preach to me not of pomp and power; but oh! tell me that a man is a saint of the Lord, for then he is an honourable man. God respects him, angels respect him, and the universe one day shall respect him, when Christ shall come to call him to his account, and say, ‘well done, good and faithful servant, enter thou into the joy of thy Lord.’ You may despise a child of God now, sinner; you may laugh at him, you may say he is a hypocrite; you may call him a saint, a methodist, a cant, and everything you like; but know that those titles will not mar his dignity—he is the honourable of the earth, and God estimates him as such.

But some persons will say, ‘I wish you would prove what you affirm, when you say that saints are kings; for, if we were kings, we should never have any sorrows; kings are never poor as we are, and never suffer as we do.’ Who told you so? You say if you are kings, you would live at ease. Do not kings ever suffer? Was not David an anointed king? and was he not hunted like a partridge on the mountains? Did not the king himself pass over the brook Kedron, and all his people weeping as he went, when his son Absalom pursued him? And was he not a monarch when he slept on the cold ground, with no couch save the damp heather? O yes, kings have their sorrows—crowned heads have their afflictions. Full oft

‘Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown.’

Do not expect that because you are a king, you are to have no sorrows. ‘It is not for kings, O Lemuel, it is not for kings to drink wine, nor for princes strong drink.’ And it is often so. The saints get but little wine here. It is not for kings to drink the wine of pleasure, it is not for kings to have much of the intoxicating drink and the surfeits of this world’s delight. They shall have joy enough up yonder, when they shall drink it new in their Father’s kingdom. Poor saint! do dwell on this. Thou art a king! I beseech thee, let it not go away from thy mind; but in the midst of thy tribulation, still rejoice in it. If thou hast to go through the dark tunnel of infamy, for Christ’s name; if thou art ridiculed and reviled, still rejoice in the fact, ‘I am a king, and all the dominions of the earth shall be mine!’

That last idea, and I have done with this part of the subject. Kings have dominion. Do you know I am a fifth monarchy man? In Cromwell’s time some said there had been four monarchies, and the fifth would come and overturn every other. Well, I never wish to do as they did; but I believe with them, that a fifth monarchy shall come. There have now existed four great empires, arrogating universal dominion, and there never shall be another world-wide monarchy until Christ shall come. Jesus, our Lord, is to be King of all the earth, and rule all nations in a glorious spiritual, or personal reign. The saints, as being kings in Christ, have a right to the whole world. Here am I this morning, and my congregation before me. Some persons say, ‘Keep to your own place and preach,’ and I have heard the advice, ‘Do not go out of your parish.’ But Rowland Hill used to say he never went out of his parish in his life; his parish was England, Scotland, and Wales, and he never went out of it. I suppose that is my parish, and the parish of every gospel minister. When we see a city full of sin and iniquity, what should we say? That is ours, we will go and storm it. When we see a street or some crowded area, where the people are very bad and wicked, we should say, ‘That is our alley, we will go and take it.’ When we see a house where people will not receive the gospel, we should say, ‘That is our house, we will go and attack it.’ We will not go with the strong arm of the law; we will not ask the policeman, or government to help us; but take with us ‘the weapons of our warfare’ which ‘are not carnal but spiritual, and mighty through God, to the pulling down of strongholds.’ We will go, and by God’s Spirit we shall overcome. There is a town where the children are running about the street, uneducated, we will go and take those children—kidnap them for Christ. We will have a Sabbath school. If they are ragged urchins who cannot come to a Sabbath school, we will have a ragged school. There is a part of the world where the inhabitants are sunk in ignorance and superstition: we will send a missionary to them. Ah! those who do not like missionary enterprise, do not know the dignity of the saint. Talk of India, talk of China; ‘it is mine,’ saith the saint. All the kingdoms of the earth are ours. ‘Africa is my washpot—I will triumph over Asia. They are mine! they are mine!’ ‘Who shall bring me into the strong city?’ Is it not thou, O Lord? God shall give us the kingdom of Christ. The whole earth is ours; and by the power of the Holy Ghost, Bel shall bow, Nebo shall stoop, the gods of the heathen, Budha and Brahma shall be cast down, and all nations bow before the sceptre of Christ. ‘He has made us kings.’
Our second point, upon which I shall be very brief, is, ‘He hath made us kings and PRIESTS.’ Saints are not only kings, but priests. I shall go to it at once, without any preface.

We are priests, because priests are divinely chosen persons, and so are we. ‘No man taketh this honour unto himself, but he that is called of God, as was Aaron.’ But we have that calling and election; we were all ordained to it from the foundations of the world. We were predestinated to be priests, and in process of time we had a special effectual call, which we could not and did not resist, and which at last so overcame us, that we became at once the priests of God. We are priests, divinely constituted. When we say we are priests, we do not talk as certain parties do, who say they are priests, wishing thereby to arrogate to themselves a distinction. I always have an objection—I must state it strongly—to calling a clergyman, or any man that preaches, a priest. We are no more so than you are. All saints are priests. But, for a man to stand up and say he is a priest, any more than those he preaches to, is a falsehood. I detest the distinction of clergy and laity. I like scriptural priestcraft, for that is the craft or work of the people who are all priests; but all other priestcraft I abhor. Every saint of the Lord is a priest at God’s altar, and is bound to worship God with the holy incense of prayer and praise. We are priests, each one of us, if we are called by divine grace; for thus we are priests by divine constitution.

Then, next, we are priests, because we enjoy divine honours. None but a priest might enter within the veil; there was a court of the priests into which none might ever go, except the called ones. Priests had certain rights and privileges which others had not. Saint of Jesus! heir of heaven! thou hast high and honourable privileges, which the world wots not of! Hast thou ever been within the veil in communion with Christ? Hast thou ever been in the court of the Lord’s house, the court of the priests, where he has taught thee, and manifested himself to thee? Hast thou? Yes, thou knowest thou hast; thou enjoyest constant access to God’s throne; thou hast a right to come and tell thy griefs and sorrows into the ear of Jehovah. The poor worldling must not come there, the poor child of wrath has no God to tell his troubles to. He must not go within the veil; he has no wish to go: but thou mayest; thou mayest come to God’s ear, swing the censer before the throne, and offer thy petition in the name of Jesus. Others have not these divine honours. Thou art divinely honoured, and divinely blessed.

Then another remark, to finish up with, shall be, we have a divine service to perform; and as I want you all, this morning, to turn this chapel into one great altar—as I want to make you all working priests, and this the temple for sacrifice—look earnestly at your service. You are all priests, because you love his dear name and have a great sacrifice to perform; not a propitiation for your sins, for that has been once offered, but a sacrifice this day of holy thanksgiving. Oh! how sweet in God’s ear is the prayer of his people! That is the sacrifice that he accepts; and when their holy hymn swells upwards towards the sky, how pleasant it is in his ears, because then he can say, ‘My hosts of priests are sacrificing praise.’ And do you know, beloved, there is one point in which most of us fail in our oblations before God? We offer our prayer, we present our praise; but how little do we sacrifice of our substance unto the Lord! I had thought this morning seeing I desire to make you amazingly liberal, to have made this my text, ‘Honour the Lord with thy substance, and with the first-fruits of all thine increase: so shall thy barns be filled with plenty, and thy presses shall burst out with new wine;’ and I had thought of showing that our substance was the Lord’s, that we were bound to devote no small portion of it to him, and that if we did do so we might expect prosperity even in worldly business, for he would make our barns full and our presses burst with new wine. However, I conceive it to be needless to preach a collection sermon—I thought I would rather tell your about your honour and dignity, and then you shall just give what you like, for the only free-will I like, is a free-will offering. Suffer, ye beloved, a few words. God has said in his Word that you are to honour him with your substance. As a priest of the Lord will you not sacrifice something to the Lord this day? Here we have a great object before us, we want more room for the crowds who come to hear the gospel. It seems important, when such a throng is gathered, that none should go away. Ought we not to bless God that they come? There was a time you were few indeed, and the cry was, ‘Who hath believed our report?’ But God has given us great success, the ministry here has been blessed to the conversion of not a few souls; I have many cases, now in this chapel, of broken hearts and contrite spirits; doubtless, there are many more than I know of, and I believe the blessed Spirit will bring them out in due time. Oh! do you not grieve that any should have to turn away from the voice of the ministry—that any who come here should have to go away, perhaps to spend the Sabbath in sin. You know not where they have to go, when they cannot get within these walls. The thing is, we have come to the resolution that this chapel should be enlarged, so that there should be accommodation for a larger number. Now, ye priests, sacrifice to the Lord. Let the priests build the house of Lord; let those who worship in the sanctuary take up the trowel to-day; let the mortar and the brick be laid, and let this house be once more filled with the glory of the Lord, and an abundant congregation.

III. Now, I have to close up with THE WORLD’S FUTURE. ‘We shall reign on the earth.’ I have not much time for this, and I dare say it is expected that I shall tell you about the millennium and the personal reign of Christ. I shall not at all, because I don’t know anything about it. I have heard a great many people talk of it, and, if anybody shows me a book on the millennium, I say, ‘I cannot read it just yet.’ A good man has lately written a book on it, and a gentleman recommended it to me so strongly, that I could not but buy it out of courtesy; but I elevated it to the aristocratic region of library, in the higher ranks, and there it rests in quiet repose. I do not think myself capable of threading the labyrinths of the subject, and I do not believe the very respectable author can do it. It is a subject so dark, and I have read so many different views upon it, that it is all a phantasmagoria with me. I believe all the Bible says of a glorious future, but I cannot pretend to be a maker of charts for all time. Only this I gather as a positive fact, that the saints will one day reign on the earth. This truth appears to me clear enough, whatever may be the different views on the millennium. Now, the saints do not reign visibly; they are despised. They were driven, in old times, into dens and caves of the earth: but the time is coming when kings will be saints, and princes the called ones of God—when queens shall be the nursing mothers and kings the nursing fathers of Christ’s church. The hour is coming when the saint, instead of being dishonoured, shall be honoured; and monarchs, once the foes of truth, shall become its friends. The saints shall reign. They shall have the majority; the kingdom of Christ shall have the upper hand; it shall not be cast down—this shall not be Satan’s world any longer—it shall again sing with all its sister stars, the never ceasing song of praise. Oh! I believe there is a day coming when Sabbath bells shall sprinkle music over the plains of Africa—when the deep thick jungle of India shall see the saints of God going up to the sanctuary, and I am assured that the teeming multitudes of China shall gather together in temples built for prayer, and, as you and I have done, shall sing, to the ever glorious Jehovah,

‘Praise God from whom all blessings flow.’

Happy day! happy day! May it speedily come!

Now, to close up, one very practical inference. Ye are kings and priests unto your God. Then how much ought kings to give to the collection this morning? Thus speak ye to yourselves. ‘I am a king; I will give as a king giveth unto a king.’ Now, mark you, no paltry subscriptions! We don’t expect kings to put down their names for trifles. Then, again: you are a priest. Well, priest, do you mean to sacrifice? ‘Yes.’ But you would not sacrifice a broken-legged lamb, or a blemished bullock, would you? Would you not select the best of the flock? Very right, then select the very best of the Queen’s coins, and offer, if you can, sheep with golden fleece. Excuse my pressing this subject. I want to get this chapel enlarged; so do you; we are all agreed about it; we are all rowing in one boat. I have set my mind on £50, and I must, and will, have it to-day, if possible. I hope you won’t disappoint me. It is not my own cause, but my Master’s—at other times you have given liberally—I am not afraid of you—but hope to come forward, next Sabbath morning, with the cheering announcement that the £50 is all raised, and then I think my spirits will be so elevated, that, by the help of God, I will venture to promise you one of the best sermons I am capable of delivering.

* * * * *

The Christian reader will be pleased to learn, that after this appeal, the sum of £50 0s. 11½d. was collected at the doors, towards defraying the expenses of the enlargement. Should any reader of the New Park Street Pulpit desire to contribute to this excellent object, any sum will be thankfully received by MR. WILLIAM OLNEY, Secretary, at the Chapel.

Photo by Mert Kahveci on Unsplash

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‘Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty.’—-2 Corinthians 3:17.

LIBERTY is the birthright of every man. He may be born a pauper; he may be a foundling; his parentage may be altogether unknown; but liberty is his inalienable birthright. Black may be his skin; he may live uneducated and untaught; he may be poor as poverty itself; he may never have a foot of land to call his own; he may scarce have a particle of clothing, save a few rags to cover him; but, poor as he is, nature has fashioned him for freedom—he has a right to be free, and if he has not liberty, it is his birthright, and he ought not to be content until he wins it.

Liberty is the heirloom of all the sons and daughters of Adam. But where do you find liberty unaccompanied by religion? True it is that all men have a right to liberty, but it is equally true that you do not meet it in any country save where you find the Spirit of the Lord. ‘Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty.’ Thank God, this is a free country. This is a land where I can breathe the air and say it is untainted by the groan of a single slave; my lungs receive it, and I know there has never been mingled with its vapours the tear of a single slave woman shed over her child which has been sold from her. This land is the home of liberty. But why is it so? I take it, it is not so much because of our institutions as because the Spirit of the Lord is here—the spirit of true and hearty religion. There was a time, remember, when England was no more free than any other country, when men could not speak their sentiments freely, when kings were despots, when Parliaments were but a name. Who won our liberties for us? who have loosed our chains? Under the hand of God, I say, the men of religion—men like the great and glorious Cromwell, who would have liberty of conscience, or die—men who, if they could not reach kings’ hearts, because they were unsearchable in cunning, would strike kings low, rather than they would be slaves. We owe our liberty to men of religion, to men of the stern Puritanical school—men who scorned to play the craven and yield their principles at the command of man. And if we ever are to maintain our liberty (as God grant we may) it shall be kept in England by religious liberty—by religion. This Bible is the Magna Charta of old Britain; its truths, its doctrines have snapped our fetters, and they never can be riveted on again, whilst men, with God’s Spirit in their hearts, go forth to speak its truths. In no other land, save where the Bible is unclasped—in no other realm, save where the gospel is preached, can you find liberty. Roam through other countries, and you speak with bated breath; you are afraid; you feel you are under an iron hand; the sword is above you; you are not free. Why? Because you are under the tyranny engendered by a false religion: you have not free Protestantism there, and it is not till Protestantism comes that there can be freedom. It is where the Spirit of the Lord is that there is liberty, and nowhere else. Men talk about being free: they describe model governments, Platonic republics, or Owenite paradises, but they are dreamy theorists; for there can be no freedom in the world, save, ‘where the spirit of the Lord is.’

I have commenced with this idea, because I think worldly men ought to be told that if religion does not save them, yet it has done much for them—that the influence of religion has won them their liberties.
But the liberty of the text is no such freedom as this: it is an infinitely greater and better one. Great as civil or religious liberty may be, the liberty of my text transcendently exceeds. There is a liberty, dear friends, which Christian men alone enjoy; for even in Great Britain there are men who taste not the sweet air of liberty. There are some who are afraid to speak as men, who have to cringe and fawn, and bow, and stoop, to any one; who have no will of their own, no principles, no voice, no courage, and who cannot stand erect in conscious independence. But he is the free man, whom the truth makes free. He who has grace in his heart is free, he cares for no one; he has the right upon his side; he has God within him—the indwelling Spirit of the Holy Ghost; he is a prince of the blood royal of heaven; he is a noble, having the true patent of nobility; he is one of God’s elect, distinguished, chosen children, and he is not the man to bend, or meanly cringe. No!—sooner would he walk the burning furnace with Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego—sooner would he be cast into the lions’ den with Daniel, than yield a point in principle. He is a free man. ‘Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty’ in its fullest, highest and widest sense. God give you friends, to have that ‘Spirit of the Lord;’ for without it, in a free country, ye may still be bondsmen; and where there are no serfs in body, ye may be slaves in soul. The text speaks of Spiritual liberty; and now I address the children of God. Spiritual liberty, brethren, you and I enjoy if we have ‘the Spirit of the Lord’ within us. What does this imply? It implies that there was a time when we had not that Spiritual liberty—when we were slaves. But a little while ago all of us who now are free in Christ Jesus, were slaves of the devil: we were led captives at his will. We talked of free-will, but free-will is a slave. We boasted that we could do what we pleased; but oh! what a slavish and dreamy liberty we had. It was a fancied freedom. We were slaves to our lusts and passions—slaves to sin; but now we are freed from sin; we are delivered from our tyrant; a stronger than he has cast out the strong man armed, and we are free.

Let us now examine a little more closely, in what our liberty consists.

I. And first, my friends, ‘Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty’ from the Bondage of Sin. Ah! I know I shall speak feelingly to some of you when I talk about the bondage of sin. You know what that misery means. Of all bondage and slavery in this world, there is none more horrible than the bondage of sin. Tell me of Israel in Egypt preparing their tale of bricks unsupplied with straw; tell me of the negro beneath the lash of his cruel task-master, and I confess it is a bondage fearful to be borne; but there is one far worse—the bondage of a convinced sinner when he is brought to feel the burden of his guilt; the bondage of a man when once his sins are baying him, like hounds about a weary stag; the bondage of a man when the burden of sin is on his shoulder—a burden too heavy for his soul to bear—a burden which will sink him for ever in the depths of everlasting torment, unless he doth escape from it. Methinks I see such a person. He hath ne’er a smile upon his face; dark clouds hath gathered on his brow; solemn and serious he stands; his very words are sighs; his songs are groans; his smiles are tears; and when he seems most happy, hot drops of grief roll in burning showers, scalding furrows on his cheek. Ask him what he is, and he tells you he is ‘a wretch undone.’ Ask him how he is, and he confesses that he is ‘misery incarnate.’ Ask him what he shall be, and he says, ‘he shall be lost in flames for ever, and there is no hope.’ Behold him alone in his retirement: when he lays his head on his pillow, up he starts again: at night he dreams of torment, and by day he almost feels that of which he dreamed. Such is the poor convinced sinner under bondage. Such have I been in my days, and such have you been, friends. I speak to those who understand it. You have passed through that gloomy Slough of Despond; you have gone through that dark vale of penitence: you have been made to drink the bitter cup of repentance: and I know you will say, ‘Amen’ when I declare that of all bondage this is the most painful—the bondage of the law, the bondage of corruption. ‘O wretched man that I am, who shall deliver me’ from it? But the Christian is free; he can smile now, though he wept before; he can rejoice now, whereas he lamented. ‘There is,’ he says, ‘no sin upon my conscience now, there is no crime upon my breast; I need not walk through the earth fearful of every shadow, and afraid of every man I meet, for sin is washed away; my spirit is no more guilty; it is pure, it is holy; there no longer resteth the frown of God upon me; but my Father smiles: I see his eyes—they are glancing love: I hear his voice—it is full of sweetness. I am forgiven, I am forgiven, I am forgiven! All hail, thou breaker of fetters! glorious Jesus! Ah! that moment when first the bondage passed away! Methinks I recollect it now. I saw Jesus on his cross before me. I thought on him, and as I mused upon his death and sufferings, methought I saw him cast a look on me; and when he gazed on me, I looked at him, and said,

‘Jesus, lover of my soul,
Let me to thy bosom fly.’

He said ‘come,’ and I flew to him and clasped him, and when he let me go again, I wondered where my burden was. It was gone! There, in the sepulchre, it lay, and I felt light as air; like a winged sylph, I could fly over mountains of trouble and despair; and oh! what liberty and joy I had! I could leap with ecstasy for I had much forgiven and now I was freed from sin.’ Beloved, this is the first liberty of the children of God. ‘Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty’ from the bondage of sin.

2. Liberty from the Penalty of Sin.—What is it? Eternal death-torment for ever—that is the sad penalty of sin. It is no sweet thing to fear that if I died now I might be in hell. It is no pleasant thought for me to stand here and believe that if I dropped down I must sink into the arms of Satan and have him for my tormentor. Why, sirs, it is a thought that would plague me; it is a thought that would be the bitterest curse of my existence. I would fain be dead and rotting in the tomb rather than walk the earth with the thought that I might suffer such a penalty as this. There are some of you here who know right well that if you die hell is your portion. You don’t attempt to deny it, you believe the Bible, and there you read your doom, ‘He that believeth not shall be damned.’ You cannot put yourselves among believers. You are still without Christ. Have any of you been brought into such a condition that you believe yourself so full of sin that God could not be just if he did not punish you? Have you not felt that you have so rebelled against God by secret crimes, ay, I say, by secret crimes, and by open transgression, that if he did not punish you he must cease to be God and lay aside his sceptre? And then you have trembled, and groaned, and cried out under the fear of the penalty of sin. You thought when you dreamed, that you saw that burning lake whose waves are fire, and whose billows are ever blazing brimstone, and each day you walked the earth it was with fear and dread lest the next step should let you into the pit which is without a bottom. But Christian, Christian, you are free from the penalty of sin. Do you know it? Can you recognize the fact? You are free at this moment from the penalty of sin. Not only are you forgiven; but you never can be punished on account of your sins however great and enormous they may have been.

‘The moment a sinner believes,
And trusts in his crucified God;
His pardon at once he receives,
Salvation in full through his blood,’

and he never can be punished on account of sin. Talk of the punishment of a believer! there is not such a thing. The afflictions of this mortal life are not punishments for sin to Christians, they are fatherly chastisements, and not the punishments of a judge. For me there is no hell; let it smoke and burn, if I am a believer I shall never have my portion there. For me there are no eternal racks, no torments, for if I am justified, I cannot be condemned. Jesus hath suffered the punishment in my stead, and God would be unjust if he were to punish me again, for Christ has suffered once, and satisfied justice for ever. When conscience tells me I am a sinner, I tell conscience I stand in Christ’s place, and Christ stands in mine. True, I am a sinner, but Christ died for sinners. True, I deserve punishment, but if my ransom died, will God ask for the debt twice? Impossible! He has cancelled it. There never was, and never shall be one believer in hell. We are free from punishment, and we never need quake on ­account of it. However horrible it may be—if it is eternal, as we know it is—it is nothing to us, for we never can suffer it. Heaven shall open its pearly portals to admit us; but hell’s iron gates are barred for ever against every believer. Glorious liberty of the children of God!

3. But there is one fact more startling than both of these things, and I dare say some of you will demur to it; nevertheless it is God’s truth, and if you don’t like it, you must leave it! There is liberty from the guilt of sin. This is the wonder of wonders. The Christian is ­positively not guilty any longer the moment he believes. Now, if Her Majesty in her goodness spares a murderer by giving him a free pardon, that man cannot be punished: but still he will be a guilty man; she may give him a thousand pardons, and the law cannot touch him, but still he will be guilty; the crime will always be on his head, and he will be branded as a murderer as long as he lives. But the Christian is not only delivered from the bondage and from the punishment, but he is positively absolved from the guilt. Now this is something at which you will stand amazed. You say, ‘What? is a Christian no more a sinner in God’s sight?’ I answer, he is a sinner as considered in himself; but in the person of Christ he is no more a sinner than the angel Gabriel; for snowy as are angelic wings, and spotless as are cherubic robes, an angel cannot be more pure than the poor blood-washed sinner when he is made whiter than snow. Do you understand how it is that the very guilt of the sinner is taken away? Here I stand to-day a guilty and condemned traitor; Christ comes for my salvation, he bids me leave my cell, ‘I will stand where you are; I will be your substitute; I will be the sinner; all your guilt is to be imputed to me; I will die for it, I will suffer for it; I will have your sins.’ Then stripping himself of his robes, he says, ‘There, put them on; you shall be considered as if you were Christ; you shall be the righteous one. I will take your place, you take mine.’ Then he casts around me a glorious robe of perfect righteousness; and when I behold it, I exclaim, ‘Strangely, my soul, art thou arrayed, with my elder brother’s garments on.’ Jesus Christ’s crown is on my head, his spotless robes are round my loins, and his golden sandals are the shoes of my feet. And now is there any sin? The sin is on Christ; the righteousness is on me. Ask for the sinner, Justice! Let the voice of Justice cry, ‘Bring forth the sinner!’ The sinner is brought. Who doth the executioner lead forth? It is the incarnate Son of God. True, he did not commit the sin; he was without fault; but it is imputed to him: he stands in the sinner’s place. Now Justice cries, ‘Bring forth the righteous, the perfectly righteous.’ Whom do I see? Lo, the Church is brought, each believer is brought. Justice says, ‘Are these perfectly righteous?’ ‘Yes they are. What Christ did is theirs, what they did is laid on Christ; his righteousness is theirs; their sins are his.’ I appeal to you, ye ungodly: this seems strange and startling, does it not? You have set it down to hyper-calvinism, and you laugh at it. Set it down for what you please, sirs. God has set it up as his truth; he has made us righteous through the imputed righteousness of Jesus Christ. And now, if I am a true believer, I stand here freed from every sin. There is not a crime against me in the book of God, it is blotted out for ever; it is cancelled; and not only can I never be punished, but I have nothing to be punished for. Christ has atoned for my sins, and I have received his righteousness, ‘Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty.’

4. Furthermore, the Christian man, whilst delivered from the guilt and punishment of sin, is likewise delivered from the dominion of it. Every living man before he is converted, is a slave to lust. Profane men glory in free living and free thinking. They call this free living—a full glass, a Bacchanalian revel, shouting wantonness, chambering.—Free living, sir! Let the slave hold up his fetters and jingle them in my ears, and say, ‘This is music, and I am free.’ The man is a poor maniac. Let the man chained in his cell, the madman of Bethlehem, tell me he is a king, and grin a horrible smile; I say, ‘Ah, poor wretch, I know wherefore he counteth that he is a king; he is demented, and is mad.’ So it is with the worldling who says he is free. Free sir! you are a slave. You think you are happy; but at night, when you lay yourself upon your bed, how many times have you tossed from side to side sleepless and ill at ease; and when you awaked have you not said, ‘Ah! that yesterday—that yesterday!’ And though you plunged into another day of sin, that ‘yesterday,’ like a hell-dog, barked at you, and followed at your heels. You know it, sir,—sin is a bondage and a slavery. And have you ever tried to get rid of that slavery? ‘Yes,’ you say, ‘I have.’ But I will tell you what has been the end of it. When you have tried, you have bound your fetters firmer than ever; you have riveted your chains. A sinner without grace attempting to reform himself is like Sisiphus rolling the stone up hill, which always comes down with greater force. A man without grace attempting to save himself, is engaged in as hopeless a task as the daughters of Danaus, when they attempted to fill a vast vessel with bottomless buckets. He has a bow without a string, a sword without a blade, a gun without powder. He needs strength. I grant you, he may produce a hollow reformation; he may earth up the volcano, and sow flowers around its crater; but when it once begins to stir again, it shall move the earth away, and the hot lava shall roll over all the fair flowers which he had planted, and devastate both his works and his righteousness. A sinner without grace is a slave: he cannot deliver himself from his sins. But not so the Christian! Is he a slave to his sin? Is a true-born heir of God a slave? Oh, no. He does not sin, because he is born of God; he does not live in uncleanness, because he is an heir of immortality. Ye beggars of the earth may stoop to deeds of wrong, but princes of heaven’s blood must follow acts of right. Ye poor worldlings, mean and pitiful wretches in God’s sight—ye may live in dishonesty and unrighteousness, but the heir of heaven cannot; he loves his Lord; he is free from the power of sin; his work is righteousness, and his end is everlasting life. We are free from the dominion of sin.

5. Once more: ‘Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty’ in all holy acts of love—liberty from a slavish fear of law. Many people are honest because they are afraid of the policeman. Many are sober because they are afraid of the eye of the public. Many persons are seemingly religious because of their neighbours. There is much virtue which is like the juice of the grape—it has to be squeezed before you get it; it is not like the generous drop of the honeycomb, distilling willingly and freely. I am bold to say, that if a man be destitute of the grace of God, his works are only works of slavery; he feels forced to do them. I know before I came into the liberty of the children of God, if I went to God’s house, I went because I thought I must do it; if I prayed, it was because I feared some misfortune would happen in the day if I did not; if I ever thanked God for a mercy, it was because I thought I should not get another if I were not thankful; if I performed a righteous deed it was with the hope that very likely God would reward me at last, and I should be winning some crown in heaven. A poor slave, a mere Gibeonite, hewing wood and drawing water. If I could have left off doing it, I should have loved to do so. If I could have had my will, there would have been no chapel-going for me, no religion for me—I would have lived in the world and followed the ways of Satan if I could have done as I pleased. As for righteousness, it was slavery; sin would have been my liberty. But now, Christian, what is your liberty? What makes you come to the house of God to-day?

‘Love made your willing feet
In swift obedience move.’

What makes you bend your knee in prayer? It is because you like to talk with your Father who seeth in secret. What is it that opens your purses, and makes you give liberally? It is because you love the poor children of God, and you feel, so much being given to you, that it is a privilege to give something back to Christ. What is it that constrains you to live honestly, righteously, and soberly? Is it the fear of the jail? No; you might pull the jail down; you might annihilate the convict settlements; you might hurl all chains into the sea; and we should be just as holy as we are now. Some people say, ‘Then, sir, you mean to say that Christians may live as they like.’ I wish they could, sir. If I could live as I liked, I would, always live holily. If a Christian could live as he liked, he would always live as he ought. It is a slavery to him to sin; righteousness is his delight. Oh! if I could but live as I list, I would list to live as I ought. If I could but live as I would I would live as God commands me. The greatest happiness of a Christian is to be holy. It is no slavery to him. Put him where you will, he will not sin. Expose him to any temptation, if it were not for that evil heart still remaining, you would never find him sinning. Holiness is his pleasure; sin is his slavery. Ah ye poor bondsmen who come to church and chapel because ye must; ah! ye poor slavish moralists that are honest because of the gyves, and sober because of the prison; ah! ye poor slaves! We are not so; we are not under the law, but under grace. Call us Antinomians if you will; we will even glory in the scandalous title; we are freed from the law, but we are freed from it that we may obey it more than ever we did. The true-born child of God serves his Master more than ever he did. As old Erskine says:—

‘Slight now his loving presence if they can;
No, no; his conquering kindness leads the van.
When everlasting love exerts the sway,
They judge themselves most kindly bound to obey;
Bound by redeeming love in stricter sense,
Than ever Adam was in innocence.’

6. But to conclude, ‘where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty’ from the Fear of Death. O death! how many a sweet cup hast thou made bitter. O death! how many a revel hast thou broken up. O death! how many a gluttonous banquet hast thou spoiled. O death! how many a sinful pleasure hast thou turned into pain. Take ye, my friends, the telescope this morning, and look through the vista of a few years, and what see you? Grim death in the distance grasping his scythe. He is coming, coming, coming; and what is behind him? Ay, that depends upon your own character. If ye are the sons of God, there is the palm-branch; if ye are not, ye know what followeth death—Hell follows him. O death! thy spectre hath haunted many a house where sin otherwise would have rioted. O death! thy chilly hand hath touched many a heart that was big with lust, and made it start affrighted from its crime. Oh! how many men are slaves to the fear of death. Half the people in the world are afraid to die. There are some madmen who can march up to the cannon’s mouth; there are some fools who rush with bloody hands before their Maker’s tribunal; but most men fear to die. Who is the man that does not fear to die? I will tell you. The man that is a believer. Fear to die! Thank God, I do not. The cholera may come again next summer—I pray God it may not; but if it does, it matters not to me: I will toil and visit the sick by night and by day, until I drop, and if it takes me, sudden death is sudden glory. And so with the weakest saint in this hall; the prospect of dissolution does not make you tremble. Sometimes you fear, but oftener you rejoice. You sit down calmly and think of dying. What is death? It is a low porch through which you stoop to enter heaven. What is life? It is a narrow screen that separates us from glory, and death kindly removes it. I recollect a saying of a good old woman, who said, ‘Afraid to die, sir! I have dipped my foot in Jordan every morning before breakfast for the last fifty years, and do you think I am afraid to die now?’ Die! beloved: why we die hundred of times, we ‘die daily,’ we die every morning, we die each night when we sleep, by faith we die, and so dying will be old work when we come to it. We shall say, ‘Ah, death! you and I have been old acquaintances; I have had thee in my bedroom every night. I have talked with thee each day; I have had the skull upon my dressing table, and I have ofttimes thought of thee. Death! thou art come at last, but thou art a welcome guest—thou art an angel of light, and the best friend I have had.’ Why, then, dread death since there is no fear of God’s leaving you when you come to die! Here I must tell you that anecdote of the good Welch lady, who, when she lay a-dying, was visited by her minister. He said to her, ‘Sister are you sinking?’ She answered him not a word, but looked at him with an incredulous eye. He repeated the question, ‘Sister, are you sinking?’ She looked at him again, as if she could not believe that he would ask such a question. At last, rising a little in the bed, she said, ‘Sinking! Sinking! Did you ever know a sinner sink through a rock? If I had been standing on the sand, I might sink; but, thank God I am on the Rock of Ages, and there is no sinking there.’ How glorious to die! Oh, angels, come! Oh, cohorts of the Lord of hosts, stretch, stretch your broad wings and lift us up from earth; O, winged seraphs, bear us far above the reach of these inferior things; but till ye come, I’ll sing,

‘Since Jesus is mine, I’ll not fear undressing—
But gladly put off these garments of clay;
To die in the Lord is a covenant blessing,
Since Jesus to glory, through death lead the way.’

And now, dear friends, I have shown you as briefly as I can the negative side of this liberty. I have tried to tell you, as well as I could put it in a few words, what we are freed from. But there are two sides to such questions as this. There are some glorious things that we are free to. Not only are we freed from sin in every sense, from the law, and from the fear of death; but we are free to do something. I shall not occupy many moments, but shall just run over a few things we are free to; for, my brother Christians, ‘Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty;’ and that liberty gives us certain rights and privileges.
In the first place, we are free to heaven’s charter. There is heaven’s charter—the Magna Charta—the Bible; and, my brother, you are free to it. There is a choice passage here: ‘When thou passest through the river I will be with thee, and the floods shall not overflow thee:’ thou art free to that. Here is another: ‘Mountains may depart, and hills may be removed; but my lovingkindness shall not depart:’ you are free to that. Here is another: ‘Having loved his own, he loved them unto the end.’ You are free to that. ‘Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty.’ Here is a chapter touching election: you are free to that if you are elect. Here is another, speaking of the non-condemnation of the righteous, and their justification; you are free to that. You are free to all that is in the Bible. Here is a never-failing treasure filled with boundless stores of grace. It is the bank of heaven: you may draw from it as much as you please without let or hindrance. Bring nothing with you, except faith. Bring as much faith as you can get, and you are welcome to all that is in the Bible. There is not a promise, not a word in it, that is not yours. In the depths of tribulation let it comfort you. Mid waves of distress let it cheer you. When sorrows surround thee, let it be thy helper. This is thy father’s love-token: let it never be shut up and covered with dust. Thou art free to it—use, then, thy freedom.

Next, recollect that thou art free to the throne of grace. It is the privilege of Englishmen, that they can always send a petition to Parliament; and it is the privilege of a believer, that he can always send a petition to the throne of God. I am free to God’s throne. If I want to talk to God to-morrow morning, I can. If to-night I wish to have conversation with my Master, I can go to him. I have a right to go to his throne. It matters not how much I may have sinned. I go and ask for pardon. It signifies nothing how poor I am—I go and plead his promise that he will provide all things needful. I have a right to go to his throne at all times—in midnight’s darkest hour, or in noontide’s heat. Where’er I am; if fate command me to the utmost verge of the wide earth, I have still constant admission to his throne. Use that right, beloved—use that right. There is not one of you that lives up to his privilege. Many a gentleman will live beyond his income, spending more than he has coming in; but there is not a Christian that does that—I mean that lives up to his spiritual income. Oh, no! you have an infinite income—an income of promises—an income of grace; and no Christian ever lived up to his income. Some people say, ‘If I had more money I should have a larger house, and horses, and carriage, and so on.’ Very well and good; but I wish the Christian would do the same. I wish they would set up a larger house, and do greater things for God; look more happy, and take those tears away from their eyes.

‘Religion never was designed
To make our pleasures less.’

With such stores in the bank, and so much in hand, that God gives you, you have no right to be poor. Up! rejoice! rejoice! The Christian ought to live up to his income, and not below it.
Then, if you have the ‘Spirit of the Lord,’ dear friends, you have a right to enter into the city. There are many of the freemen of the City of London here, I dare say, and that is a great privilege, very likely. I am not a freeman of London, but I am a freeman of a better city.

‘Saviour, if of Zion’s city,
I, by grace, a member am,
Let the world revile or pity,
I will glory in thy name.’

You have a right to the freedom of Zion’s city, and you do not exercise it. I want to have a word with some of you. You are very good Christian people, but you have never joined the church yet. You know it is quite right, that he that believeth should be baptized; but I suppose you are afraid of being drowned, for you never come. Then the Lord’s table is spread once every month, and it is free to all God’s children, but you never approach it. Why is that? It is your banquet. I do not think if I were an alderman I should omit the city banquet; and being a Christian, I cannot omit the Christian banquet; it is the banquet of the saints.

‘Ne’er did angels taste above
Redeeming grace and dying love.’

Some of you never come to the Lord’s table; you neglect his ordinances. He says, ‘This do in remembrance of me.’ You have obtained the freedom of the city, but you won’t take it up. You have a right to enter in through the gates into the city, but you stand outside. Come in brother; I will give you my hand. Don’t remain outside the church any longer, for you have a right to come in.

Then, to conclude, you have the freedom of Jerusalem, the mother of us all. That is the best gift. We are free to heaven. When a Christian dies, he knows the open sesame that can open the gates of heaven, he knows the pass-word that can make the gates wide open fly; he has the white stone whereby he shall be known as a ransomed one, and that shall pass him at the barrier; he has the passport that shall let him into the dominions of Jehovah; he has liberty to ­enter into heaven. Methinks I see you, ye unconverted, in the land of shades, wandering up and down to find your portion. Ye come to the porch of heaven. It is great and lofty. The gate hath written o’er it, ‘The righteous only are admitted here.’ As ye stand, ye look for the porter. A tall archangel appeareth from above the gate, and ye say, ‘Angel, let me in.’ ‘Where is thy robe?’ Thou searchest, and thou hast none; thou hast only some few rags of thine own spinning, but no wedding garment. ‘Let me in,’ sayest thou, ‘for the fiends are after me to drag me to yonder pit. Oh, let me in.’ But with a quiet glance the angel lifteth up his finger and saith. ‘Read up there;’ and thou readest, ‘None but the righteous enter here.’ Then thou tremblest, thy knees knock together; thy hands shake. Were thy bones of brass they might melt, and were thy ribs of iron they might be dissolved Ah! there thou standest, shivering, quaking, trembling; but not long, for a voice which frights thee from thy feet and lays thee prostrate, cries, ‘Depart ye cursed into everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels.’ O dear hearers, shall that be your portion? My friends as I love you,—I do this morning and hope I ever shall,— shall this be your lot? Will you not have freedom to enter into the city? Will you not seek that Spirit which giveth liberty? Ah! I know ye will not have it if left to yourselves; some of you perhaps never will. O God, grant that that number may be but few, but may the number of the saved be great indeed!

‘Turn, then my soul unto thy rest
The ransom of thy great High Priest,
Hath set the captive free.
Trust to his efficacious blood
Nor fear thy banishment from God,
Since Jesus died for thee.’

Photo by Jonathan Mabey on Unsplash

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‘But we preach Christ crucified, unto the Jews a stumblingblock, and unto the Greeks foolishness; but unto them which are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God, and the wisdom of God.’ (1 Corinthians 1:23, 24)

WHAT contempt hath God poured upon the wisdom of this world! How hath he brought it to nought, and made it appear as nothing. He has allowed it to work out its own conclusions, and prove its own folly. Men boasted that they were wise; they said that they could find out God to perfection; and in order that their folly might be refuted once and for ever, God gave them the opportunity of so doing. He said ‘Worldly wisdom, I will try thee. Thou sayest that thou art mighty, that thine intellect is vast and comprehensive, that thine eye is keen, that thou canst unravel all secrets; now, behold, I try thee: I give thee one great problem to solve. Here is the universe; stars make its canopy, fields and flowers adorn it, and the floods roll over its surface; my name is written therein; the invisible things of God may be clearly seen in the things which are made. Philosophy, I give thee this problem—find me out. Here are my works—find me out. Discover in the wondrous world which I have made, the way to worship me acceptably. I give thee space enough to do it—there are data enough. Behold the clouds, the earth, and the stars. I give thee time enough; I will give thee four thousand years and I will not interfere; but thou shalt do as thou wilt with thine own world. I will give thee men in abundance, for I will make great minds and vast, whom thou shalt call lords of earth; thou shalt have orators, thou shalt have philosophers. Find me out, O reason, find me out, O wisdom; discover my nature, if thou canst: find me out unto perfection, if thou art able; and if thou canst not, then shut thy mouth for ever, and then I will teach thee that the wisdom of God is wiser than the wisdom of man; yea that the foolishness of God is wiser than men.’ And how did the reason of man work out the problem? How did wisdom perform her feat? Look upon the heathen nations; there you see the result of wisdom’s researches. In the time of Jesus Christ, you might have beheld the earth covered with the slime of pollution—a Sodom on a large scale, corrupt, filthy, depraved, indulging in vices which we dare not mention, revelling in lusts too abominable even for our imagination to dwell upon for a moment. We find the men prostrating themselves before blocks of wood and stone, adoring ten thousand gods more vicious than themselves. We find, in fact, that reason wrote out her own depravity with a finger covered with blood and filth, and that she for ever cut herself out from all her glory, by the vile deeds she did. She would not worship God. She would not bow down to him who is ‘clearly seen,’ but she worshipped any creature; the reptile that crawled, the crocodile, the viper, everything might be a god, but not, forsooth, the God of Heaven. Vice might be made into a ceremony, the greatest crime might be exalted into a religion; but true worship she knew nothing of. Poor reason! poor wisdom! how art thou fallen from heaven! Like Lucifer—thou son of the morning—thou art lost. Thou hast written out thy conclusion, but it is a conclusion of consummate folly. ‘After that in the wisdom of God the world by wisdom knew not God, it pleased God by the foolishness of preaching to save them that believe.’

Wisdom had had its time, and time enough; it had done its all, and that was little enough; it had made the world worse than it was before it stepped upon it, and now, says God, ‘Foolishness shall overcome wisdom; now ignorance, as ye call it, shall sweep away your science; now, humble, child-like faith, shall crumble to the dust all the colossal systems your hands have piled.’ He calls his army. Christ puts his trumpet to his mouth, and up come the warriors, clad in fisherman’s garb, with the brogue of the lake of Galilee—poor humble mariners. Here are the warriors, O wisdom! that are to confound thee; these are the heroes who shall overcome thy proud philosophers! these men are to plant their standard upon the ruined walls of thy strongholds, and bid them fall for ever; these men, and their successors, are to exalt a gospel in the world which ye may laugh at as absurd, which ye may sneer at as folly, but which shall be exalted above the hills, and shall be glorious even to the highest heavens. Since that day, God has always raised up successors of the apostles. I claim to be a successor of the apostles, not by any lineal descent, but because I have the same role and charter as any apostle, and am as much called to preach the gospel as Paul himself: if not as much owned in the conversion of sinners, yet in a measure, blessed of God; and, therefore, here I stand, foolish as Paul might be, foolish as Peter, or any of those fisherman, but still with the might of God I grasp the sword of truth—coming here to ‘preach Christ and him crucified, unto the Jews a stumbling block, and unto the Greeks foolishness; but unto them which are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God.’

Before I enter upon our text, let me very briefly tell you what I believe preaching Christ and him crucified is. My friends, I do not believe it is preaching Christ and him crucified, to give our people a batch of philosophy every Sunday morning and evening, and neglect the truth of this Holy Book. I do not believe it is preaching Christ and him crucified, to leave out the main cardinal doctrines of the Word of God, and preach a religion which is all a mist and a haze, without any definite truths whatever. I take it that man does not preach Christ and him crucified, who can get through a sermon without mentioning Christ’s name once; nor does that man preach Christ and him crucified who leaves out the Holy Spirit’s work, who never says a word about the Holy Ghost, so that indeed the hearers might say, ‘We do not so much as know whether there be a Holy Ghost.’ And I have my own private opinion that there is no such a thing as preaching Christ and him crucified, unless you preach what now-a-days is called Calvinism. I have my own ideas, and those I always state boldly. It is a nickname to call it Calvinism; Calvinism is the gospel, and nothing else. I do not believe we can preach the gospel, if we do not preach justification by faith, without works; nor unless we preach the sovereignty of God in his dispensation of grace; nor unless we exalt the electing, unchangeable, eternal, immutable, conquering, love of Jehovah; nor do I think we can preach the gospel, unless we base it upon the peculiar redemption which Christ made for his elect and chosen people; nor can I comprehend a gospel which lets saints fall away after they are called, and suffers the children of God to be burned in the fires of damnation after having believed. Such a gospel I abhor. The gospel of the Bible is not such a gospel as that. We preach Christ and him crucified in a different fashion, and to all gainsayers we reply, ‘We have not so learned Christ.’

There are three things in the text. First, a gospel rejected — ‘Christ crucified, to the Jews a stumblingblock, and to the Greeks foolishness;’ secondly, a gospel triumphant—‘unto those which are called, both Jews and Greeks;’ and thirdly, a gospel admired—it is to them who are called ‘the power of God, and the wisdom of God.’

First, we have here A GOSPEL REJECTED. One would have imagined that when God sent his gospel to men, all men would meekly listen, and humbly receive its truths. We should have thought that God’s ministers had but to proclaim that life is brought to light by the gospel, and that Christ is come to save sinners, and every ear would be attentive, every eye would be fixed, and every heart would be wide open to receive the truth. We should have said, judging favourably of our fellow-creatures, that there would not exist in the world a monster so vile, so depraved, so polluted, as to put so much as a stone in the way of the progress of truth; we could not have conceived such a thing; yet that conception is the truth. When the gospel was preached, instead of being accepted and admired, one universal hiss went up to heaven; men could not bear it; its first Preacher they dragged to the brow of the hill, and would have sent him down headlong: yea, they did more, they nailed him to the cross, and there they let him languish out his dying life in agony such as no man hath borne since. All his chosen ministers have been hated and abhorred by worldlings; instead of being listened to, they have been scoffed at; treated as if they were the offscouring of all things, and the very scum of mankind. Look at the holy men in the old times, how they were driven from city to city, persecuted, afflicted, tormented, stoned to death wherever the enemy had power to do so. Those friends of men, those real philanthropists, who came with hearts big with love, and hands full of mercy, and lips pregnant with celestial fire, and souls that burned with holy influence; those men were treated as if they were spies in the camp, as if they were deserters from the common cause of mankind; as if they were enemies, and not, as they truly were, the best of friends. Do not suppose, my friends, that men like the gospel any better now, than they did then. There is an idea that you are growing better. I do not believe it. You are growing worse. In many respects men may be better—outwardly better—but the heart within is still the same. The human heart of to-day dissected, would be just like the human heart a thousand years ago: the gall of bitterness within that breast of yours, is just as bitter as the gall of bitterness in that of Simon of old. We have in our hearts the same latent opposition to the truth of God; and hence we find men even as of old, who scorn the gospel.

I shall, in speaking of the gospel rejected, endeavour to point out the two classes of persons who equally despise the truth. The Jews make it a stumblingblock, and the Greeks account it foolishness. Now these two very respectable gentlemen—the Jew and the Greek—I am not going to make these ancient individuals the object of my condemnation, but I look upon them as members of a great parliament, representatives of a great constituency, and I shall attempt to show that if all the race of Jews were cut off, there would be still a great number in the world who would answer to the name of Jews, to whom Christ is a stumblingblock; and that if Greece were swallowed up by some earthquake, and ceased to be a nation, there would still be the Greek unto whom the gospel would be foolishness. I shall simply introduce the Jew and the Greek, and let them speak a moment to you, in order that you may see the gentlemen who represent you; the representative men; the persons who stand for many of you, who as yet are not called by divine grace.

The first is the Jew; to him the gospel is a stumblingblock. A respectable man the Jew was in his day; all formal religion was concentrated in his person; he went up to the temple very devoutly; he tithed all he had, even to the mint and the cummin. You would see him fasting twice in the week, with a face all marked with sadness and sorrow. If you looked at him, he had the law between his eyes; there was the phylactery, and the borders of his garments of amazing width, that he might never be supposed to be a Gentile dog; that no one might ever conceive that he was not a Hebrew of pure descent. He had a holy ancestry; he came of a pious family; a right good man was he. He could not endure those Sadducees at all, who had no religion. He was thoroughly a religious man; he stood up for his synagogue; he would not have that temple on Mount Gerizim; he could not bear the Samaritans, he had no dealings with them; he was a religionist of the first order, a man of the very finest kind; a specimen of a man who is a moralist, and who loves the ceremonies of the law. Accordingly, when he heard about Christ, he asked who Christ was. ‘The Son of a carpenter.’ ‘Ah!’ ‘The son of a carpenter, and his mother’s name was Mary, and his father’s name Joseph.’ ‘That of itself is presumption enough,’ said he, ‘positive proof, in fact, that he cannot be the Messiah. And what does he say?’ ‘Why he says, “Woe unto you, Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites.’’’ ‘That won’t do.’ ‘Moreover,’ he says, ‘‘It is not by the works of the flesh that any man can enter into the kingdom of heaven.’’’ The Jew tied a double knot in his phylactery at once; he thought he would have the borders of his garment made twice as broad. He bow to the Nazarene! No, no; and if so much as a disciple crossed the street, he thought the place polluted, and would not tread in his steps. Do you think he would give up his old father’s religion—the religion which came from Mount Sinai—that old religion that lay in the ark and the overshadowing cherubim? He give that up? not he. A vile impostor—that is all Christ was in his eyes. He thought so. ‘A stumblingblock to me! I cannot hear about it! I will not listen to it.’ Accordingly, he turned a deaf ear to all the Preacher’s eloquence and listened not at all. Farewell, old Jew. Thou sleepest with thy fathers, and thy generation is a wandering race, still walking the earth. Farewell, I have done with thee. Alas! poor wretch, that Christ who was thy stumblingblock, shall be thy Judge, and on thy head shall be that loud curse: ‘His blood be on us and on our children.’ But I am going to find out Mr. Jew here in Exeter Hall—persons who answer to his description—to whom Jesus Christ is a stumblingblock. Let me introduce you to yourselves, some of you. You were of a pious family too, were you not? Yes. And you have a religion which you love—you love it so far as the chrysalis of it goes, the outside, the covering, the husk. You would not have one rubric altered, nor one of those dear old arches taken down, nor the stained glass removed for all the world; and any man who should say a word against such things, you would set down as a heretic at once. Or, perhaps you do not go to such a place of worship, but you love some plain old meeting-house, where your forefathers worshipped, called a dissenting chapel. Ah! it is a beautiful plain place; you love it, you love its ordinances, you love its exterior; and if anyone spoke against the place, how vexed you would feel. You think that what they do there, they ought to do everywhere; in fact your church is a model one; the place where you go, is exactly the sort of place for everybody; and if I were to ask you why you hope to go to heaven, you would, perhaps, say, ‘Because I am a Baptist,’ or, ‘Because I am an Episcopalian,’ or whatever other sect you belong to. There is yourself; I know Jesus Christ will be to you a stumblingblock. If I come and tell you that all your going to the house of God is good for nothing; if I tell you that all those many times you have been singing and praying, all pass for nothing in the sight of God, because you are a hypocrite and a formalist. If I tell you that your heart is not right with God, and that unless it is so, all the external is good for nothing, I know what you will say—‘I shan’t hear that young man again.’ It is a stumblingblock. If you had stepped in anywhere where you had heard formalism exalted; if you had been told ‘this must you do, and this other must you do, and then you will be saved,’ you would highly approve of it. But how many are there externally religious, with whose characters you could find no fault, but who have never had the regenerating influence of the Holy Ghost; who never were made to lie prostrate on their face before Calvary’s cross; who never turned a wishful eye to yonder Saviour crucified; who never put their trust in him that was slain for the sons of men. They love a superficial religion, but when a man talks deeper than that, they set it down for cant. You may love all that is external about religion, just as you may love a man for his clothes—caring nothing for the man himself. If so, I know you are one of those who reject the gospel. You will hear me preach; and while I speak about the externals, you will hear me with attention; whilst I plead for morality, and argue against drunkenness, or show the heinousness of Sabbath-breaking, all well and good; but if once I say, ‘Except ye be converted, and become as little children, ye can in no wise enter into the kingdom of God;’ if once I tell you that you must be elected of God—that you must be purchased with the Saviour’s blood—that you must be converted by the Holy Ghost—you say, ‘He is a fanatic! Away with him, away with him! We do not want to hear that any more.’ Christ crucified, is to the Jew—the ceremonialist—a stumblingblock.

But there is another specimen of this Jew to be found. He is thoroughly orthodox in his sentiments. As for forms and ceremonies, he thinks nothing about them. He goes to a place of worship where he learns sound doctrine. He will hear nothing but what is true. He likes that we should have good works and morality. He is a good man, and no man can find fault with him. Here he is, regular in his Sunday pew. In the market he walks before men in all honesty—so you would imagine. Ask him about any doctrine, and he can give you a disquisition upon it. In fact, he could write a treatise upon anything in the Bible, and a great many things besides. He knows almost everything; and here, up in this dark attic of the head, his religion has taken up its abode; he has a best parlour down in his heart, but his religion never goes there—that is shut against it. He has money in there—mammon, worldliness; or he has something else—self-love, pride. Perhaps he loves to hear experimental preaching; he admires it all; in fact, he loves anything that is sound. But then he has not any sound in himself: or rather, it is all sound and there is no substance. He likes to hear true doctrine; but it never penetrates his inner man. You never see him weep. Preach to him about Christ crucified, a glorious subject, and you never see a tear roll down his cheek; tell him of the mighty influence of the Holy Ghost—he admires you for it, but he never had the hand of the Holy Spirit on his soul; tell him about communion with God, plunging into Godhead’s deepest sea, and being lost in its immensity—the man loves to hear, but he never experiences, he has never communed with Christ; and accordingly when once you begin to strike home, when you lay him on the table, take out your dissecting knife, begin to cut him up, and show him his own heart, let him see what it is by nature, and what it must become by grace—the man starts, he cannot stand that; he wants none of that—Christ received in the heart and accepted. Albeit, that he loves it enough in the head, ’tis to him a stumblingblock, and he casts it away. Do you see yourselves here, my friends? See yourselves as others see you? See yourselves as God sees you? For so it is, here be many to whom Christ is as much a stumblingblock now as ever he was. O ye formalists! I speak to you; O ye who have the nutshell, but abhor the kernel; O ye who like the trappings and the dress; but care not for that fair virgin who is clothed therewith: O ye who admire the paint and the tinsel, but abhor the solid gold, I speak to you; I ask you, does your religion give you solid comfort? Can you stare death in the face with it, and say, ‘I know that my Redeemer liveth?’ Can you close your eyes at night, singing as your vesper song—

‘I to the end must endure,

As sure as the earnest is given?’

Can you bless God for affliction; Can you plunge in accoutred as ye are, and swim through all the floods of trial? Can you march triumphant through the lion’s den, laugh at affliction, and bid defiance to hell? Can you? No! Your gospel is an effeminate thing; a thing of words and sounds, and not of power. Cast it from you, I beseech you: it is not worth your keeping; and when you come before the throne of God, you will find it will fail you, and fail you so that you shall never find another; for lost, ruined, destroyed, ye shall find that Christ who is now skandalon, ‘a stumblingblock,’ will be your Judge.

I have found out the Jew, and I have now to discover the Greek. He is a person of quite a different exterior to the Jew. As to the phylactery, to him it is all rubbish; and as to the broad-hemmed garment, he despises it. He does not care for the forms of religion; he has an intense aversion, in fact, to broad-brimmed hats, or to everything which looks like outward show. He appreciates eloquence; he admires a smart saying; he loves a quaint expression; he likes to read the last new book; he is a Greek, and to him the gospel is foolishness. The Greek is a gentleman found in most places now-a-days: manufactured sometimes in colleges, constantly made in schools, produced everywhere. He is on the exchange; in the market; he keeps a shop; rides in a carriage; he is a noble, a gentleman; he is everywhere; even in court. He is thoroughly wise. Ask him anything, and he knows it. Ask for a quotation from any of the old poets, or any one else, and he can give it you. If you are a Mahommedan, and plead the claims of your religion, he will hear you very patiently. But if you are a Christian, and talk to him of Jesus Christ, ‘Stop your cant,’ he says, ‘I don’t want to hear anything about that.’ This Grecian gentleman believes all philosophy except the true one; he studies all wisdom except the wisdom of God; he seeks all learning except spiritual learning; he loves everything except that which God approves; he likes everything which man makes, and nothing which comes from God; it is foolishness to him, confounded foolishness. You have only to discourse about one doctrine in the Bible, and he shuts his ears; he wishes no longer for your company; it is foolishness. I have met this gentleman a great many times. Once when I saw him, he told me he did not believe in any religion at all; and when I said I did, and had a hope that when I died I should go to heaven, he said he dared say it was very comfortable, but he did not believe in religion, and that he was sure it was best to live as nature dictated. Another time he spoke well of all religions, and believed they were very good in their place, and all true; and he had no doubt that if a man were sincere in any kind of religion, he would be all right at last. I told him I did not think so, and that I believed there was but one religion revealed of God—the religion of God’s elect, the religion which is the gift of Jesus. He then said I was a bigot, and wished me good morning. It was to him foolishness. He had nothing to do with me at all. He either liked no religion, or every religion. Another time I held him by the coat button, and I discussed with him a little about faith. He said, ‘It is all very well, I believe that is true Protestant doctrine.’ But presently I said something about election, and he said, ‘I don’t like that; many people have preached that and turned it to bad account.’ I then hinted something about free grace, but that he could not endure, it was to him foolishness. He was a polished Greek, and thought that if he were not chosen, he ought to be. He never liked that passage—‘God hath chosen the foolish things of this world to confound the wise, and the things which are not, to bring to nought things that are.’ He thought it was very discreditable to the Bible; and when the book was revised, he had no doubt it would be cut out. To such a man—for he is here this morning, very likely come to hear this reed shaken of the wind—I have to say this: Ah! thou wise man, full of worldly wisdom; thy wisdom will stand thee here, but what wilt thou do in the swellings of Jordan? Philosophy may do well for thee to lean upon whilst thou walkest through this world; but the river is deep, and thou wilt want something more than that. If thou hast not the arm of the Most High to hold thee up in the flood and cheer thee with promises, thou wilt sink, man; with all thy philosophy, thou wilt sink; with all thy learning, thou shalt sink, and be washed into that awful ocean of eternal torment, where thou shalt be for ever. Ah! Greeks, it may be foolishness to you, but ye shall see the Man your Judge, and then ye shall rue the day that e’er ye said that God’s gospel was foolishness.

Having spoken thus far upon the gospel rejected, I shall now briefly speak upon the GOSPEL TRIUMPHANT. ‘Unto us who are called, both Jews and Greeks, it is the power of God, and the wisdom of God.’ Yonder man rejects the gospel, despises grace, and laughs at it as a delusion. Here is another man who laughed at it too; but God will fetch him down upon his knees. Christ shall not die for nothing. The Holy Ghost shall not strive in vain. God hath said, ‘My word shall not return unto me void, but it shall accomplish that which I please, and it shall prosper in the thing whereto I sent it.’ ‘He shall see of the travail of his soul, and shall be abundantly satisfied.’ If one sinner is not saved, another shall be. The Jew and the Greek shall never depopulate heaven. The choirs of glory shall not lose a single songster by all the opposition of Jews and Greeks; for God hath said it; some shall be called; some shall be saved; some shall be rescued.

‘Perish the virtue, as it ought, abhorred,

And the fool with it, who insults his Lord.

The atonement a Redeemer’s love has wrought

Is not for you—the righteous need it not.

Seest thou yon harlot wooing all she meets,

The worn-out nuisance of the public streets,

Herself from morn to night, from night to morn,

Her own abhorrence, and as much your scorn:

The gracious shower, unlimited and free,

Shall fall on her when heaven denies it thee.

Of all that wisdom dictates, this the drift,

That man is dead in sin, and life a gift.’

If the righteous and good are not saved, if they reject the gospel, there are others who are to be called, others who shall be rescued, for Christ will not lose the merits of his agonies, or the purchase of his blood.

‘Unto us who are called.’ I received a note this week asking me to explain that word ‘called;’ because in one passage it says, ‘Many are called but few are chosen,’ while in another it appears that all who are called must be chosen. Now, let me observe that there are two calls. As my old friend John Bunyan says, ‘The hen has two calls, the common cluck, which she gives daily and hourly, and the special one which she means for her little chickens.’ So there is a general call, a call made to every man; every man hears it. Many are called by it; you are all called this morning in that sense; but very few are chosen. The other is a special call, the children’s call. You know how the bell sounds over the workshop to call the men to work—that is a general call. A father goes to the door and calls out, ‘John, it is dinner-time’—that is the special call. Many are called with the general call, but they are not chosen; the special call is for the children only, and that is what is meant in the text, ‘Unto us who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God.’ That call is always a special one. While I stand here and call men, nobody comes; while I preach to sinners universally, no good is done; it is like the sheet lightning you sometimes see on the summer’s evening, beautiful, grand, but who have ever heard of anything being struck by it? But the special call is the forked flash from heaven; it strikes somewhere, it is the arrow sent in between the joints of the harness. The call which saves, is like that of Jesus, when he said, ‘Mary,’ and she said unto him, ‘Rabboni.’ Do you know anything about that special call, my beloved? Did Jesus ever call you by name? Canst thou recollect the hour when he whispered thy name in thine ear, when he said, ‘Come to me?’ If so, you will grant the truth of what I am going to say next about it,—that it is an effectual call. There is no resisting it. When God calls with his special call, there is no standing out. Ah! I know I laughed at religion; I despised, I abhorred it; but that call! Oh! I would not come. But God said, ‘Thou shalt come. All that the Father giveth to me shall come.’ ‘Lord, I will not.’ ‘But thou shalt,’ said God. And I have gone up to God’s house sometimes almost with a resolution that I would not listen, but listen I must. Oh! how the word came into my soul! Was there a power of resistance? No; I was thrown down; each bone seemed to be broken; I was saved by effectual grace. I appeal to your experience, my friends. When God took you in hand, could you withstand him? You stood against your minister times enough. Sickness did not break you down; disease did not bring you to God’s feet; eloquence did not convince you; but when God put his hand to the work, ah! then what a change; like Saul, with his horses going to Damascus, that voice from heaven said, ‘I am Jesus whom thou persecutest. Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me?’ There was no going further then. That was an effectual call. Like that, again, which Jesus gave to Zaccheus, when he was up in the tree: stepping under the tree, he said, ‘Zaccheus, come down, to-day I must abide at thy house.’ Zaccheus was taken in the net; he heard his own name; the call sank into his soul; he could not stop up in the tree, for an Almighty impulse drew him down. And I could tell you some singular instances of persons going to the house of God and having their characters described, limned out to perfection, so that they have said, ‘He is painting me, he is painting me.’ Just as I might say to that young man here who stole his master’s gloves yesterday, that Jesus calls him to repentance. It may be that there is such a person here; and when the call comes to a peculiar character, it generally comes with a special power. God gives his ministers a brush, and shows them how to use it in painting life-like portraits, and thus the sinner hears the special call. I cannot give the special call; God alone can give it, and I leave it with him. Some must be called. Jew and Greek may laugh, but still there are some who are called, both Jews and Greeks.

Then to close up this second point, it is a great mercy that many a Jew has been made to drop his self-righteousness; many a legalist has been made to drop his legalism and come to Christ, many a Greek has bowed his genius at the throne of God’s gospel. We have a few such. As Cowper says:

‘We boast some rich ones whom the gospel sways,

And one who wears a coronet and prays;

Like gleamings of an olive tree they show,

Here and there one upon the topmost bough.’

III. Now we come to our third point, A GOSPEL ADMIRED; unto us who are called of God, it is the power of God, and the wisdom of God. Now, beloved, this must be a matter of pure experience between your souls and God. If you are called of God this morning, you will know it. I know there are times when a Christian has to say,

‘’Tis a point I long to know,

Oft it causes anxious thought;

Do I love the Lord or no?

Am I his, or am I not?’

But if a man never in his life knew himself to be a Christian, he never was a Christian. If he never had a moment of confidence, when he could say, ‘Now I know in whom I have believed,’ I think I do not utter a harsh thing when I say, that that man could not have been born again; for I do not understand how a man can be born again, and not know it; I do not understand how a man can be killed and then made alive again, and not know it; how a man can pass from death unto life, and not know it; how a man can be brought out of darkness into marvellous light without knowing it. I am sure I know it, when I shout out my old verse,

‘Now free from sin, I walk at large,

My Saviour’s blood’s my full discharge;

At his dear feet content I lay,

A sinner saved, and homage pay.’

There are moments when the eyes glisten with joy; and we can say, ‘We are persuaded, confident, certain.’ I do not wish to distress anyone who is under doubt. Often gloomy doubts will prevail; there are seasons when you fear you have not been called; when you doubt your interest in Christ. Ah! what a mercy it is that it is not your hold of Christ that saves you, but his hold of you! What a sweet fact that it is not how you grasp his hand, but his grasp of yours, that saves you. Yet I think you ought to know sometime or other, whether you are called of God. If so, you will follow me in the next part of my discourse which is a matter of pure experience; unto us who are saved, it is ‘Christ the power of God, and the wisdom of God.’

The gospel is to the true believer a thing of power. It is Christ the power of God. Ay, there is a power in God’s gospel beyond all description. Once, I, like Mazeppa, bound on the wild horse of my lust, bound hand and foot, incapable of resistance, was galloping on with hell’s wolves behind me, howling for my body and my soul, as their just and lawful prey. There came a mighty hand which stopped that wild horse, cut my bands, set me down, and brought me into liberty. Is there power, sir? Ay, there is power, and he who has felt it must acknowledge it. There was a time when I lived in the strong old castle of my sins, and rested in my works. There came a trumpeter to the door, and bade me open it. I with anger chid him from the porch, and said he never should enter. There came a goodly personage, with loving countenance; his hands were marked with scars, where nails were driven, and his feet had nail-prints too; he lifted up his cross, using it as a hammer; at the first blow the gate of my prejudice shook; at the second it trembled more; at the third down it fell, and in he came; and he said, ‘Arise, and stand upon thy feet, for I have loved thee with an everlasting love.’ A thing of power! Ah! it is a thing of power. I have felt it here, in this heart; I have the witness of the Spirit within, and know it is a thing of might, because it has conquered me; it has bowed me down.

‘His free grace alone, from the first to the last,

Hath won my affection, and held my soul fast.’

The gospel to the Christian is a thing of power. What is it that makes the young man devote himself as a missionary to the cause of God, to leave father and mother, and go into distant lands? It is a thing of power that does it—it is the gospel. What is it that constrains yonder minister, in the midst of the cholera, to climb up that creaking staircase, and stand by the bed of some dying creature who has that dire disease? It must be a thing of power which leads him to venture his life; it is love of the cross of Christ which bids him do it. What is that which enables one man to stand up before a multitude of his fellows, all unprepared it may be, but determined that he will speak nothing but Christ and him crucified? What is it that enables him to cry, like the war-horse of Job in battle, Aha! and move glorious in might? It is a thing of power that does it—it is Christ crucified. And what emboldens that timid female to walk down that dark lane in the wet evening, that she may go and sit beside the victim of a contagious fever? What strengthens her to go through that den of thieves, and pass by the profligate and profane? What influences her to enter into that charnel-house of death, and there sit down and whisper words of comfort? Does gold make her do it? They are too poor to give her gold. Does fame make her do it? She shall never be known, nor written among the mighty women of this earth. What makes her do it? Is it love of merit? No; she knows she has no desert before high heaven. What impels her to it? It is the power of the gospel on her heart; it is the cross of Christ; she loves it, and she therefore says—

‘Were the whole realm of nature mine.

That were a present far too small;

Love so amazing, so divine,

Demands my soul, my life, my all.’

But I behold another scene. A martyr is hurried to the stake; the halberd men are around him; the crowds are mocking, but he is marching steadily on. See, they bind him, with a chain around his middle, to the stake; they heap faggots all about him; the flame is lighted up; listen to his words: ‘Bless the Lord, O my soul, and all that is within me, bless his holy name.’ The flames are kindling round his legs; the fire is burning him even to the bone; see him lift up his hands, and say, ‘I know that my Redeemer liveth, and though the fire devour this body, yet in my flesh shall I see the Lord.’ Behold him clutch the stake, and kiss it as if he loved it, and hear him say, ‘For every chain of iron that man girdeth me with, God shall give me a chain of gold; for all these faggots, and this ignominy and shame, he shall increase the weight of my eternal glory.’ See, all the under parts of his body are consumed; still he lives in the torture; at last he bows himself, and the upper part of his body falls over; and as he falls you hear him say, ‘Into thy hands I commend my spirit.’ What wondrous magic was on him, sirs? What made that man strong? What helped him to bear that cruelty? What made him stand unmoved in the flames? It was the thing of power; it was the cross of Jesus crucified. For ‘unto us who are saved it is the power of God.’

But behold another scene far different. There is no crowd there; it a silent room. There is a poor pallet, a lonely bed: a physician standing by. There is a young girl; her face is blanched by consumption; long hath the worm eaten her cheek, and though sometimes the flush came, it was the death-flush of the deceitful destroyer. There she lieth, weak pale, wan, worn, dying: yet behold a smile upon her face, as if she had seen an angel. She speaketh, and there is music in her voice. Joan of Arc of old was not half so mighty as that girl. She is wrestling with dragons on her death-bed; but see her composure, and hear her dying sonnet:

‘Jesus! lover of my soul,

Let me to thy bosom fly,

While the billows near me roll,—

While the tempest still is high!

Hide me, O my Saviour! hide

Till the storm of life is past!

Safe into the haven guide;

Oh, receive my soul at last!’

And with a smile she shuts her eye on earth, and opens it in heaven. What enables her to die like that? It is the power of God unto salvation; it is the cross; it is Jesus crucified.

I have little time to discourse upon the other point, and be it far from me to weary you by a lengthened and prosy sermon, but we must glance at the other statement: Christ is, to the called ones, the wisdom of God, as well as the power of God. To a believer, the gospel is the perfection of wisdom, and if it appear not so to the ungodly, it is because of the perversion of judgment consequent on their depravity.

An idea has long possessed the public mind, that a religious man can scarcely be a wise man. It has been the custom to talk of infidels, atheists, and deists, as men of deep thought and comprehensive intellect; and to tremble for the Christian controversialist, as if he must surely fall by the hand of the enemy. But this is purely a mistake; for the gospel is the sum of wisdom; an epitome of knowledge; a treasure-house of truth; and a revelation of mysterious secrets. In it we see how justice and mercy may be married; here we behold inexorable law entirely satisfied, and sovereign love bearing away the sinner in triumph. Our meditation upon it enlarges the mind; and as it opens to our soul in successive flashes of glory, we stand astonished at the profound wisdom manifest in it. Ah, dear friends! if ye seek wisdom, ye shall see it displayed in all its greatness; not in the ­balancing of the clouds, nor the firmness of earth’s foundations; not in the measured march of the armies of the sky, nor in the perpetual motion of the waves of the sea; not in vegetation with all its fairy forms of beauty; nor in the animal with its marvellous tissue of nerve, and vein, and sinew; nor even in man, that last and loftiest work of the Creator. But turn aside and see this great sight!—an incarnate God upon the cross; a substitute atoning for mortal guilt; a sacrifice satisfying the vengeance of heaven; and delivering the rebellious sinner. Here is essential wisdom; enthroned, crowned, glorified. Admire ye men of earth, if ye be not blind; and ye, who glory in your learning, bend your heads in reverence, and own that all your skill could not have devised a gospel at once so just to God, so safe to man.

Remember, my friends, that while the gospel is in itself wisdom, it also confers wisdom on its students; she teaches young men wisdom and discretion, and gives understanding to the simple. A man who is a believing admirer and a hearty lover of the truth, as it is in Jesus, is in a right place to follow with advantage any other branch of science. I confess I have a shelf in my head for everything now. Whatever I read I know where to put it; whatever I learn I know where to stow it away. Once when I read books, I put all my knowledge together in glorious confusion; but ever since I have known Christ, I have put Christ in the centre as my sun, and each science revolves round it like a planet, while minor sciences are satellites to these planets. Christ is to me the wisdom of God. I can learn everything now. The science of Christ crucified is the most excellent of sciences, she is to me the wisdom of God. Oh, young man, build thy studio on Calvary! there raise thine observatory, and scan by faith the lofty things of nature. Take thee a hermit’s cell in the garden of Gethsemane, and lave thy brow with the waters of Siloa. Let the Bible be thy standard classic —thy last appeal in matters of contention. Let its light be thine illum­ination, and thou shalt become more wise than Plato; more truly learned than the seven sages of antiquity.

And now, my dear friends, solemnly and earnestly, as in the sight of God, I appeal to you. You are gathered here this morning, I know, from different motives; some of you have come from curiosity; others of you are my regular hearers; some have come from one place and some from another. What have you heard me say this morning? I have told you of two classes of persons who reject Christ; the religionist who has a religion of form and nothing else; and the man of the world, who calls our gospel foolishness. Now put your hand upon your heart and ask yourself this morning, ‘Am I one of these?’ If you are, then walk the earth in all your pride; then go as you came in; but know that for all this the Lord shall bring thee into judgment; know thou that thy joys and delights shall vanish like a dream, ‘and, like the baseless fabric of a vision,’ be swept away for ever. Know thou this, moreover, O man, that one day in the halls of Satan, down in hell, I perhaps may see thee amongst those myriad spirits who revolve for ever in a perpetual circle with their hands upon their hearts. If thine hand be transparent, and thy flesh transparent, I shall look through thy hand and flesh, and see thy heart within. And how shall I see it? Set in a case of fire—in a case of fire! And there thou shalt revolve for ever, with the worm gnawing within thy heart, which shall never die—a case of fire around thy never-dying, ever-tortured heart. Good God! let not these men still reject and despise Christ; but let this be the time when they shall be called.

To the rest of you who are called, I need say nothing. The longer you live, the more powerful will you find the gospel to be; the more deeply Christ-taught you are, the more you live under the constant influence of the Holy Spirit, the more you will know the gospel to be a thing of power, and the more also will you understand it to be a thing of wisdom. May every blessing rest upon you; and may God come up with us in the evening!

‘Let men or angels dig the mines

Where nature’s golden treasure shines;

Brought near the doctrine of the cross,

All nature’s gold appears but dross.

Should vile blasphemers with disdain

Pronounce the truths of Jesus vain,

We’ll meet the scandal and the shame.

And sing and triumph in his name.’

Photo by Alicia Quan on Unsplash

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‘A bruised reed shall he not break, and smoking flax shall he not quench, till he send forth judgment unto victory.’—
Matthew 12:20.

BABBLING fame ever loves to talk of one man or another. Some there be whose glory it trumpets forth, and whose honour it extols above the heavens. Some are her favourites, and their names are carved on marble, and heard in every land, and every clime. Fame is not an impartial judge; she has her favourites. Some men she extols, exalts, and almost deifies; others, whose virtues are far greater, and whose characters are more deserving of commendation, she passes by unheeded, and puts the finger of silence on her lips. You will generally find that those persons beloved by fame are men made of brass or iron, and cast in a rough mould. Fame caresseth Caesar, because he ruled the earth with a rod of iron. Fame loves Luther, because he boldly and manfully defied the Pope of Rome, and with knit brow dared laugh at the thunders of the Vatican. Fame admires Knox; for he was stern, and proved himself the bravest of the brave. Generally, you will find her choosing out the men of fire and mettle, who stood before their fellow-creatures fearless of them, men who were made of courage; who were consolidated lumps of fearlessness, and never knew what timidity might be. But you know there is another class of persons equally virtuous, and equally to be esteemed-perhaps even more so-whom fame entirely forgets. You do not hear her talk of the gentle-minded Melancthon—she says but little of him—yet he did as much, perhaps, in the Reformation, as even the mighty Luther. You do not hear fame talk much of the sweet and blessed Rutherford, and of the heavenly words that distilled from his lips; or of Archbishop Leighton, of whom it was said, that he was never out of temper in his life. She loves the rough granite peaks that defy the storm-cloud: she does not care for the more humble stone in the valley, on which the weary traveller resteth; she wants something bold and prominent; something that courts popularity; something that stands out before the world. She does not care for those who retreat in shade. Hence it is, my brethren, that the blessed Jesus, our adorable Master, has escaped fame. No one says much about Jesus, except his followers. We do not find his name written amongst the great and mighty men; though, in truth, he is the greatest, mightiest, holiest, purest, and best of men that ever lived; but because he was ‘Gentle Jesus, meek and mild,’ and was emphatically the man whose kingdom is not of this world, because he had nothing of the rough about him, but was all love; because his words were softer than butter, his utterances more gentle in their flow than oil; because never man spake so gently as this man; therefore he is neglected and forgotten. He did not come to be a conqueror with his sword, nor a Mohammed with his fiery eloquence, but he came to speak with a ‘still small voice,’ that melteth the rocky heart, that bindeth up the broken in spirit; and that continually saith, ‘Come unto me all ye that are weary and heavy laden;’ ‘Take my yoke upon you and learn of me, for I am meek and lowly of heart, and ye shall find rest unto your souls.’ Jesus Christ was all gentleness; and this is why he has not been extolled amongst men as otherwise he would have been. Beloved! our text is full of gentleness; it seems to have been steeped in love; and I hope I may be able to show you something of the immense sympathy and the mighty tenderness of Jesus, as I attempt to speak from it. There are three things to be noticed: first, mortal frailty; secondly, divine compassion; and thirdly, certain triumph—‘till he send forth judgment unto victory.’

I. First, we have before us a view of MORTAL FRAILTY—bruised reed and smoking flax—two very suggestive metaphors, and very full of meaning. If it were not too fanciful—and if it is I know you will excuse me—I should say that the bruised reed is an emblem of a sinner in the first stage of his conviction. The work of God’s Holy Spirit begins with bruising. In order to be saved, the fallow ground must be ploughed up, the hard heart must be broken, the rock must be split in sunder. An old divine says there is no going to heaven without passing hard by the gates of hell—without a great deal of soul-trouble and heart-exercise. I take it then that the bruised reed is a picture of the poor sinner when first God commences his operation upon the soul; he is a bruised reed, almost entirely broken and consumed, there is but little strength in him. The smoking flax I conceive to be a backsliding Christian; one who has been a burning and a shining light in his day, but by neglect of the means of grace, the withdrawal of God’s Spirit, and falling into sin, his light is almost gone out—not quite—it never can go out, for Christ saith, ‘I will not quench it;’ but it becomes like a lamp when ill supplied with oil—almost useless. It is not quite extinguished. It smokes—it was a useful lamp once, but now it has become as smoking flax. So I think these metaphors very likely describe the contrite sinner as a bruised reed, and the backsliding Christian as smoking flax. However, I shall not choose to make such a division as that, but I shall put both the metaphors together, and I hope we may fetch out a few thoughts from them.

And first, the encouragement offered in our text applies to weak ones. What in the world is weaker than the bruised reed, or the smoking flax? A reed that groweth in the fen or marsh, let but the wild duck light upon it, and it snaps; let but the foot of man brush against it and it is bruised and broken; every wind that comes howling across the river makes it shake to and fro, and well nigh tears it up by the roots. You can conceive of nothing more frail or brittle, or whose existence depends more upon circumstances than a bruised reed. Then look at smoking flax—what is it? It has a spark within it, it is true, but it is almost smothered, an infant’s breath might blow it out, or the tears of a maiden quench it in a moment; nothing has a more precarious existence than the little spark hidden in the smoking flax. Weak things, you see, are here described. Well, Christ say of them, ‘The smoking flax I will not quench; the bruised reed I will not break.’ Let me go in search of the weaklings. Ah! I shall not have to go far. There are many in this house of prayer this morning who are indeed weak. Some of God’s children, blessed be his name, are made strong to do mighty works for him. God hath his Samsons here and there who can pull up Gaza’s gates, and carry them to the top of the hill; he hath here and there his mighty Gideons, who can go to the camp of the Midianites, and overthrow their hosts; he hath his mighty men, who can go into the pit in winter, and slay the lions; but the majority of his people are a timid, weak race. They are like the starlings that are frightened at every passer by, a little fearful flock. If temptation comes, they fall before it; if trial comes, they are overwhelmed by it: their frail skiff is danced up and down by every wave; and when the wind comes, they are drifted along like a sea-bird on the crest of the billows; weak things, without strength, without force, without might, without power. Ah! dear friends, I know I have got hold of some of your hands now, and your hearts too; for you are saying, ‘Weak! Ah that I am. Full often I am constrained to say, I would, but cannot sing; I would, but cannot pray; I would, but cannot believe.’ You are saying that you cannot do anything; your best resolves are weak and vain; and when you cry, ‘My strength renew,’ you feel weaker than before. You are weak, are you? Bruised reeds and smoking flax? Blessed be God, this text is for you then. I am glad you can come in under the denomination of weak ones, for here is a promise that he will never break nor quench them, but will sustain and hold them up. I know there are some very strong people here—I mean strong in their own ideas. I often meet with persons who would not confess any such weakness as this. They are strong minds. They say, ‘Do you think that we go into sin, sir? Do you tell us that our hearts are corrupt? We do not believe any such thing; we are good, and pure, and upright; we have strength and might.’ To you I am not preaching this morning; to you I am saying nothing; but take heed—your strength is vanity, your power is a delusion, your might is a lie—for however much you may boast in what you can do, it shall pass away; when you come to the real contest with death, you shall find that you have no strength to grapple with it: when one of these days of strong temptation shall come, it will take hold of you, moral man, and down you will go; and the glorious livery of your morality will be so stained, that though you wash your hands in snow water, and make yourselves never so clean, you shall be so polluted that your own clothes shall abhor you. I think it is a blessed thing to be weak. The weak one is a sacred thing; the Holy Ghost has made him such. Can you say, ‘No strength have I?’ Then this text is for you.

Secondly, the things mentioned in our text are not only weak, but worthless things. I have heard of a man who would pick up a pin as he walked along the street, on the principle of economy; but I never yet heard of a man who would stop to pick up bruised reeds. They are not worth having. Who would care to have a bruised reed—a piece of rush lying on the ground? We all despise it as worthless. And smoking flax, what is the worth of that? It is an offensive and noxious thing, but the worth of it is nothing. No one would give the snap of a finger either for the bruised reed or smoking flax. Well, then, beloved, in our estimation there are many of us who are worthless things. There are some here, who, if they could weigh themselves in the scales of the sanctuary, and put their own hearts into the balance of conscience, would appear to be good for nothing—worthless, useless. There was a time when you thought yourselves to be the very best people in the world—when if any one had said that you had more than you deserved, you would have kicked at it, and said, ‘I believe I am as good as other people.’ You thought yourselves something wonderful—extremely worthy of God’s love and regard but you now feel yourselves to be worthless Sometimes you imagine God can hardly know where you are; you are such a despicable creature—so worthless—not worth his consideration. You can understand how he can look upon an animalcule in a drop of water, or upon a grain of dust in the sunbeam, or upon the insect of the summer evening; but you can hardly tell how he can think of you, you appear so worthless—a dead blank in the world, a useless thing. You say, ‘What good am I? I am doing nothing. As for a minister of the gospel, he is of some service, as for a deacon of the church, he is of some use; as for a Sabbath-school teacher, he is doing some good; but of what service am I?’ But you might ask the same question here. What is the use of a bruised reed? Can a man lean upon it? Can a man strengthen himself therewith? Shall it be a pillar in my house? Can you bind it up into the pipes of Pan, and make music come from a bruised reed? Ah! no; it is of no service. And of what use is smoking flax? the midnight traveller cannot be lighted by it; the student cannot read by the flame of it. It is of no use: men throw it into the fire and consume it. Ah! that is how you talk of yourselves. You are good for nothing, so are these things. But Christ will not throw you away because you are of no value. You do not know of what use you may be, and you cannot tell how Jesus Christ values you after all. There is a good woman there, a mother, perhaps, she says, “Well, I do not often go out—I keep house with my children, and seem to be doing no good.’ Mother, do not say so; your position is a high, lofty, responsible one, and in training up children for the Lord, you are doing as much for his name as yon eloquent Apollos, who so valiantly preached the word. And you, poor man, all you can do is to toil from morning till night, and earn just enough to enable you to live day by day; you have nothing to give away, and when you go to the Sabbath school, you can just read, you cannot teach much—well, but unto him to whom little is given of him little is required. Do you not know that there is such a thing as glorifying God by sweeping the street crossing? If two angels were sent down to earth, one to rule an empire, and the other to sweep a street, they would have no choice in the matter, so long as God ordered them. So God, in his providence, has called you to work hard for your daily bread; do it to his glory. ‘Whatsoever ye do, whether ye eat or drink, do all to his honour.’ But, ah! I know there are some of you here who seem useless to the Church. You do all you can; but when you have done it, it is nothing; you can neither help us with money, nor talents, nor time, and, therefore, you think God must cast you out. You think if you were like Paul or Peter you might be safe. Ah! beloved, talk not so; Jesus Christ saith he will not quench the useless flax, nor break the worthless bruised reed; he has something for the useless and for the worthless ones. But mark you, I do not say this to excuse laziness—to excuse those that can do, but do not; that is a very different thing. There is a whip for the ass, a scourge for idle men, and they must have it sometimes. I am speaking now of those who cannot do it; not of Issachar, who is like a strong ass, crouching down between two burdens, and too lazy to get up with them. I say nothing for the sluggard, who will not plough by reason of the cold; but of the men and women who really feel that they can be of little service—who cannot do more; and to such, the words of the text are applicable.

Now we will make another remark. The two things here mentioned are offensive things. A bruised reed is offensive, for I believe there is an allusion here to the pipes of Pan, which you all know are reeds put together, along which a man moves his mouth, thus causing some kind of music. This is the organ, I believe which Jubal invented, and which David mentions, for it is certain that the organ we use was not then in use. The bruised reed, then, would of course spoil the melody of all the pipes; one unsound tube would so let the air out, as to produce a discordant sound, or no sound at all, so that one’s impulse would be to take the pipe out and put in a fresh one. And, as for smoking flax, the wick of a candle or anything of that kind, I need not inform you that the smoke is offensive. To me no odour in all the world is so abominably offensive as smoking flax. But some say, ‘How can you speak in so low a style?’ I have not gone lower than I could go myself, nor lower than you can go with me; for I am sure you are, if God the Holy Ghost has really humbled you, just as offensive to your own souls, and just as offensive to God as a bruised reed would be among the pipes, or as smoking flax to the eyes and nose. I often think of dear old John Bunyan, when he said he wished God had made him a toad, or a frog, or a snake or anything rather than a man, for he felt he was so offensive. Oh; I can conceive a nest of vipers, and I think that they are obnoxious; I can imagine a pool of all kinds of loathsome creatures, breeding corruption, but there is nothing one half so worthy of abhorrence as the human heart. God spares from all eyes but his own that awful sight—a human heart; and could you and I but once see our heart, we should be driven mad, so horrible would be the sight. Do you feel like that? Do you feel that you must be offensive in God’s sight—that you have so rebelled against him, so turned away from his commandments, that surely you must be obnoxious to him? If so, my text is yours.

Now, I can imagine some woman here this morning who has departed from the paths of virtue, and, while she is standing in the throng up there, or sitting down she feels as if she had no right to tread these hallowed courts, and stand among God’s people. She thinks that God might almost make the chapel break down upon her to destroy her, she is so great a sinner. Never mind, broken reed and smoking flax! Though thou art the scorn of man, and loathsome to thyself, yet Jesus saith to thee, ‘Neither do I condemn thee, go, and sin no more, lest a worse thing come unto thee.’ There is some man here who hath something in his heart that I know not of—who may have committed crimes in secret, that we will not mention in public; his sins stick like a leech to him, and rob him of all comfort. Here you are young man, shaking and trembling, lest your crime should be divulged before high heaven; you are broken down, bruised like a reed, smoking like flax. Ah! I have a word for thee too. Comfort! comfort! comfort! Despair not; for Jesus saith he will not quench the smoking flax, he will not break the bruised reed.

And yet, my dear friends, there is one thought before I turn away from this point. Both of these articles, however worthless they may be, may yet be of some service. When God puts his hand to a man, if he were worthless and useless before, he can make him very valuable. You know the price of an article does not depend so much upon the value of the raw material as upon workmanship put upon it. Here is very bad raw material to begin with—bruised reeds and smoking flax, but by Divine workmanship both these things become of wondrous value. You tell me the bruised reed is good for nothing; I tell you that Christ will take that bruised reed and mend it up, and fit it in the pipes of heaven. Then when the grand orchestra shall send forth its music, when the organs of the skies shall peal forth their deep-toned sounds, we shall ask, ‘What was that sweet note heard there, mingling with the rest?’ And some one shall say, ‘It was a bruised reed.’ Ah! Mary Magdalene’s voice in heaven, I imagine, sounds more sweet and liquid than any other; and the voice of that poor thief, who said ‘Lord, remember me,’ if it is a deep bass voice, is more mellow and more sweet than the voice of any other, because he loved much, for he had much forgiven him. This reed may yet be of use. Do not say you are good for nothing; you shall sing up in heaven yet. Do not say you are worthless; at last you shall stand before the throne among the blood-washed company, and shall sing God’s praise. Ay! and the smoking flax too, what good can that be? I will soon tell you. There is a spark in that flax somewhere; it is nearly out, but still a spark remaineth. Behold the prairie on fire! See you the flames come rolling on? See you stream after stream of hot fire deluging the plain till all the continent is burnt and scorched—till heaven is reddened with the flame. Old night’s black face is scarred with the burning, and the stars appear affrighted at the conflagration. How was that mass ignited? By a piece of smoking flax dropped by some traveller, fanned by the soft wind, till the whole prairie caught the flame. So one poor man, one ignorant man, one weak man, even one backsliding man, may be the means of the conversion of a whole nation. Who knows but that you who are nothing now may be of more use than those of us who appear to stand better before God, because we have more gifts and talents? God can make a spark set a world on fire—he can light up a whole nation with the spark of one poor praying soul. You may be useful yet; therefore be of good cheer. Moss groweth upon gravestones; the ivy clingeth to the mouldering pile, the mistletoe groweth on the dead branch, and even so shall grace, and piety, and virtue, and holiness, and goodness, come from smoking flax and bruised reeds.

II. Thus, then, my dear friends, I have tried to find out the parties for whom this text is meant, and I have shown you somewhat of mortal frailty; now I mount; step higher—to DIVINE COMPASSION. ‘The bruised reed he will not break, the smoking flax he will not quench.’

Notice what is first of all stated, and then let me tell you that Jesus Christ means a great deal more than he says. First of all, what does he say? He says plainly enough that he will not break the bruised reed. There is a bruised reed before me—a poor child of God under a deep sense of sin. It seems as if the whip of the law would never stop. It keeps on, lash, lash, lash; and though you say, ‘Lord, stop it and give me a little respite,’ still comes down the cruel thong, lash, lash, lash. You feel your sins. Ah! I know what you are saying this morning: ‘If God continues this a little longer my heart will break: I shall perish in despair, I am almost distracted by my sin; if I lie down at night I cannot sleep; it appears as if ghosts were in the room—ghosts of my sins—and when I awake at midnight, I see the black form of death staring at me, and saying, ‘Thou art my prey, I shall have thee;’ while hell behind seems to burn. Ah! poor bruised reed, he will not break you, conviction shall be too strong, it shall be great enough to melt thee, and to make thee go to Jesu’s feet; but it shall not be strong enough to break thy heart altogether, so that thou shouldst die. Thou shalt never be driven to despair; but thou shalt be delivered; thou shalt come out of the fire, poor bruised reed, and shalt not be broken.

So there is a backslider here this morning, he is like the smoking flax. Years gone by you found such happiness in the ways of the Lord, and such delight in his service, that you said, ‘There I would for ever stay.

‘What peaceful hours I then enjoyed;

How sweet their memory still!

But they have left an aching void,

The world can never fill.’”

You are smoking, and you think God will put you out. If I were an Arminian, I should tell you that he would, but being a believer in the Bible, and nothing else, I tell you that he will not quench you. Though you are smoking, you shall not die. Whatever your crime has been, the Lord says, ‘Return ye backsliding children of men, for I will have mercy upon you.’ He will not cast thee away, poor Ephraim; only come back to him—he will not despise thee, though thou hast plunged thyself in the mire and dirt, though thou art covered from head to foot with filthiness; come back, poor prodigal, come back, come back! Thy father calls thee. Hearken poor backslider! Come at once to him whose arms are ready to receive thee.

It says he will not quench—he will not break. But there is more under cover than we see at first sight. When Jesus says he will not break, he means more than that; he means, ‘I will take that poor bruised reed; I will plant it hard by the rivers of waters, and (miracle of miracles) I will make it grow into a tree whose leaf shall not wither, I will water it every moment, I will watch it; there shall be heavenly fruits upon it, I will keep the birds of prey from it, but the birds of heaven, the sweet songsters of paradise shall make their dwellings in the branches.’ When he says that he will not break the bruised reed, he means more; he means that he will nourish, that he will help, and strengthen, and support, and glorify—that he will execute his commission on it, and make it glorious for ever. And when he says to the backslider that he will not quench him, he means more than that—he means that he will fan him up to a flame. Some of you, I dare say, have gone home from chapel and found that your fire had gone nearly out; I know how you deal with it, you blow gently at the single spark, if there is one, and least you should blow too hard, you hold your fingers before it, and if you were alone and had but one match, or one spark in the tinder, how gently would you blow it. So, backslider, Jesus Christ deals with thee; he does not put thee out; he blows gently; he says, ‘I will not quench thee;’ he means, ‘I will be very tender, very cautious, very careful;’ he will put on dry material, so that by-and-by a little spark shall come to a flame and blaze up towards heaven, and great shall be the fire thereof.

Now I want to say one or two things to Little-Faiths this morning. The little children of God who are here mentioned as being bruised reeds or smoking flax are just as safe as the great saints of God. I wish for a moment to expand this thought, and then I will finish with the other head. These saints of God who are called bruised reeds and smoking flax are just as safe as those who are mighty for their Master and great in strength, for several reasons. First of all, the little saint is just as much God’s elect as the great saint. When God chose his people, he chose them all at once, and altogether; and he elected one just as much as the other. If I choose a certain number of things, one may be less than the rest, but one is as much chosen as the other; and so Mrs. Fearing and Miss Despondency are just as much elected as Great-Heart, or Old Father Honest. Again: the little ones are redeemed equally with the great ones! the feeble saints cost Christ as much suffering as the strong ones; the tiniest child of God could not have been purchased with less than Jesus’ precious blood; and the greatest child of God did not cost him more. Paul did not cost any more than Benjamin—I am sure he did not—for I read in the Bible that ‘there is no difference.’ Besides, when of old they came to pay their redemption-money, every person brought a shekel. The poor shall bring no less, and the rich shall bring no more than just a shekel. The same price was paid for the one as the other. Now then little child of God, take that thought to thy soul. You see some men very prominent in Christ’s cause—and it is very good that they should be—but they did not cost Jesus a farthing more than you did; he paid the same price for you that he paid for them. Recollect again, you are just as much a child of God as the greatest saint. Some of you have five or six children. There is one child of yours, perhaps who is very tall and handsome, and has, moreover, gifts of mind; and you have another child who is the smallest of the family, perhaps has but little intellect and understanding. But which is the most your child? ‘The most!’ you say; ‘both alike are my children, certainly, one as much as the other.’ And so, dear friends, you may have very little learning, you may be very dark about divine things, you may but ‘see men as trees walking,’ but you are as much the children of God as those who have grown to the stature of men in Christ Jesus. Then remember, poor tried saint, that you are just as much justified as any other child of God. I know that I am completely justified.

‘His blood and righteousness

My beauty are, my glorious dress.’

I want no other garments, save Jesus’ doings, and his imputed righteousness.

The boldest child of God wants no more; and I who am ‘less than the least of all saints,’ can be content with no less, and I shall have no less. O Ready-to-Halt, thou art as much justified as Paul, Peter, John the Baptist, or the loftiest saint in heaven. There is no difference in that matter. Oh! take courage and rejoice.

Then one thing more. If you were lost, God’s honour would be as much tarnished as if the greatest one were lost. A queer thing I once read in an old book about God’s children and people being a part of Christ and in union with him. The writer says—‘A father sitteth in his room, and there cometh in a stranger; the stranger taketh up a child on his knee, and the child hath a sore finger; so he saith, ‘My child, you have a sore finger;” “Yes!” “Well, let me take it off, and give thee a golden one! The child looketh at him and saith, “I will not go to that man any more, for he talks of taking off my finger; I love my own finger, and I will not have a golden one instead of it.”’ So the saint saith, ‘I am one of the members of Christ, but I am like a sore finger, and he will take me off and put a golden one on.’ ‘No,’’ said Christ, ‘no, no;—I cannot have any of my members taken away; if the finger be a sore one, I will bind it up; I will strengthen it.’ Christ cannot allow a word about cutting his members off. If Christ lose one of his people, he would not be a whole Christ any longer. If the meanest of his children could be cast away, Christ would lack a part of his fullness; yea, Christ would be incomplete without his Church. If one of his children must be lost, it would be better that it should be a great one, than a little one. If a little one were lost, Satan would say, ‘Ah! you save the great ones, because they had strength and could help themselves; but the little one that has no strength, you could not save him.’ You know what Satan would say; but God would shut Satan’s mouth, by proclaiming, ‘They are all here, Satan, in spite of thy malice, they are all here; every one is safe; now lie down in thy den for ever, and be bound eternally in chains, and smoke in fire!’ So shall he suffer eternal torment, but not one child of God ever shall.

One thought more and I shall have done with this head. The salvation of great saints often depends upon the salvation of little ones. Do you understand that? You know that my salvation, or the salvation of any child of God, looking at second causes, very much depends upon the conversion of some one else. Suppose your mother is the means of your conversion, you would, speaking after the manner of men, say, that your conversion depended upon hers; for her being converted, made her the instrument of bringing you in. Suppose such-and-such a minister to be the means of your calling; then your conversion, in some sense, though not absolutely, depends upon his. So it often happens, that the salvation of God’s mightiest servants depends upon the conversion of little ones. There is a poor mother; no one ever knows anything about her; she goes to the house of God; her name is not in the newspapers, or anywhere else; she teaches her child and brings him up in the fear of God; she prays for that boy; she wrestles with God, and her tears and prayers mingle together. The boy grows up. What is he? A missionary—a William Knibb—a Moffat—a Williams. But you do not hear anything about the mother Ah! but if the mother had not been saved, where would the boy have been? Let this cheer the little ones; and may you rejoice that he will nourish and cherish you, though you are like bruised reeds and smoking flax.

III. Now, to finish up, there is a CERTAIN VICTORY. ‘Till he send forth judgment unto victory.’

Victory! There is something beautiful in that word. The death of Sir John Moore, in the Peninsular War, was very touching; he fell in the arms of triumph; and sad as was his fate, I doubt not that his eye was lit up with lustre by the shout of victory. So also, I suppose, that Wolfe spoke a truth when he said, ‘I die happy,’ having just before heard the shout, ‘they run, they run.’ I know victory even in that bad sense—for I look not upon earthly victories as of any value—must have cheered the warrior. But oh! how cheered the saint when he knows that victory is his! I shall fight during all my life, but I shall write ‘vici’ on my shield. I shall be ‘more than conqueror through him that loved me.’ Each feeble saint shall win the day; each man upon his crutches; each lame one; each one full of infirmity, sorrow, sickness, and weakness, shall gain the victory. ‘They shall come with singing unto Zion; as well the blind, and lame, and halt, and the woman with child together.’ So saith the Scripture. Not one shall be left out; but he shall ‘send forth judgment unto victory.’ Victory! victory! victory! This is the lot of each Christian; he shall triumph through his dear Redeemer’s name.

Now a word about this victory. I speak first to aged men and women. Dear brethren and sisters, you are often, I know, like the bruised reed. Coming events cast their shadows before them; and death casts the shadow of old age on you. You feel the grasshopper to be a burden; you feel full of weakness and decay; your frame can hardly hold together. Ah! you have here a special promise. ‘The bruised reed I will not break.’ ‘I will strengthen thee.’ ‘When thy heart and thy flesh faileth, I will be the strength of thy heart and thy portion for ever.’

‘Even down to old age, all my people shall prove

My sovereign, eternal, unchangeable love;

And when hoary hairs shall their temples adorn,

Like lambs they shall still in my bosom be borne.’

Tottering on thy staff, leaning, feeble, weak, and wan; fear not the last hour; that last hour shall be thy best; thy last day shall be a consummation devoutly to be wished. Weak as thou art, God will temper the trial to thy weakness; he will make thy pain less, if thy strength be less; but thou shalt sing in heaven, ‘Victory! victory! victory!’ There are some of us who could wish to change places with you, to be so near heaven—to be so near home. With all your infirmities, your grey hairs are a crown of glory to you; for you are near the end, as well as in the way of righteousness.

A word with you middle-aged men, battling in this life’s rough storm. You are often bruised reeds, your religion is so encumbered by your worldly callings, so covered up by the daily din of business, business, business, that you seem like smoking flax; it is as much as you can do to serve your God, and you cannot say that you are ‘fervent in spirit’ as well as ‘diligent in business.’ Man of business, toiling and striving in this world, he will not quench thee when thou art like smoking flax; he will not break thee when thou art like the bruised reed, but will deliver thee from thy troubles, thou shalt swim across the sea of life, and shalt stand on the happy shore of heaven, and shalt sing, ‘Victory’ through him that loved thee.

Ye youths and maidens! I speak to you, and have a right to do so. You and I ofttimes know what the bruised reed is, when the hand of God blights our fair hopes. We are full of giddiness and waywardness, it is only the rod of affliction that can bring folly out of us, for we have much of it in us. Slippery paths are the paths of youths, and dangerous ways are the ways of the young, but God will not break or destroy us. Men, by their over caution, bid us never tread a step lest we fall; but God bids us go, and makes our feet like hind’s feet, that we may tread upon high places. Serve God in early days; give your hearts to him, and then he will never cast you out, but will nourish and cherish you.

Let me not finish without saying a word to little children. You who have heard of Jesus, he says to you, ‘The bruised reed I will not break, the smoking flax I will not quench.’ I believe there is many a little prattler, not six years old, who knows the Saviour. I never despise infantile piety; I love it. I have heard little children talk of mysteries that grey-headed men knew not. Ah! little children who have been brought up in Sabbath-schools, and love the Saviour’s name, if others say you are too forward, do not fear, love Christ still.

Gentle Jesus, meek and mild,

Still will look upon a child;

Pity thy simplicity,

And suffer thee to come to him.

He will not cast thee away; for smoking flax he will not quench, and the bruised reed he will not break.

Photo by Marko Sun on Unsplash

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GOOD old Simeon called Jesus the consolation of Israel; and so he was. Before his actual appearance, his name was the Day-Star; cheering the darkness, and prophetic of the rising sun. To him they looked with the same hope which cheers the nightly watcher, when from the lonely castletop he sees the fairest of the stars, and hails her as the usher of the morn. When he was on earth, he must have been the consolation of all those who were privileged to be his companions. We can imagine how readily the disciples would run to Christ to tell him of their griefs, and how sweetly with that matchless intonation of his voice, he would speak to them and bid their fears be gone. Like children, they would consider him as their Father; and to him every want, every groan, every sorrow, every agony, would at once be carried, and he, like a wise physician, had a balm for every wound; he had mingled a cordial for their every care; and readily did he dispense some mighty remedy to allay all the fever of their troubles. Oh! it must have been sweet to have lived with Christ. Surely sorrows then were but joys in masks because they gave an opportunity to go to Jesus to have them removed. Oh! would to God, some of us may say, that we could have lain our weary heads upon the bosom of Jesus, and that our birth had been in that happy era, when we might have heard his kind voice, and seen his kind look, when he said ‘Let the weary ones come unto me.’

But now he was about to die. Great prophecies were to be fulfilled, and great purposes were to be answered; and therefore Jesus must go. It behoved him to suffer, that he might be made a propitiation for our sins. It behoved him to slumber in the dust awhile, that he might perfume the chamber of the grave to make it—

‘No more a charnel house to fence

The relics of lost innocence.’

It behoved him to have a resurrection, that we who shall one day be the dead in Christ, might rise first, and in glorious bodies stand upon earth. And it behoved him that he should ascend up on high, that he might lead captivity captive; that he might chain the fiends of hell; that he might lash them to his chariot wheels and drag them up high heaven’s hill, to make them feel a second overthrow from his right arm when he should dash them from the pinnacles of heaven down to deeper depths beneath. ‘It is right I should go away from you,’ said Jesus, ‘for if I go not away, the Comforter will not come.’ Jesus must go. Weep ye disciples. Jesus must be gone. Mourn ye poor ones who are to be left without a Comforter. But hear how kindly Jesus speaks: ‘I will not leave you comfortless, I will pray the Father, and he shall send you another Comforter, who shall be with you, and shall dwell in you for ever.’ He would not leave those few poor sheep lone in the wilderness; he would not desert his children and leave them fatherless. Albeit that he had a mighty mission which did fill his heart and hand; albeit that he had so much to perform that we might have thought that even his gigantic intellect would be overburdened; albeit he had so much to suffer, that we might suppose his whole soul to be concentrated upon the thought of the sufferings to be endured, yet it was not so; before he left, he gave soothing words of comfort; like the good Samaritan, he poured in oil and wine; and we see what he promised: ‘I will send you another Comforter—one who shall be just what I have been, yea even more; who shall console you in your sorrows, remove your doubts, comfort you in your afflictions, and stand as my vicar on earth, to do that which I would have done, had I tarried with you.’

Before I discourse of the Holy Ghost as the Comforter, I must make one or two remarks on the different translations of the word rendered ‘Comforter.’ The Flemish translation, which you are aware is adopted by Roman Catholics, has left the word untranslated, and gives it ‘Paraclete.’ ‘But the Paraclete which is the Holy Ghost, whom the Father will send in my name, he shall teach you all things.’ This is the original Greek word, and it has some other meanings besides ‘Comforter.’ Sometimes it means the monitor or instructor: ‘I will send you another monitor, another teacher.’ Frequently it means ‘Advocate;’ but the most common meaning of the word is that which we have here: ‘I will send you another Comforter.’ However, we cannot pass over those other two interpretations without saying something upon them.

‘I will send you another teacher.’ Jesus Christ had been the official teacher of his saints whilst on earth. They called no man Rabbi except Christ. They sat at no men’s feet to learn their doctrines; but they had them direct from the lips of him who ‘spake as never man spake.’ ‘And now,’ says he, ‘when I am gone, where shall you find the great infallible teacher? Shall I set you up a Pope at Rome, to whom you shall go, and who shall be your infallible oracle? Shall I give you the councils of the church to be held to decide all knotty points?’ Christ said no such thing. ‘I am the infallible paraclete or teacher, and when I am gone, I will send you another teacher and he shall be the person who is to explain Scripture; he shall be the authoritative oracle of God, who shall make all dark things light, who shall unravel mysteries, who shall untwist all knots of revelation, and shall make you understand what you could not discover, had it not been for his influence.’ And beloved, no man ever learns anything aright, unless he is taught of the Spirit. You may learn election, and you may know it so that you shall be damned by it, if you are not taught of the Holy Ghost; for I have known some who have learned election to their soul’s destruction; they have learned it, so that they said they were of the elect, whereas they had no marks, no evidences and no work of the Holy Ghost in their souls. There is a way of learning truth in Satan’s college, and holding it in licentiousness; but if so, it shall be to your souls as poison to your veins, and prove your everlasting ruin. No man can know Jesus Christ unless he is taught of God. There is no doctrine of the Bible which can be safely, thoroughly, and truly learned, except by the agency of the one authoritative teacher. Ah! tell me not of systems of divinity, tell me not of schemes of theology; tell me not of infallible commentators, or most learned and most arrogant doctors; but tell me of the Great Teacher, who shall instruct us, the sons of God, and shall make us wise to understand all things. He is the Teacher; it matters not what this or that man says; I rest on no man’s boasting authority, nor will you. Ye are not to be carried away with the craftiness of men, nor sleighs of words; this is the authoritative oracle, the Holy Ghost resting in the hearts of his children.

The other translation is advocate. Have you ever thought how the Holy Ghost can be said to be an advocate? You know Jesus Christ is called the wonderful, the counsellor, and mighty God; but how can the Holy Ghost be said to be an advocate? I suppose it is thus: he is an advocate on earth to plead against the enemies of the cross. How was it that Paul could so ably plead before Felix and Agrippa? How was it that the Apostles stood unawed before the magistrates and confessed their Lord? How has it come to pass that in all times God’s ministers have been made fearless as lions, and their brows have been firmer than brass, their hearts sterner than steel, and their words like the language of God? Why, it is simply for this reason, that it was not the man who pleaded, but it was God the Holy Ghost pleading through him. Have you never seen an earnest minister, with hands uplifted and eyes dropping tears, pleading with the sons of men? Have you never admired that portrait from the hand of old John Bunyan? A grave person with eyes uplifted to heaven, the best of books in his hand, the law of truth written on his lips, the world behind his back, standing as if he pleaded with men, and a crown of gold hanging over his head. Who gave that minister so blessed a manner and such goodly matter? Whence came his skill? Did he acquire it in the college? Did he learn it in the seminary? Ah! no; he learned it of the God of Jacob; he learned it of the Holy Ghost; for the Holy Ghost is the great counsellor who teaches us how to advocate his cause aright.

But, besides this, the Holy Ghost is the advocate in men’s hearts. Ah! I have known men reject a doctrine until the Holy Ghost began to illumine them. We who are the advocates of the truth are often very poor pleaders; we spoil our cause by the words we use; but it is a mercy that the brief is in the hand of a special pleader, who will advocate successfully and overcome the sinner’s opposition. Did you ever know him fail once? Brethen, I speak to your souls. Has not God in old times convinced you of sin? Did not the Holy Ghost come and prove that you were guilty, although no minister could ever get you out of your self-righteousness? Did he not advocate Christ’s righteousness? Did he not stand and tell you that your works were filthy rags? and when you had well-nigh still refused to listen to his voice, did he not fetch hell’s drum and make it sound about your ears, bidding you look through the vista of future years and see the throne set, and the books open, and the sword brandished, and hell burning, and fiends howling, and the damned shrieking for ever? and did he not thus convince you of the judgment to come? He is a mighty advocate when he pleads in the soul—of sin, of righteousness, and of the judgment to come. Blessed advocate! plead in my heart, plead with my conscience. When I sin, make conscience bold to tell me of it; when I err, make conscience speak at once; and when I turn aside to crooked ways, then advocate the cause of righteousness, and bid me sit down in confusion, knowing my guiltiness in the sight of God.

But there is yet another sense in which the Holy Ghost advocates, and that is, he advocates our cause with Jesus Christ, with groanings that cannot be uttered. O my soul, thou art ready to burst within me! O my heart, thou art swelled with grief; the hot tide of my emotion would well-nigh overflow the channels of my veins. I long to speak, but the very desire chains my tongue. I wish to pray, but the fervency of my feeling curbs my language. There is a groaning within that cannot be uttered. Do you know who can utter that groaning, who can understand it, and who can put it into heavenly language and utter it in a celestial tongue, so that Christ can hear it? Oh! yes; it is God the Holy Spirit; he advocates our cause with Christ and then Christ advocates it with his Father. He is the advocate, who maketh intercession for us, with groanings that cannot be uttered.

Having thus explained the Spirit’s office as teacher and advocate, we come now to the translation of our version—the Comforter; and here I shall have three divisions. First, the comforter; secondly, the comfort; and thirdly, the comforted.

I. First, then, the COMFORTER. Briefly let me run over in my mind and in your minds too, the characteristics of this glorious Comforter. Let me tell you some of the attributes of his comfort, so that you may understand how well adapted he is to your case.

And first, we will remark that God the Holy Ghost is a very loving Comforter. I am in distress and want consolation. Some passer-by hears of my sorrow, and he steps within, sits down and essays to cheer me; he speaks soothing words; but he loves me not, he is a stranger, he knows me not at all, he has only come in to try his skill; and what is the consequence? his words run over me like oil upon a slab of marble—they are like the pattering rain upon the rock; they do not break my grief; it stands unmoved as adamant, because he has no love for me. But let someone who loves me dearly as his own life come and plead with me, then truly his words are music; they taste like honey; he knows the pass-word of the doors of my heart, and my ear is attentive to every word, I catch the intonation of each syllable as it falls, for it is like the harmony of the harps of heaven. Oh! there is a voice in love, it speaks a language which is its own, it is an idiom and an accent which none can mimic; wisdom cannot imitate it, oratory cannot attain unto it; it is love alone which can reach the mourning heart; love is the only handkerchief which can wipe the mourner’s tears away. And is not the Holy Ghost a loving Comforter? Dost thou know, O saint, how much the Holy Spirit loves thee? Canst thou measure the love of the Spirit? Dost thou know how great is the affection of his soul towards thee? Go, measure heaven with thy span; go, weigh the mountains in the scales; go, take the ocean’s water, and tell each drop; go count the sand upon the sea’s wide shore, and when thou hast accomplished this, thou canst tell how much he loveth thee. He has loved thee long, he has loved thee well; he loved thee ever and he still shall love thee. Surely he is the person to comfort thee, because he loves. Admit him, then, to your heart, O Christian, that he may comfort you in your distress.

But next he is a faithful Comforter. Love sometimes proves unfaithful. ‘Oh! sharper than a serpent’s tooth is an unfaithful friend! Oh! far more bitter than the gall of bitterness, to have a friend to turn from me in my distress! Oh! woe of woes, to have one who loves me in my prosperity forsake me in the dark day of my trouble. Sad indeed but such is not God’s Spirit. He ever loves, and loves even to the end—a faithful Comforter. Child of God, you are in trouble. A little while ago you found him a sweet and loving Comforter; you obtained relief from him when others were but broken cisterns; he sheltered you in his bosom, and carried you in his arms. Oh, wherefore dost thou distrust him now? Away with thy fears! for he is a faithful Comforter. ‘Ah! but ‘thou sayest, ‘I fear I shall be sick and shall be deprived of his ordinances.’ Nevertheless, he shall visit thee on thy sick bed, and sit by thy side to give the consolation. ‘Ah! but I have distresses greater than you can conceive of, wave upon wave rolleth over me; deep calleth unto deep at the noise of the Eternal’s waterspouts.’ Nevertheless, he will be faithful to his promise. ‘Ah! but I have sinned.’ So thou hast, but sin cannot sever thee from his love; he loves thee still. Think not, O poor downcast child of God, because the scars of thine old sins have marred thy beauty, that he loves thee less because of that blemish. Oh, no! He loved thee when he foreknew thy sin; he loved thee with the knowledge of what the aggregate of thy wickedness would be; and he does not love the less now. Come to him in all boldness of faith; tell him thou hast grieved him, and he will forget thy wandering, and will receive thee again; the kisses of his love shall be bestowed upon thee, and the arms of his grace shall embrace thee. He is faithful: trust him; he will never deceive you; trust him; he will never leave you.

Again, he is an unwearied Comforter. I have sometimes tried to comfort persons that have been tried. You now and then meet with the case of a nervous person. You ask, ‘What is your trouble?’ You are told, and you essay, if possible, to remove it, but while you are preparing your artillery to batter the trouble, you find that it has shifted its quarters, and is occupying quite a different position. You change your argument and begin again; but lo, it is again gone, and you are bewildered. You feel like Hercules cutting off the ever-growing heads of the Hydra, and you give up your task in despair. You meet with persons whom it is impossible to comfort, reminding me of the man who locked himself up in fetters and threw the key away, so that nobody could unlock him. I have found some in the fetters of despair. ‘O, I am the man,’ say they, ‘that has seen affliction; pity me, pity me, O my friends;’ and the more you try to comfort such people, the worse they get; and therefore, out of all heart, we leave them to wander alone among the tombs of their former joys. But the Holy Ghost is never out of heart with those whom he wishes to comfort. He attempts to comfort us and we run away from the sweet cordial; he gives some sweet draught to cure us, and we will not drink it; he gives some wondrous potion to charm away all our troubles, and we put it away from us. Still he pursues us; and though we say that we will not be comforted, he says we shall be, and when he has said, he does it, he is not to be wearied by all our sins, not by all our murmurings.

And oh, how wise a Comforter is the Holy Ghost. Job had comforters, and I think he spoke the truth when he said, ‘Miserable comforters are ye all.’ But I dare say they esteemed themselves wise; and when the young man Elihu rose to speak, they thought he had a world of impudence. Were they not ‘grave and reverend seniors?’ Did not they comprehend his grief and sorrow? If they could not comfort him, who could? But they did not find out the cause. They thought he was not really a child of God, that he was self-righteous; and they gave him the wrong physic. It is a bad case when the doctor mistakes the disease and gives a wrong prescription, and so, perhaps, kills the patient. Sometimes, when we go and visit people we mistake their disease, we want to comfort them on this point, whereas they do not require any such comfort at all, and they would be better left alone than spoiled by such unwise comforters as we are. But oh! how wise the Holy Spirit is! he takes the soul, lays it on the table, and dissects it in a moment; he finds out the root of the matter, he sees where the complaint is, and then he applies the knife where something is required to be taken away, or puts a plaster where the sore is; and he never mistakes. Oh! how wise, the blessed Holy Ghost! from every comforter I turn and leave them all, for thou art he who alone givest the wisest consolation.

Then mark how safe a Comforter the Holy Ghost is. All comfort is not safe; mark that. There is a young man over there very melancholy. You know how he became so. He stepped into the house of God and heard a powerful preacher, and the word was blessed and convinced him of sin. When he went home, his father and the rest found there was something different about him, ‘Oh,’ they said, ‘John is mad; he is crazy,’ and what said his mother? ‘Send him into the country for a week, let him go to the ball or to the theater.’ John! Did you find any comfort there? ‘Ah no; they made me worse, for while I was there, I thought hell might open and swallow me up.’ Did you find any relief in the gaities of the world? ‘No,’ say you, ‘I thought it was idle waste of time.’ Alas! this is miserable comfort, but it is the comfort of the worldling; and when a Christian gets into distress, how many will recommend him this remedy and the other. ‘Go and hear Mr. So-and-so preach; have a few friends at your house; read such-and-such a consoling volume; and very likely it is the most unsafe advice in the world. The devil will sometimes come to men’s souls as a false comforter, and he will say to the soul, ‘What need is there to make all this ado about repentance? you are no worse than other people,’ and he will try to make the soul believe that what is presumption is the real assurance of the Holy Ghost; thus he deceives many by false comfort. Ah, there have been many, like infants, destroyed by elixirs given to lull them to sleep; many have been ruined by the cry of ‘peace, peace,’ when there is no peace, hearing gentle things when they ought to be stirred to the quick. Cleopatra’s asp was brought in a basket of flowers; and men’s ruin often lurks in fair and sweet speeches. But the Holy Ghost’s comfort is safe, and you may rest on it. Let him speak the word, and there is a reality about it; let him give the cup of consolation, and you may drink it to the bottom, for in its depths there are no dregs, nothing to intoxicate or ruin, it is all safe.

Moreover, the Holy Ghost is an active Comforter: he does not comfort by words, but by deeds. Some comfort by ‘Be ye warmed and be ye filled, giving nothing.’ But the Holy Ghost gives, he intercedes with Jesus; he gives us promises, he gives us grace, and so he comforts us. Mark again, he is always a successful Comforter; he never attempts what he cannot accomplish.

Then to close up, he is an ever-present Comforter, so that you never have to send for him. Your God is always near you, and when you need comfort in your distress, behold, the word is nigh thee, it is in thy mouth, and in thy heart; he is an ever-present help in time of trouble. I wish I had time to expand these thoughts; but I cannot.

II. The second thing is the COMFORT. Now there are some persons who make a great mistake about the influence of the Holy Spirit. A foolish man, who had fancy to preach in a certain pulpit, though in truth he was quite incapable of the duty, called upon the minister, and assured him solemnly that it had been revealed to him by the Holy Ghost, that he was to preach in his pulpit. ‘Very well,’ said the minister, ‘I suppose I must not doubt your assertion, but as it has not been revealed to me that I am to let you preach, you must go your way until it is.’ I have heard many fanatical persons say the Holy Spirit revealed this and that to them. Now that is very generally revealed nonsense. The Holy Ghost does not reveal anything fresh now. He brings old things to our remembrance. ‘He shall teach you all things, and bring all things to your remembrance whatsoever I have told you.’ The canon of revelation is closed; there is no more to be added. God does not give a fresh revelation, but he rivets the old one. When it has been forgotten, and laid in the dusty chamber of our memory, he fetches it out and cleans the picture, but does not paint a new one. There are no new doctrines, but the old ones are often revived. It is not, I say, by any new revelation that the Spirit comforts. He does so by telling us old things over again; he brings a fresh lamp to manifest the treasures hidden in Scripture; he unlocks the strong chests in which the truth had long lain, and he points to secret chambers filled with untold riches; but he comes no more, for enough is done. Believer! there is enough in the Bible for thee to live upon for ever. If thou shouldst outnumber the years of Methusaleh, there would be no need for a fresh revelation; if thou shouldst live till Christ should come upon the earth, there would be no necessity for the addition of a single word; if thou shouldst go down as deep as Jonah, or even descend as David said he did, into the belly of hell, still there would be enough in the Bible to comfort thee without a supplementary sentence. But Christ says, ‘He shall take of mine and shall show it unto you.’ Now let me just tell you briefly what it is the Holy Ghost tells us.

Ah! does he not whisper to the heart, ‘Saint, be of good cheer; there is one who died for thee; look to Calvary; behold his wounds; see the torrent gushing from his side; there is thy purchaser, and thou art secure. He loves thee with an everlasting love, and this chastisement is meant for thy good; each stroke is working thy healing; by the blueness of the wound thy soul is made better. ‘Whom he loveth he chasteneth, and scourgeth every son whom he receiveth.’ Doubt not his grace, because of thy tribulation, but believe that he loveth thee as much in seasons of trouble as in times of happiness.’ And then, moreover, he says, ‘What is all thy suffering compared with that of thy Lord’s or what, when weighed in the scales of Jesu’s agonies, is all thy distress?’ And especially at times does the Holy Ghost take back the veil of heaven, and lets the soul behold the glory of the upper world! then it is that the saint can say, ‘Oh, thou art a Comforter to me!’

‘Let cares like a wild deluge come,

And storms of sorrow fall;

May I but safely reach my home,

My God, my heaven, my all.’

Some of you could follow, were I to tell of manifestations of heaven. You too have left sun, moon, and stars, at your feet, while in your flight, outstripping the tardy lightning, you have seemed to enter the gates of pearl, and tread the golden streets, borne aloft on wings of the Spirit. But here we must not trust ourselves, lest, lost in reverie, we forget our theme.

III. And now thirdly, who are the COMFORTED persons! I like, you know at the end of my sermon to cry out ‘Divide! divide!’ There are two parties here—some who are the comforted, and others who are the comfortless ones—some who have received the consolation of the Holy Ghost, and some who have not. Now let us try and sift you, and see which is the chaff; and which is the wheat; and may God grant that some of the chaff may this night be transformed into his wheat.

You may say, ‘How am I to know whether I am a recipient of the comfort of the Holy Ghost?’ You may know it by one rule. If you have received one blessing from God, you will receive all other blessings too. Let me explain myself: If I could come here as an auctioneer, and sell the gospel off in lots, I should dispose of it all. If I could say here is justification through the blood of Christ, free, giving away, gratis; many a one would say, ‘I will have justification: give it me; I wish to be justified, I wish to be pardoned.’ Suppose I took sanctification, the giving up of all sin, a thorough change of heart, leaving off drunkenness and swearing, many would say, ‘I don’t want that; I should like to go to heaven, but I do not want that holiness; I should like to be saved at last, but I should like to have my drink still; I should like to enter glory, but then I must have an oath or two on the road.’ Nay, but sinner, if thou hast one blessing, thou shalt have all. God will never divide the gospel. He will not give justification to that man, and sanctification to another; pardon to one and holiness to another. No, it all goes together. Whom he calls, them he justifies; whom he justifies, them he sanctifies; and whom he sanctifies, them he also glorifies. Oh; if I could lay down nothing but the comforts of the gospel, ye would fly to them as flies do to honey. When ye come to be ill, ye send for the clergyman. Ah! you all want your minister then to come and give you consoling words. But if he be an honest man, he will not give some of you a particle of consolation. He will not commence pouring oil when the knife would be better. I want to make a man feel his sins before I dare tell him anything about Christ. I want to probe into his soul and make him feel that he is lost before I tell him anything about the purchased blessing. It is the ruin of many to tell them, ‘Now just believe on Christ, and that is all you have to do.’ If, instead of dying they get better, they rise up whitewashed hypocrites—that is all. I have heard of a city missionary who kept a record of two thousand persons who were supposed to be on their death-bed, but recovered, and whom he should have put down as converted persons had they died, and how many do you think lived a Christian life afterwards out of the two-thousand! Not two! Positively he could only find one who was found to live afterwards in the fear of God. Is it not horrible that when men and women come to die, they should cry, ‘Comfort, comfort?’ and that hence their friends conclude that they are children of God, while after all they have no right to consolation, but are intruders upon the enclosed grounds of the blessed God. O God! may these people ever be kept from having comfort when they have no right to it! Have you the other blessings? Have you had conviction of sin? Have you ever felt your guilt before God? Have your souls been humbled at Jesus’ feet? And have you been made to look to Calvary alone for – your refuge? If not, you have no right to consolation. Do not take an atom of it. The Spirit is a Convincer before he is a Comforter; and you must have the other operations of the Holy Spirit before you can derive anything from this.

And now I have done. You have heard what this babbler hath said once more. What has it been? Something about the Comforter. But let me ask you, before you go, what do you know about the Comforter? Each one of you before descending the steps of this chapel, let this solemn question thrill through your souls—What do you know of the Comforter? Oh! poor souls, if ye know not the Comforter, I will tell you what you shall know—You shall know the Judge! If ye know not the Comforter on earth, ye shall know the Condemner in the next world, who shall cry, ‘Depart ye cursed into everlasting fire in hell.’ Well might Whitefield call out, ‘O earth, earth, earth, hear the Word of the Lord! ‘If we were to live here for ever, ye might slight the gospel; if ye had a lease of your lives, ye might despise the Comforter. But sirs, ye must die. Since last we met together, probably some have gone to their long last home; and ere we meet again in this sanctuary, some here will be amongst the glorified above, or amongst the damned below. Which will it be? Let your soul answer. If to-night you fell down dead in your pews, or where you are standing in the gallery, where would you be? in heaven or in hell? Ah! deceive not yourselves; let conscience have its perfect work; and if, in the sight of God, you are obliged to say, ‘I tremble and fear lest my portion should be with unbelievers,’ listen one moment, and then I have done with thee. ‘He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved, and he that believeth not shall be damned.’ Weary sinner, hellish sinner, thou who art the devil’s castaway, reprobate, profligate, harlot, robber, thief, adulterer, fornicator, drunkard, swearer, Sabbath-breaker—list! I speak to thee as well as the rest. I exempt no man. God hath said there is no exemption here. ‘Whosoever believeth in the name of Jesus Christ shall be saved.’ Sin is no barrier: thy guilt is no obstacle. Whosoever—though he were as black as Satan, though he were filthy as a fiend—whosoever this night believes, shall have every sin forgiven, shall have every crime effaced, shall have every iniquity blotted out; shall be saved in the Lord Jesus Christ, and shall stand in heaven safe and secure. That is the glorious gospel. God apply it home to your hearts, and give you faith in Jesus!

‘We have listened to the preacher—

Truth by him has now been shown;

But we want a GREATER TEACHER,

From the everlasting throne:

APPLICATION

Is the work of God alone.’

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‘And I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you forever; even the Spirit of truth; whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth him not, neither knoweth him: but ye know him; for he dwelleth with you, and shall be in you.’—John 14:16, 17.

YOU will be surprised to hear me announce that I do not intend this morning to say anything about the Holy Spirit as the Comforter. I propose to reserve that for a special Sermon this evening.[1] In this discourse I shall endeavour to explain and enforce certain other doctrines which I believe are plainly taught in this text and which I hope God the Holy Ghost may make profitable to our souls. Old John Newton once said that there were some books which he could not read, they were good and sound enough; but, said he, ‘they are books of halfpence;—you have to take so much in quantity before you have any value; there are other books of silver, and others of gold, but I have one book that is a book of bank notes; and every leaf is a bank note of immense value.’ So I found with this text: that I had a bank note of so large a sum, that I could not tell it out all this morning. I should have to keep you several hours, before I could unfold to you the whole value of this precious promise—one of the last which Christ gave to his people.

I invite your attention to this passage, because we shall find in it some instruction on four points, first, concerning the true and proper personality of the Holy Ghost; secondly, concerning the united agency of the glorious Three Persons in the work of our salvation; thirdly, we shall find something to establish the doctrine of the indwelling of the Holy Ghost in the souls of all believers; and fourthly, we shall find out the reason why the carnal mind rejects the Holy Ghost.

1. First of all, we shall have some little instruction concerning the proper PERSONALITY OF THE HOLY SPIRIT. We are so much accustomed to talk about the influence of the Holy Ghost, and his sacred operations and graces, that we are apt to forget that the Holy Spirit is truly and actually a person—that he is a subsistence—an existence; or as we Trinitarians usually say, one person in the essence of the Godhead. I am afraid that, though we do not know it, we have acquired the habit of regarding the Holy Ghost as an emanation flowing from the Father and the Son, but not as being actually a person himself. I know it is not easy to carry about in our mind the idea of the Holy Spirit as a person. I can think of the Father as a person, because his acts are such as I can understand. I see him hang the world in ether; I behold him swaddling a new-born sea in bands of darkness; I know it is he who formed the drops of hail, who leadeth forth the stars by their hosts, and calleth them by their name, I can conceive of Him as a person, because I behold his operations. I can realize Jesus, the Son of Man, as a real person, because he is bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh. It takes no great stretch of my imagination to picture the babe in Bethlehem, or to behold the ‘Men of sorrows and acquainted with grief;’ of the King of martyrs, as he was persecuted in Pilate’s hall, or nailed to the accursed tree for our sins. Nor do I find it difficult at times to realize the person of my Jesus sitting on his throne in heaven; or girt with clouds and wearing the diadem of all creation, calling the earth to judgment, and summoning us to hear our final sentence. But when I come to deal with the Holy Ghost, his operations are so mysterious, his doings are so secret, his acts are so removed from everything that is of sense, and of the body, that I cannot so easily get the idea of his being a person; but a person he is. God the Holy Ghost is not an influence, an emanation, a stream of something flowing from the Father, but he is as much an actual person as either God the Son, or God the Father. I shall attempt this morning a little to establish the doctrine, and to show you the truth of it—that God the Holy Spirit is actually a person.

The first proof we shall gather from the pool of holy baptism. Let me take you down, as I have taken others, into the pool, now concealed, but which I wish were always open to your view. Let me take you to the baptismal font, where believers put on the name of the Lord Jesus, and you shall hear me pronounce the solemn words, ‘I baptize thee in the name,’—mark, ‘in the name,’ not names,— ‘of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost.’ Every one who is baptized according to the true form laid down in Scripture, must be a Trinitarian: otherwise his baptism is a farce and a lie, and he himself is found a deceiver and a hypocrite before God. As the Father is mentioned, and as the Son is mentioned, so is the Holy Ghost, and the whole is summed up as being a Trinity in unity, by its being said, not the names, but the ‘name’ the glorious name, the Jehovah name, ‘of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost.’ Let me remind you that the same thing occurs each time you are dismissed from this house of prayer. In pronouncing the solemn closing benediction, we invoke on your behalf the love of Jesus Christ, the grace of the Father, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit, and thus, according to the apostolic manner, we make a manifest distinction between the persons showing that we believe the Father to be a person, the Son to be a person, and the Holy Ghost to be a person. Were there no other proofs in Scripture, I think these would be sufficient for every sensible man. He would see that if the Holy Spirit were a mere influence, he would not be mentioned in conjunction with two whom we all confess to be actual and proper persons.

A second argument arises from the fact, that the Holy Ghost has actually made different appearances on earth. The Great Spirit has manifested himself to man; he has put on a form, so that whilst he has not been beheld by mortal men, he has been so veiled in appearance that he was seen, so far as that appearance was concerned, by the eyes of all beholders. See you Jesus Christ our Saviour? There is the river Jordan, with its shelving banks, and its willows weeping at its stale. Jesus Christ, the Son of God, descends into the stream, and the holy Baptist, John, plunges him into the waves. The doors of heaven are opened; a miraculous appearance presents itself, a bright light shineth from the sky, brighter than the sun in all its grandeur, and down in a flood of glory descends something which you recognize to be a dove. It rests on Jesus—it sits upon his sacred head, and as the old painters put a halo round the brow of Jesus, so did the Holy Ghost shed a resplendence around the face of him who came to fulfil all Righteousness, and therefore commenced with the ordinances of baptism. The Holy Ghost was seen as a dove, to mark his purity and his gentleness, and he came down like a dove from heaven to show that it is from heaven alone that he descendeth. Nor is this the only time when the Holy Ghost has been manifest in a visible shape. You notice that company of disciples gathered together in an upper room, they are waiting for some promised blessing, by-and-by it shall come. Hark! there is a sound as of a rushing mighty wind, it fills all the house where they are sitting, and astonished, they look around them, wondering what will come next. Soon a bright light appears, shining upon the heads of each: cloven tongues of fire sat upon them. What were these marvellous appearances of wind and flame but a display of the Holy Ghost in his proper person? I say the fact of an appearance manifests that he must be a person. An influence could not appear—an attribute could not appear: we cannot see attributes—we cannot behold influences. The Holy Ghost must then have been a person; since he was beheld by mortal eyes, and came under the cognizance of mortal sense.

Another proof is from the fact, that personal qualities are, in Scripture, ascribed to the Holy Ghost. First, let me read to you a text in which the Holy Ghost is spoken of as having understanding. In the 1st Epistle to the Corinthians, chap 2, you will read, ‘But as it is written, eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither hath it entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him. But God hath revealed them unto us by his Spirit: for the Spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God. For what man knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit of man which is in him? Even so the things of God knoweth no man, but the Spirit of God.’ Here you see an understanding—a power of knowledge is ascribed to the Holy Ghost. Now, if there be any persons here whose minds are of so preposterous a complexion that they would ascribe one attribute to another, and would speak of a mere influence having understanding, then I give up all the argument. But I believe every rational man will admit, that when anything is spoken of as having an understanding it must be an existence—it must, in fact, be a person. In the 12th chap., 11th verse of the same Epistle, you will find a will ascribed to the Holy Spirit. ‘But all these worketh that one and the self same Spirit, dividing to every man severally as he will.’ So it is plain the Spirit has a will. He does not come from God simply at God’s will, but he has a will of his own, which is always in keeping with the will of the infinite Jehovah, but is, nevertheless, distinct and separate; therefore, I say he is a person. In another text power is ascribed to the Holy Ghost, and power is a thing which can only be ascribed to an existence. In Romans 15:13, it is written, ‘Now the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, that ye may abound in hope through the power of the Holy Ghost.’ I need not insist upon it, because it is self-evident, that wherever you find understanding, will, and power, you must also find an existence; it cannot be a mere attribute, it cannot be a metaphor, it cannot be a personified influence; but it must be a person.

But I have a proof which, perhaps, will be more telling upon you than any other. Acts and deeds are ascribed to the Holy Ghost; therefore he must be a person. You read in the first chapter of the Book of Genesis, that the Spirit brooded over the surface of the earth, when it was as yet all disorder and confusion. This world was once a mass of chaotic matter; there was no order; it was like the valley of darkness and of the shadow of death. God the Holy Ghost spread his wings over it; he sowed the seeds of life in it; the germs from which all beings sprang were implanted by him; he impregnated the earth so that it became capable of life. Now it must have been a person who brought order out of confusion; it must have been an existence who hovered over this world and made it what it now is. But do we not read in Scripture something more of the Holy Ghost? Yes, we are told that ‘holy men of old spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost.’ When Moses penned the Pentateuch, the Holy Ghost moved his hand, when David wrote the Psalms, and discoursed sweet music on his harp, it was the Holy Spirit that gave his fingers their Seraphic motion; when Solomon dropped from his lips the words of the Proverbs of wisdom, or when he hymned the Canticles of love it was the Holy Ghost who gave him words of knowledge and hymns of rapture. Ah! and what fire was that which touched the lips of the eloquent Isaiah? What hand was that which came upon Daniel? What might was that which made Jeremiah so plaintive in his grief? or what was that which winged Ezekiel, and made him like an eagle, soar into mysteries aloft, and see the mighty unknown beyond our reach? Who was it that made Amos, the herdsman, a prophet? Who taught the rough Haggai to pronounce his thundering sentences? Who showed Habbakuk the horses of Jehovah marching through the waters? or who kindled the burning eloquence of Nahum? Who caused Malachi to close up the book with the muttering of the word curse? Who was in each of these, save the Holy Ghost? And must it not have been a person who spake in and through these ancient witnesses? We must believe it. We cannot avoid believing it, when we recall that ‘holy men of old spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost.’

And when has the Holy Ghost ceased to have an influence upon men? We find that still he deals with his ministers and with all his saints. Turn to the Acts, and you will find that the Holy Ghost said, ‘Separate me Paul and Barnabas for the work.’ I never heard of an attribute saying such a thing. The Holy Spirit said to Peter, ‘Go to the centurion, and what I have cleansed, that call not thou common’. The Holy Ghost caught away Philip after he had baptised the eunuch, and carried him to another place; and the Holy Ghost said to Paul, ‘Thou shalt not go into that city, but shalt turn into another.’ And we know that the Holy Ghost was lied unto by Ananias and Sapphira, when it was said, ‘Thou hast not lied unto man, but unto God.’ Again, that power which we feel every day who are called to preach—that wondrous spell which makes our lips so potent—that power which gives us thoughts which are like birds from a far-off region, not the natives of our soul—that influence which I sometimes strangely feel, which, if it does not give me poetry and eloquence, gives me a might I never felt before, and lifts me above my fellow-man—that majesty with which he clothes his ministers, till in the midst of the battle they cry, aha! like the war-horse of Job, and move themselves like leviathans in the water—that power which gives us might over men, and causes them to sit and listen as if their ears were chained, as if they were entranced by the power of some magician’s wand—that power must come from a person, it must come from the Holy Ghost.

But is it not said in Scripture, and do we not feel it, dear brethren, that it is the Holy Ghost who regenerates the soul? It is the Holy Ghost who quickens us. ‘You hath he quickened who were dead in trespasses and sins.’ It is the Holy Spirit who imparts the first germ of life, convincing us of sin, of righteousness, and of judgment to come. And is it not the Holy Spirit who after that flame is kindled, still fans it with the breath of his mouth and keeps it alive? Its author is its preserver. Oh! can it be said that it is the Holy Ghost who strives in men’s souls, that it is the Holy Ghost who brings them to the foot of Sinai, and then guides them into the sweet place that is called Calvary—can it be said that he does all these things, and yet is not a person? It may be said, but it must be said by fools; for he never can be a wise man who can consider that these things can be done by any other than a glorious person—a divine existence.

Allow me to give you one more proof, and I shall have done. Certain feelings are ascribed to the Holy Ghost, which can only be understood upon the supposition that he is actually a person. In the 4th chapter of Ephesians, verse 30th, it is said that the Holy Ghost can be grieved: ‘Grieve not the Holy Spirit of God, whereby ye are sealed unto the day of redemption.’ In Isaiah, chap. 63:5-10 it is said that the Holy Ghost can be vexed: ‘But they rebelled, and vexed his Holy Spirit, therefore he was turned to be their enemy, and he fought against them.’ In Acts, chap. 7:51, you read that the Holy Ghost can be resisted: ‘Ye stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears, ye do always resist the Holy Ghost; as your fathers did, so do ye.’ And in the 5th chapter, 9th verse of the same book, you will find that the Holy Ghost may be tempted. We are there informed that Peter said to Ananias and Sapphira, ‘How is it that ye have agreed together to tempt the Spirit of the Lord?’ Now, these things could not be emotions which might be ascribed to a quality or an emanation they must be understood to relate to a person; an influence could not be grieved; it must be a person who can be grieved, vexed, or resisted.

And now, dear brethren, I think I have fully established the point of the personality of the Holy Ghost; allow me now, most earnestly, to impress upon you the absolute necessity of being sound unto the doctrine of the Trinity. I knew a man, a good minister of Jesus Christ he is now, and I believe he was before he turned aside unto heresy—he began to doubt the glorious divinity of our blessed Lord, and for years did he preach the heterodox doctrine, until one day he happened to hear a very eccentric old minister preaching from the text, ‘But there the glorious Lord shall be unto us a place of broad rivers and streams, wherein shall go no galley with oars, neither shall gallant ship pass thereby. Thy tacklings are loosed: they could not well strengthen their mast, they could not spread the sail.’ ‘Now,’ said the old minister, ‘you give up the Trinity, and your tacklings are loosed, you cannot strengthen your masts. Once give up the doctrine of three persons, and your tacklings are all gone. Your mast, which ought to be a support to your vessel, is a ricketty one, and shakes.’ A gospel without a Trinity!—it is a pyramid built upon its apex. A gospel without the Trinity!—it is a rope of sand that cannot hold together. A gospel without the Trinity!—then, indeed, Satan can overturn it. But, give me a gospel with the Trinity, and the might of hell cannot prevail against it; no man can any more overthrow it, than a bubble could split a rock, or a feather break in halves a mountain. Get the thought of the three persons, and you have the marrow of all divinity. Only know the Father, and know the Son, and know the Holy Ghost to be One, and all things will appear clear. This is the golden key to the secrets of nature; this is the silken clue of the labyrinths of mystery, and he who understands this, will soon understand as much as mortals ever can know.

2. Now for the second point—the UNITED AGENCY of the three persons in the work of our salvation. Look at the text, and you will find all the three persons mentioned. ‘I,’—that is the Son— ‘will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter.’ There are the three persons mentioned, all of them doing something for our salvation. ‘I will pray,’ says the Son. ‘I will send,’ says the Father. ‘I will comfort,’ says the Holy Ghost. Now, let us for a few moments discourse upon this wondrous theme—the unity of the Three Persons with regard to the great purpose of the salvation of the elect. When God first made man, he said, ‘Let us make man,’ not let me, but ‘Let us make man in our own image.’ The covenant Elohim said to each other, ‘Let us unitedly become the Creator of man.’ So, when in ages far gone by in eternity, they said, ‘Let us save man.’ It was not the Father who said, ‘Let me save man,’ but the three persons conjointly said with one consent, ‘Let us save man.’ It is to me a source of sweet comfort, to think that it is not one person of the Trinity that is engaged for my salvation; it is not simply one person of the Godhead who vows that he will redeem me, but it is a glorious trio of Godlike ones, and the three declare, unitedly, ‘We will save man.’

Now, observe here, that each person is spoken of as performing a separate office. ‘I will pray,’ says the Son—that is intercession. ‘I will send,’ says the Father—that is donation. ‘I will comfort,’ says the Holy Spirit—that is supernatural influence. Oh! if it were possible for us to see the three persons of the Godhead, we should behold one of them standing before the throne with outstretched hands crying day and night, ‘O Lord, how long?’ We should see one girt with Urim and Thummin, precious stones, on which are written the twelve names of the tribes of Israel; we should behold him crying unto his Father, ‘Forget not thy promises, forget not thy covenant,’ we should hear him make mention of our sorrows, and tell forth our griefs on our behalf, for he is our intercessor. And could we behold the Father, we should not see him a listless and idle spectator of the intercession of the Son, but we should see him with attentive ear listening to every word of Jesus, and granting every petition. Where is the Holy Spirit all the while? Is he lying idle? Oh no, he is floating over the earth, and when he sees a weary soul, he says, ‘Come to Jesus, he will give you rest.’ When he beholds an eye filled with tears, he wipes away the tears, and bids the mourner look for comfort on the cross. When he sees the tempest-tost believer, he takes the helm of his soul and speaks the word of consolation, he helpeth the broken in heart, and bindeth up their wounds; and ever on his mission of mercy, he flies around the world, being everywhere present. Behold how the three persons work together. Do not then say, ‘I am grateful to the Son,’—so you ought to be, but God the Son no more saves you than God the Father. Do not imagine that God the Father is a great tyrant, and that God the Son had to die to make him merciful. It was not to make the Father’s love flow towards his people. Oh, no. One loves as much as the other; the three are conjoined in the great purpose of rescuing the elect from damnation.

But you must notice another thing in my text, which will show the blessed unity of the three—the one person promises to the other. The Son says, ‘I will pray the Father.’ ‘Very well,’ the disciples may have said, ‘We can trust you for that.’ ‘And he will send you.’ You see here is the Son signing a bond on behalf of the Father. ‘He will send you another Comforter.’ There is a bond on behalf of the Holy Spirit, too. ‘And he will abide with you forever.’ One person speaks for the other, and how could they if there were any disagreement between them? If one wished to save, and the other not, they could not promise on one another’s behalf. But whatever the Son says, the Father listens to, whatever the Father promises, the Holy Ghost works, and whatever the Holy Ghost injects into the soul, that God the Father fulfils. So the three together mutually promise on one another’s behalf. There is a bond with three names appended—Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. By three immutable things, as well as by two, the Christian is secured beyond the reach of death and hell. A Trinity of Securities, because there is a trinity of God.

3. Our third point is the INDWELLING of the Holy Ghost in believers. Now beloved, these first two things have been matters of pure doctrine, this is the subject of experience. The indwelling of the Holy Ghost is a subject so profound, and so having to do with the inner man, that no soul will be able truly and really to comprehend what I say, unless it has been taught of God. I have heard of an old minister, who told a Fellow of one of the Cambridge Colleges, that he understood a language that he never learnt in all his life. ‘I have not,’ he said, ‘even a smattering of Greek, and I know no Latin, but thank God I can talk the language of Canaan, and that is more than you can.’ So, beloved, I shall now have to talk a little of the language of Canaan. If you cannot comprehend me, I am much afraid it is because you are not of Israelitish extraction, you are not a child of God nor an inheritor of the kingdom of heaven.

We are told in the text, that Jesus would send the Comforter, who would abide in the saints for ever; who would dwell with them and be in them. Old Ignatius, the martyr, used to call himself Theophorus, or the Godbearer, ‘because,’ said he, ‘I bear about with me the Holy Ghost.’ And truly every Christian is a God-bearer. Know ye not that ye are temples of the Holy Ghost? for he dwelleth in you. That man is no Christian who is not the subject of the indwelling of the Holy Spirit; he may talk well, he may understand theology and be a sound Calvinist; he will be the child of nature finely dressed, but not the living child. He may be a man of so profound an intellect, so gigantic a soul, so comprehensive a mind, and so lofty an imagination, that he may dive into all the secrets of nature; may know the path which the eagle’s eye hath not seen, and go into depths where the ken of mortals reacheth not; but he shall not be a Christian with all his knowledge, he shall not be a son of God with all his researches, unless he understands what it is to have the Holy Ghost dwelling in him, and abiding in him, yea, and that for ever.

Some people call this fanaticism, and they say, ‘You are a Quaker: why not follow George Fox?’ Well we would not mind that much, we would follow any one who followed the Holy Ghost. Even he, with all his eccentricities, I doubt not, was, in many cases, actually inspired by the Holy Spirit; and whenever I find a man in whom there rests the Spirit of God, the Spirit within me leaps to hear the Spirit within him, and he feels that we are one. The Spirit of God in one Christian soul recognizes the Spirit in another. I recollect talking with a good man, as I believe he was, who was insisting that it was impossible for us to know whether we had the Holy Spirit within us or not. I should like him to be here this morning, because I would read this verse to him: ‘But ye know him, for he dwelleth with you, and shall be in you.’ Ah! you think you cannot tell whether you have the Holy Spirit or not. Can I tell whether I am alive or not? If I were touched by electricity, could I tell whether I was or not? I suppose I should; the shock would be strong enough to make me know where I stood. So, if I have God within me—if I have Deity tabernacling in my breast—if I have God the Holy Ghost resting in my heart, and making a temple of my body, do you think I shall know it? Call ye it fanaticism if ye will; but I trust that there are some of us who know what it is to be always, or generally, under the influence of the Holy Spirit—always in one sense, generally in another. When we have difficulties we ask the direction of the Holy Ghost. When we do not understand a portion of Holy Scripture, we ask God the Holy Ghost to shine upon us. When we are depressed, the Holy Ghost comforts us. You cannot tell what the wondrous power of the indwelling of the Holy Ghost is: how it pulls back the hand of the saint when he would touch the forbidden thing; how it prompts him to make a covenant with his eyes; how it binds his feet, lest they should fall in a slippery way, how it restrains his heart, and keeps him from temptation. O ye who know nothing of the indwelling of the Holy Ghost, despise it not. O despise not the Holy Ghost, for it is the unpardonable sin. ‘He that speaketh a word against the Son of Man, it shall be forgiven him, but he that speaketh against the Holy Ghost, it shall never be forgiven him, either in this life, or that which is to come.’ So saith the Word of God. Therefore, tremble, lest in anything ye despise the influences of the Holy Spirit.

But before closing this point, there is one little word which pleases me very much, that is, ‘forever.’ You knew I should not miss that; you were certain I could not let it go without observation. ‘Abide with you for ever.’ I wish I could get an Arminian here to finish my sermon. I fancy I see him taking that word, ‘for ever.’ He would say, ‘for—for ever;’ he would have to stammer and stutter; for he never could get it out all at once. He might stand and pull it about, and at last he would have to say, ‘the translation is wrong.’ And then I suppose the poor man would have to prove that the original was wrong too. Ah! but blessed be God, we can read it— ‘He shall abide with you for ever.’ Once give me the Holy Ghost, and I shall never lose him till ‘for ever’ has run out; till eternity has spun its everlasting rounds.

4. Now we have to close up with a brief remark on the reason why the world rejects the Holy Ghost. It is said, ‘Whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth him not, neither knoweth him.’ You know what is sometimes meant by ‘the world,’—those whom God, in his wondrous sovereignty, passed over when he chose his people: the preterite ones; those passed over in God’s wondrous preterition—not the reprobates who were condemned to damnation by some awful decree, but those passed over by God, when he chose out his elect. These cannot receive the Spirit. Again, it means all in a carnal state are not able to procure themselves this divine influence; and thus it is true, ‘Whom the world cannot receive.’

The unregenerate world of sinners despises the Holy Ghost, ‘because it seeth him not.’ Yes, I believe this is the great secret why many laugh at the idea of the existence of the Holy Ghost—because they see him not. You tell the worldling, ‘I have the Holy Ghost within me.’ He says, ‘I cannot see it.’ He wants it to be something tangible: a thing he can recognize with his senses. Have you ever heard the argument used by a good old Christian against an infidel doctor? The doctor said there was no soul, and he asked, ‘Did you ever see a soul?’ ‘No,’ said the Christian. ‘Did you ever hear a soul?’ ‘No.’ ‘Did you ever smell a soul?’ No.’ ‘Did you ever taste a soul?’ ‘No.’ ‘Did you ever feel a soul?’ ‘Yes,’ said the man— ‘I feel I have one within me.’ ‘Well,’ said the doctor, ‘there are four senses against one: you have only one on your side.’ ‘Very well,’ said the Christian, ‘Did you ever see a pain?’ ‘No.’ ‘Did you ever hear a pain?’ ‘No.’ ‘Did you ever smell a pain?’ ‘No.’ ‘Did you ever taste a pain?’ ‘No.’ ‘Did you ever feel a pain?’ ‘Yes,’ ‘And that is quite enough, I suppose, to prove there is a pain?’ ‘Yes.’ So the worldling says there is no Holy Ghost, because he cannot see it. Well, but we feel it. You say that is fanaticism, and that we never felt it. Suppose you tell me that honey is bitter, I reply ‘No, I am sure you cannot have tasted it; taste it, and try.’ So with the Holy Ghost, if you did but feel his influence, you would no longer say there is no Holy Spirit, because you cannot see it. Are there not many things, even in nature, which we cannot see? Did you ever see the wind? No; but ye know there is wind, when ye behold the hurricane tossing the waves about and rending down the habitations of men; or when in the soft evening zephyr it kisses the flowers, and maketh dewdrops hang in pearly coronets around the rose. Did ye ever see electricity? No, but ye know there is such a thing, for it travels along the wires for thousands of miles, and carries our messages, though you cannot see the thing itself, you know there is such a thing. So you must believe there is a Holy Ghost working in us, both to will and to do, even though it is beyond our senses.

But the last reason why worldly men laugh at the doctrine of the Holy Spirit, is because they do not know it. If they knew it by heart-felt experience, and if they recognized its agency in the soul; if they had ever been touched by it; if they had been made to tremble under a sense of sin; if they had had their hearts melted; they would never have doubted the existence of the Holy Ghost.

And now, beloved, it says, ‘He dwelleth with you, and shall be in you.’ We will close up with that sweet recollection—the Holy Ghost dwells in all believers, and shall be with them.

One word of comment and advice to the saints of God, and to sinners, and I have done. Saints of the Lord! ye have this morning heard that God the Holy Ghost is a person; ye have had it proved to your souls. What follows from this? Why, it followeth how earnest ye should be in prayer to the Holy Spirit, as well as for the Holy Spirit. Let me say that this is an inference that you should lift up your prayers to the Holy Ghost, that you should cry earnestly unto him, for he is able to do exceeding abundantly above all you can ask or think. See this mass of people; what is to convert it? See this crowd; who is to make my influence permeate through the mass? You know this place has now a mighty influence, and God blessing us, it will have an influence, not only upon this city but upon England at large, for we now enjoy the press as well as the pulpit, and certainly, I should say before the close of the year, more than two hundred thousand of my productions will be scattered through the land—words uttered by my lips, or written by my pen. But how can this influence he rendered for good? How shall God’s glory be promoted by it? Only by incessant prayer for the Holy Spirit; by constantly calling down the influence of the Holy Ghost upon us; we want him to rest upon every page that is printed, and upon every word that is uttered. Let us then be doubly earnest in pleading with the Holy Ghost, that he would come and own our labours, that the whole church at large may be revived thereby, and not ourselves only, but the whole world share in the benefit.

Then to the ungodly, I have this one closing word to say. Ever be careful how you speak of the Holy Ghost. I do not know what the unpardonable sin is, and I do not think any man understands it; but it is something like this: ‘He that speaketh a word against the Holy Ghost, it shall never be forgiven him.’ I do not know what that means: but tread carefully! There is danger; there is a pit which our ignorance has covered by sand, tread carefully! you may be in it before the next hour. If there is any strife in your heart to-day, perhaps you will go to the ale-house and forget it. Perhaps there is some voice speaking in your soul, and you will put it away. I do not tell you you will be resisting the Holy Ghost and committing the unpardonable sin; but it is somewhere there. Be very careful. Oh! there is no crime on earth so black as the crime against the Holy Spirit. Ye may blaspheme the Father, and ye shall be damned for it unless ye repent, ye may blaspheme the Son, and hell shall be your portion, unless ye are forgiven; but blaspheme the Holy Ghost, and thus saith the Lord, ‘There is no forgiveness, neither in this world, nor in the world which is to come.’ I cannot tell you what it is, I do not profess to understand it; but there it is. It is the danger signal, stop! man, stop! If thou hast despised the Holy Spirit, if thou hast laughed at his revelations, and scorned what Christians call his influence, I beseech thee, stop! this morning seriously deliberate. Perhaps some of you have actually committed the unpardonable sin; stop! Let fear stop you; sit down. Do not drive on so rashly as you have done, Jehu! Oh! slacken your reins! Thou who art such a profligate in sin, thou who hast uttered such hard words against the Trinity, stop! Ah, it makes us all stop. It makes us all draw up and say, ‘Have I not perhaps so done?’ Let us think of this, and let us not at any time trifle either with the words, or the acts, of God the Holy Ghost.

^[1] Published as No. 5 in the New Park Street Pulpit, Vol. 1. We hope to repost this next week.

The post The Personality of the Holy Spirit: C.H. Spurgeon Sermon appeared first on Banner of Truth UK.

‘And that lord answered the man of God, and said, Now, behold, if the Lord should make windows in heaven, might such a thing be? And he said, Behold, thou shalt see it with thine eyes but shalt not eat thereof.’ 2 Kings 7:19

ONE wise man may deliver a whole city; one good man may be the means of safety to a thousand others. The holy ones are ‘the salt of the earth,’ the means of the preservation of the wicked, Without the godly as a conserve, the race would be utterly destroyed. In the city of Samaria there was one righteous man—Elisha, the servant of the Lord. Piety was altogether extinct in the court. The king was a sinner of the blackest dye, his iniquity was glaring and infamous. Jehoram walked in the ways of his father Ahab, and made unto himself false gods. The people of Samaria were fallen like their monarch: they had gone astray from Jehovah; they had forsaken the God of Israel; they remembered not the watchword of Jacob, ‘The Lord thy God is one God;’ and in wicked idolatry they bowed before the idols of the heathens, and therefore the Lord of Hosts suffered their enemies to oppress them until the curse of Ebal was fulfilled in the streets of Samaria, for ‘the tender and delicate woman who would not adventure to set the sole of her foot upon the ground for delicateness,’ had an evil eye to her own children, and devoured her offspring by reason of fierce hunger. Deuteronomy 28:56-58. In this awful extremity the one Holy man was the medium of salvation. The one grain of salt preserved the entire city; the one warrior for God was the means of the deliverance of the whole beleaguered multitude. For Elisha’s sake the Lord sent the promise that the next day, food which could not be obtained at any price, should be had at the cheapest possible rate—at the very gates of Samaria. We may picture the joy of the multitude when first the seer uttered this prediction. They knew him to be a prophet of the Lord; he had divine credentials; all his past prophecies held been fulfilled. They knew that he was a man sent of God, and uttering Jehovah message. Surely the monarch’s eyes would glisten with delight, and the emaciated multitude would leap for joy at the prospects of so speedy a release from famine. ‘To-morrow,’ would they shout, ‘to-morrow our hunger shall be over, and we shall feast to the full.’

However, the lord on whom the king leaned expressed his disbelief. We hear not that any of the common people, the plebeians, ever did so; but an aristocrat did it. Strange it is, that God has seldom chosen the great men of this world. High places and faith in Christ do seldom well agree. This great man said ‘Impossible!’ and, with an insult to the prophet, he added, ‘If the Lord should make windows in heaven, might such a thing be.’ His sin lay in the fact that after repeated seals of Elisha’s ministry, he yet disbelieved the assurances uttered by the prophet on God’s behalf. He had, doubtless, seen the marvellous defeat of Moab; he had been startled at tidings of the resurrection of the Shunamite’s son; he knew that Elisha had revealed Benhadad’s secrets and smitten his marauding hosts with blindness; he had seen the bands of Syria decoyed into the heart of Samaria; and he probably knew the story of the widow, whose oil filled all the vessels, and redeemed her sons; at all events the cure of Naaman was common conversation at court; and yet, in the face of all this accumulated evidence, in the teeth of all these credentials of the prophet’s mission, he yet doubted, and insultingly told him that heaven must become an open casement, ere the promise could be performed. Whereupon God pronounced his doom by the mouth of the man who had just now proclaimed the promise: ‘thou shalt see it with thine eyes but shalt not eat thereof.’ And providence—which always fulfils prophecy, just as the paper takes the stamp of the type—destroyed the man. Trodden down in the streets of Samaria, he perished at its gates, beholding the plenty, but tasting not of it. Perhaps his carriage was haughty, and insulting to the people; or he tried to restrain their eager rush; or, as we would say, it might have been by mere accident that he was crushed to death; so that he saw the prophecy fulfilled, but never lived to enjoy it. In his case, seeing was believing, but it was not enjoying.

I shall this morning invite your attention to two things—the man’s sin and his punishment. Perhaps I shall say but little of this man, since I have detailed the circumstances, but I shall discourse upon the sin of unbelief and the punishment thereof.

1. And first, the SIN. His sin was unbelief. He doubted the promise of God. In this particular case unbelief took the form of a doubt of the divine veracity, or a mistrust of God’s power. Either he doubted whether God really meant what he said, or whether it was within the range of possibility that God should fulfil his promise. Unbelief hath more phases than the moon, and more colours than the chameleon. Common people say of the devil, that he is seen sometimes in one shape, and sometimes in another. I am sure this is true of Satan’s first-born child—unbelief, for its forms are legion. At one time I see unbelief dressed out as an angel of light. It calls itself humility, and it saith, ‘I would not be presumptuous; I dare not think that God would pardon me; I am too great a sinner.’ We call that humility, and thank God that our friend is in so good a condition. I do not thank God for any such delusion. It is the devil dressed as an angel of light; it is unbelief after all. At other times we detect unbelief in the shape of a doubt of God’s immutability; ‘The Lord has loved me, but perhaps he will cast me off to-morrow. He helped me yesterday, and under the shadows of his wings I trust; but perhaps I shall receive no help in the next affliction. He may have cast me off; he may be unmindful of his covenant, and forget to be gracious.’ Sometimes this infidelity is embodied in a doubt of God’s power. We see every day new straits, we are involved in a net of difficulties, and we think ‘surely the Lord cannot deliver us.’ We strive to get rid of our burden, and finding that we cannot do it, we think God’s arm is as short as ours, and his power as little as human might. A fearful form of unbelief is that doubt which keeps men from coming to Christ, which leads the sinner to distrust the ability of Christ to save him, to doubt the willingness of Jesus to accept so great a transgressor. But the most hideous of all is the traitor, in its true colours, blaspheming God, and madly denying his existence. Infidelity, deism, and atheism, are the ripe fruits of this pernicious tree; they are the most terrific eruptions of the volcano of unbelief. Unbelief hath become of full stature, when quitting the mask and laying aside disguise, it profanely stalks the earth, uttering the rebellious cry, ‘No God,’ striving in vain to shake the throne of the divinity, by lifting up its arm against Jehovah, and in its arrogance would

‘Snatch from his hand the balance and the rod,

Re-judge his justice—be the god of God.’

Then truly unbelief has come to its full perfection, and then you see what it really is, for the least unbelief is of the same nature as the greatest.

I am astonished, and I am sure you will be, when I tell you that there are some strange people in the world who do not believe that unbelief is a sin. Strange people I must call them, because they are sound in their faith in every other respect; only, to make the articles of their creed consistent, as they imagine, they deny that unbelief is sinful. I remember a young man going into a circle of friends and ministers, who were disputing whether it was a sin in men that they did not believe the gospel. Whilst they were discussing it, he said, ‘Gentlemen am I in the presence of Christians? Are you believers in the Bible, or are you not?’ They said, ‘We are Christians of course.’ ‘Then,’ said he, ‘does not the Scripture say, ‘of sin, because they believed not on me?’ And is it not the dawning sin of sinners, that they do not believe on Christ?’ I could not have thought that persons should be so fool-hardy as to venture to assert that ‘it is no sin for a sinner not to believe on Christ.’ I thought that, however far they might wish to push their sentiments, they would not tell a lie to uphold the truth and, in my opinion, this is what such men are really doing. Truth is a strong tower and never requires to be buttressed with error. God’s Word will stand against all man’s devices. I would never invent a sophism to prove that it is no sin on the part of the ungodly not to believe, for I am sure it is, when I am taught in the Scriptures that, ‘This is the condemnation, that light is come into the world and men love darkness rather than light,’ and when I read, ‘He that believeth not is condemned already, because he believeth not on the Son of God,’ I affirm, and the Word declares it, unbelief is a sin. Surely with rational and unprejudiced persons, it cannot require any reasoning to prove it. Is it not a sin for a creature to doubt the word of its Maker? Is it not a crime and an insult to the Divinity, for me, an atom, a particle of dust, to dare to deny his words? Is it not the very summit of arrogance and extremity of pride for a son of Adam to say, even in his heart, as God I doubt thy grace; God I doubt thy love; God I doubt thy power?’ Oh! sirs believe me, could ye roll all sins into one mass,—could you take murder, and blasphemy, and lust, adultery, and fornication, and everything that is vile, and unite them all into one vast globe of black corruption, they would not equal even then the sin of unbelief. This is the monarch sin, the quintessence of guilt, the mixture of the venom of all crimes; the dregs of the wine of Gomorrha; it is the A 1 sin, the masterpiece of Satan, the chief work of the devil.

I shall attempt this morning, for a little while, to shew the extremely evil nature of the sin of unbelief.

1. And first the sin of unbelief will appear to be extremely heinous when we remember that it is the parent of every other iniquity. There is no crime which unbelief will not beget. I think that the fall of man is very much owing to it. It was in this point that the devil tempted Eve. He said to her, ‘Yea, hath God said, ye shall not eat of every tree of the garden?’ He whispered and insinuated a doubt, ‘Yea, hath God said so?’ as much as to say, ‘Are you quite sure he said so?’ It was by means of unbelief—that this part of the wedge—that the other sin entered; curiosity and the rest followed; she touched the fruit, and destruction came into this world, since that time, unbelief has been the prolific parent of all guilt. An unbeliever is capable of the vilest crime that ever was committed. Unbelief, sirs! why it hardened the heart of Pharaoh—it gave license to the tongue of blaspheming Rabshakeh—yea, it became a deicide, and murdered Jesus. Unbelief!—it has sharpened the knife of the suicide! it has mixed many a cup of poison; thousands it has brought to the halter; and many to a shameful grave who have murdered themselves and rushed with bloody hands before their Creator’s tribunal, because of unbelief! Give me an unbeliever—let me know that he doubts God’s word—let me know that he distrusts his promise and his threatening; and with that for a premise, I will conclude that the man shall, by-and-bye unless there is amazing restraining power exerted upon him, be guilty of the foulest and blackest crimes. Ah! this is a Beelzebub sin; like Beelzebub, it is the leader of all evil spirits. It is said of Jeroboam that he sinned and made Israel to sin; and it may be said of unbelief that it not only sins itself; but makes others sin, it is the egg of all crime, the seed of every offense; in fact everything that is evil and vile lies couched in that one word—unbelief.

And let me say here, that unbelief in the Christian is of the self-same nature as unbelief in the sinner. It is not the same in its final issue, for it will be pardoned in the Christian; yea it is pardoned: it was laid upon the scapegoat’s head of old: it was blotted out and atoned for; but it is of the same sinful nature. In fact, if there can be one sin more heinous than the unbelief of a sinner, it is the unbelief of a saint. For a saint to doubt God’s word—for a saint to distrust God after innumerable instances of his love, after ten thousand proofs of his mercy exceeds everything. In a saint, moreover, unbelief is the root of other sins. When I am perfect in faith I shall be perfect in everything else: I should always fulfil the precept if I always believed the promise. But it is because my faith is weak, that I sin. Put me in trouble, and if I can fold my arms and say, ‘Jehovah-Jireh the Lord will provide,’ you will not find me using wrong means to escape from it. But let me be in temporal distress and difficulty, if I distrust God, what then? Perhaps I shall steal, or do a dishonest act to get out of the hands of my creditors; or if kept from such a transgression, I may plunge into excess to drown my anxieties. Once take away faith, the reins are broken; and who can ride an unbroken steed without rein or bridle? Like the chariot of the sun with Phaeton for its driver, such should we be without faith. Unbelief is the mother of vice; it is the parent of sin; and, therefore, I say it is a pestilent evil—a master sin.

2. But secondly; unbelief not only begets, but fosters sin. How is it that men can keep their sin under the thunders of the Sinai preacher? How is it that, when Boanerges stands in the pulpit, and, by the grace of God, cries aloud, ‘Cursed is every man that keepeth not all the commands of the law,’—how is it that when the sinner hears the tremendous threatenings of God’s justice, still he is hardened, and walks on in his evil ways? I will tell you; it is because unbelief of that threatening prevents it from having any effect upon him. When our sappers and miners go to work around Sebastopol, they could not work in front of the walls, if they had not something to keep off the shots; so they raise earthworks, behind which they can do what they please. So with the ungodly man. The devil gives him unbelief; he thus puts up an earthwork, and finds refuge behind it. Ah! sinners, when once the Holy Ghost knocks down your unbelief—when once he brings home the truth in demonstration and in power, how the law will work upon your soul. If man did but believe that the law is holy, that the commandments are holy, just, and good, how he would be shaken over hell’s mouth; there would be no sitting and sleeping in God’s house; no careless hearers; no going away and straightway forgetting what manner of men ye are. Oh! once get rid of unbelief, how would every ball from the batteries of the law fall upon the sinner, and the slain of the Lord would be many. Again, how is it that men can hear the wooings of the cross of Calvary, and yet come not to Christ? How is it that when we preach about the sufferings of Jesus, and close up by saying, ‘yet there is room,’—how is it that when we dwell upon his cross and passion, men are not broken in their hearts? It is said,

‘Law and terrors do but harden,

All the while they work alone:

But a sense of blood-bought pardon

Will dissolve a heart of stone.’

Methinks the tale of Calvary is enough to break a rock. Rocks did rend when they saw Jesus die, Methinks the tragedy of Golgotha is enough to make a flint gush with tears, and to make the most hardened wretch weep out his eyes in drops of penitential love; but yet we tell it you, and repeat it oft, but who weeps over it? Who cares about it? Sirs, ye sit as unconcerned as if it did not signify to you. Oh I bellow and see all ye that pass by. Is it nothing to you that Jesus should die? Ye seem to say ‘It is nothing’. What is the reason? Because there is unbelief between you and the cross. If there were not that thick veil between you and the Saviour’s eyes, his looks of love would melt you. But unbelief is the sin which keeps the power of the gospel from working in the sinner: and it is not till the Holy Ghost strikes that unbelief out—it is not till the Holy Spirit rends away that infidelity and takes it altogether down, that we can find the sinner coming to put his trust in Jesus.

3. But there is a third point. Unbelief disables a man for the performance of any good work. ‘Whatsoever is not of faith is sin,’ is a great truth in more senses than one. ‘Without faith it is impossible to please God.’ You shall never hear me say a word against morality; you shall never hear me say that honesty is not a good thing, or that sobriety is not a good thing; on the contrary, I would say they are commendable things; but I will tell you what I will say afterwards—I will tell you that they are just like the Dowries of Hindostan; they may pass current among the Indians, but they will not do in England; these virtues may be current here below, but not above. If you have not something better than your own goodness, you will never get to heaven. Some of the Indian tribes use little strips of cloth instead of money and I would not find fault with them if I lived there, but when I come to England, strips of cloth will not suffice. So honesty, sobriety, and such things, may be very good amongst men—and the more you have of them the better. I exhort you, whatsoever things are lovely and pure, and of good report, have them—but they will not do up there. All these things put together, without faith do not please God. Virtues without faith are whitewashed sins. Obedience without faith, if it is possible, is a gilded disobedience. Not to believe, nullifies everything. It is the fly in the ointment; it is the poison in the pot. Without faith, with all the virtues of purity, with all the benevolence of philanthropy, with all the kindness of disinterested sympathy, with all the talents of genius, with all the bravery of patriotism, and with all the decision of principle—‘without faith it is impossible to please God.’ Do you no see then, how bad unbelief is, because it prevents men from performing good works. Yea, even in Christians themselves, unbelief disables them. Let me just tell you a tale—a story of Christ’s life. A certain man had an afflicted son, possessed with an evil spirit. Jesus was up in Mount Tabor, transfigured; so the father brought his son to the disciples. What did the disciples do? They said ‘Oh, we will cast him out.’ They put their hands upon him, and they tried to do it; but they whispered among themselves and said, ‘We are afraid we shall not be able.’ By-and-by the diseased man began to froth at the mouth, he foamed and scratched the earth, clasping it in his paroxysms. The demoniac spirit within him was alive. The devil was still there. In vain their repeated exorcism, the evil spirit remained like a lion in his den, nor could their efforts dislodge him. ‘Go!’ said they; but he went not, ‘Away to the pit!’ they cried; but he remained immovable. The lips of unbelief cannot affright the Evil One, who might well have said, ‘Faith I know, Jesus I know, but who are ye? ye have no faith.’ If they had had faith, as a grain of mustard seed, they might have cast the devil out, but their faith was gone, and therefore they could do nothing. Look at poor Peter’s case, too. While he had faith, Peter walked on the waves of the sea. That was a splendid walk; I almost envy him treading upon the billows. Why, if Peter’s faith had continued, he might have walked across the Atlantic to America. But presently there came a billow behind him, and he said, ‘That will sweep me away;’ and then another before, and he cried out, ‘That will overwhelm me;’ and he thought—how could I be so presumptuous as to be walking on than top of these waves? Downs goes Peter. Faith was Peter’s life-buoy; faith was Peter’s charm—it kept him up; but unbelief sent him down. Do you know that you and I, all our lifetime, will have to walk on the water? A Christian’s life is always walking on water—mine is—and every wave would swallow and devour him but faith makes him stand. The moment you cease to believe, that moment distress comes in, and down you go. Oh! Wherefore dost thou doubt, then?

Faith fosters every virtue; unbelief murders every one. Thousands of prayers have been strangled in their infancy by unbelief. Unbelief has been guilty of infanticide; it has murdered many an infant petition; many a song of praise that would have swelled the chorus of the skies, has been stifled by an unbelieving murmur, many a noble enterprise conceited in the heart has been blighted ere it could come forth, by unbelief; many a man would have been a missionary; would have stood and preached his Master’s gospel boldly; but he had unbelief. Once make a giant unbelieving, and he becomes a dwarf: Faith is the Samsonian lock of the Christian; cut it off, and you may put out his eyes—and he can do nothing.

4. Our next remark is—unbelief has been severely punished. Turn you to the Scriptures! I see a world all fair and beautiful; its mountains laughing in the sun, and the fields rejoicing in the golden light. I see maidens dancing, and young men singing. How fair the vision! But lo! a grave and reverend sire lifts up his hand, and cries, ‘A flood is coming to deluge the earth: the fountains of the great deep will be broken up, and all things will be covered. See yonder ark! One hundred and twenty years have I toiled with these my hands to build it; flee there, and you are safe.’ ‘Aha! old man; away with your empty predictions! Aha! let us be happy while we may! when the flood comes, then we will build an ark; but there is no flood conning; tell that to fools; we believe no such things.’ See the unbelievers pursue their merry dance. Hark! Unbeliever. Dost thou not hear that rumbling noise? Earth’s bowels have begun to move, her rocky ribs are strained by dire convulsions from within; lo! they break with the enormous strain, and forth from between them torrents rush unknown since God concealed them in the bosom of our world. Heaven is split in sunder! it rains. Not drops, but clouds descend. A cataract, like that of old Niagara, rolls from heaven with mighty noise. Both firmaments, both deeps—the deep below and the deep above—do clasp their hands. Now unbelievers, where are you now? There is your last remnant. A man—his wife clasping him round the waist—stands on the last summit that is above the water. See him there? The water is up to his loins even now. Hear his last shriek! He is floating—he is drowned. And as Noah looks from the ark he sees nothing. Nothing! It is a void profound. ‘Sea monsters whelp and stable in the palaces of kings.’ All is overthrown, covered, drowned. What hath done it? What brought the flood upon the earth? Unbelief. By faith Noah escaped from the flood. By unbelief the rest were drowned.

And, oh! do you not know that unbelief kept Moses and Aaron out of Canaan? They honoured not God—they struck the rock when they ought to have spoken to it. They disbelieved: and therefore the punishment came upon them, that they should not inherit that good land, for which they had toiled and laboured.

Let me take you where Moses and Aaron dwelt—to the vast and howling wilderness. We will walk about it for a time; sons of the weary foot, we will become like the wandering Bedouins, we will tread the desert for a while. There lies a carcase whitened in the sun; there another, and there another. What means these bleached bones? What are these bodies—there a man, and there a woman? What are all these? How came these corpses here? Surely some grand encampment must have been here cut off in a single night by a blast, or by bloodshed. Ah, no, no. Those bones are the bones of Israel; those skeletons are the old tribes of Jacob. They could not enter because of unbelief. They trusted not in God. Spies said they could not conquer the land. Unbelief was the cause of their death. It was not the Anakims that destroyed Israel; it was not the howling wilderness which devoured them; it was not the Jordan which proved a barrier to Canaan, neither Hivite or Jebusite slew them; it was unbelief alone which kept them out of Canaan. What a doom to be pronounced on Israel, after forty years of journeying: they could not enter because of unbelief!

Not to multiply instances, recollect Zechariah. He doubted, and the angel struck him dumb. His mouth was closed because of unbelief. But Oh! if you would have the worst picture of the effects of unbelief—if you would see how God has punished it, I must take you to the siege of Jerusalem, that worst massacre which time has ever seen, when the Romans raised the walls to the ground, and put the whole of the inhabitants to the sword, or sold them as slaves in the market-place. Have you never read of the destruction of Jerusalem, by Titus? Did you never turn to the tragedy of Masada, when the Jews stabbed each other rather than fall into the hands of the Romans? Do you not know, that to this day the Jew walks through the earth a wanderer, without a home and without a land? He is cut off, as a branch is cut from a vine; and why? Because of unbelief. Each time ye see a Jew with a sad and sombre countenance—each time ye mark him like a denizen of another land, treading as an exile this our country—each time ye see him, pause and say, ‘Ah! it was unbelief which caused thee to murder Christ, and now it has driven thee to be a wanderer; and faith alone—faith in the crucified Nazarene—can fetch thee back to thy country, and restore it to its ancient grandeur.’ Unbelief, you see, has the Cain-mark upon its forehead. God hates it; God has dealt hard blows upon it: and God will ultimately crush it. Unbelief dishonours God. Every other crime touches God’s territory; but unbelief aims a blow at his divinity, impeaches his veracity, denies his goodness, blasphemes his attributes, maligns his character; therefore, God of all things, hates first and chiefly, unbelief, wherever it is.

5. And now to close this point—for I have been already too long—let me remark that you will observe the heinous nature of unbelief in this—that it is the damning sin. There is one sin for which Christ never died; it is the sin against the Holy Ghost. There is one other sin for which Christ never made atonement. Mention every crime in the calendar of evil, and I will show you persons who have found forgiveness for it. But ask me whether the man who died in unbelief can be saved, and I reply there is no atonement for that man. There is an atonement made for the unbelief of a Christian, because it is temporary, but the final unbelief—the unbelief with which men die—never was atoned for. You may turn over this whole Book, and you will find that there is no atonement for the man who died in unbelief; there is no mercy for him. Had he been guilty of every other sin, if he had but believed, he would have been pardoned; but this is the damning exception—he had no faith. Devils seize him! O fiends of the pit, drag him downward to his doom! He is faithless and unbelieving, and such are the tenants for whom hell was built. It is their portion, their prison, they are the chief prisoners, the fetters are marked with their names, and for ever shall they know that, ‘he that believeth not shall be damned.’

6. This brings us now to conclude with the PUNISHMENT. ‘Thou shalt see it with thine eyes, but shalt not eat thereof.’ Listen unbelievers! ye have heard this morning your sin, now listen to your doom: ‘Ye shall see it with your eyes, but shalt not eat thereof.’ It is so often with God’s own saints. When they are unbelieving, they see the mercy with their eyes, but do not eat it. Now, there is corn in this land of Egypt; but there are some of God’s saints who come here on the Sabbath, and say, ‘I do not know whether the Lord will be with me or not.’ Some of them say, ‘Well, the gospel is preached, but I do not know whether it will be successful.’ They are always doubting and fearing. Listen to them when they get out of the chapel. ‘Well, did you get a good meal this morning?’ ‘Nothing for me.’ Of course not. Ye could see it with your eyes, but did not eat it, because you had no faith. If you had come up with faith, you would have had a morsel. I have found Christians, who have grown so very critical, that if the whole portion of the meat they are to have, in due season, is not cut up exactly into square pieces, and put upon some choice dish of porcelain they cannot eat it. Then they ought to go without; and they will have to go without, until they are brought to their appetites. They will have some affliction, which will act like quinine upon them: they will be made to eat by means of bitters in their mouths; they will be put in prison for a day or two until their appetite returns, and then they will be glad to eat the most ordinary food, off the most common platter, or no platter at all. But the real reason why God’s people do not feed under a gospel ministry, is because they have not faith. If you believed, if you did but hear one promise that would be enough; if you only heard one good thing from the pulpit, here would be food for your soul, for it is not the quantity we hear, but the quantity we believe, that does us good—it is that which we receive into our hearts with true and lively faith, that is our profit.

But, let me apply this chiefly to the unconverted. They often see great works of God done with their eyes, but they do not eat thereof. A crowd of people have come here this morning to see with their eyes, but I doubt whether all of them eat. Men cannot eat with their eyes, for if they could, most would be well fed. And, spiritually, persons cannot feed simply with their ears, nor simply with looking at the preacher; and so we find the majority of our congregations come just to see; ‘Ah, let us hear what this babbler would say, this reed shaken in the wind.’ But they have no faith; they come, and they see, and see, and see, and never eat. There is someone in the front there, who gets converted; and some one down below, who is called by sovereign grace; some poor sinner is weeping under a sense of his blood-guiltiness, another is crying for mercy to God: and another is saying, ‘Have mercy upon me, a sinner.’ A great work is going on in this chapel, but some of you do not know anything about it; you have no work going on in your hearts, and why? Because ye think it is impossible; ye think God is not at work. He has not promised to work for you who do not honour him. Unbelief makes you sit here in times of revival and of the outpouring of God’s grace, unmoved, uncalled, unsaved.

But, sirs, the worst fulfilment of this doom is to come! Good Whitefield used sometimes to lift up both his hands and shout, as I wish I could shout, but my voice fails me. ‘The wrath to come! the wrath to come!’ It is not the wrath now you have to fear, but the wrath to come; and there shall be a doom to come, when ‘ye shall see it with your eyes, but shall not eat thereof.’ Methinks I see the last great day. The last hour of time has struck. I heard the bell toll its death knell—time was, eternity is ushered in; the sea is boiling; the waves are lit up with supernatural splendour. I see a rainbow—a flying cloud, and on it there is a throne, and on that throne sits one like unto the Son of Man. I know him. In his hand he holds a pair of balances; just before him the books,—the book of life, the book of death, the book of remembrance. I see his splendour and I rejoice at it; I behold his pompous appearance, and I smile with gladness that he is come to be ‘admired of all his saints.’ But there stands a throng of miserable wretches, crouching in horror to conceal themselves, and yet looking for their eyes must look on him whom they have pierced; but when they look they cry, ‘Hide me from the face.’ What face? ‘Rocks, hide me from the face.’ What face? ‘The face of Jesus, the man who died, but now is come to judgment.’ But ye cannot be hidden from his face; ye must see it with your eyes: but ye will not sit on the right hand, dressed in robes of grandeur and when the triumphal procession of Jesus in the clouds shall come, ye shall not march in it; ye shall see it, but ye shall not be there. Oh! methinks I see it now, the mighty Saviour in his chariot, riding on the rainbow to heaven, See how his mighty coursers make the sky rattle while he drives them up heaven’s hill. A train girt in white follow behind him, and at his chariot wheels he drags the devil, death, and hell. Hark, how they clap their hands. Hark, how they shout. ‘Thou hast ascended up on high; thou hast led captivity captive.’ Hark, how they chaunt the solemn lay, ‘Hallelujah, the Lord God omnipotent reigneth.’ See the splendour of their appearance; mark the crown upon their brows; see their snow-white garments; mark the rapture of their countenances; hear how their song swells up to heaven while the Eternal joins therein, saying, ‘I will rejoice over them with joy, I will rejoice over them with singing, for I have betrothed thee unto me in everlasting lovingkindness.’ But where are you all the while? Ye can see them up there but where are you? Looking at it with your eyes, but you cannot eat thereof. The marriage banquet is spread; the good old wines of eternity are broached; they sit down to the feast of the king; but there are you, miserable, and famishing, and ye cannot eat thereof. Oh! how ye wring your hands. Might ye but have one morsel from the table—might ye but be dogs beneath the table. You shall be a dog in hell, but not a dog in heaven.

But to conclude. Methinks I see thee in some place in hell, tied to a rock, the vulture of remorse knowing thy heart; and up there is Lazarus in Abraham’s bosom, You lift up your eyes and you see who it is. ‘That is the poor man who lay on my dunghill, and the dogs licked his sores; there he is in heaven, while I am cast down. Lazarus—yes, it is Lazarus; and I who was rich in the world of time am here in hell. Father Abraham, send Lazarus, that he may dip the tip of his finger in water, to cool my tongue.’ But no! it cannot be; it cannot be. And whilst you lie there if there be one thing in hell worse than another, it will be seeing the saints in heaven. Oh, to think of seeing my mother in heaven while I am cast out! Oh, sinner, only think, to see thy brother in heaven—he who was rocked in the selfsame cradle, and played beneath the same roof-tree—yet thou art cast out. And, husband, there is thy wife in heaven, and thou art amongst the damned, And seest thou, father! thy child is before the throne; and thou! accursed of God and accursed of man, art in hell. Oh, the hell of hells will be to see our friends in heaven, and ourselves lost. I beseech you, my hearers, by the death of Christ—by his agony and bloody sweat—by his cross and passion—by all that is holy—by all that is sacred in heaven and earth—by all that is solemn in time or eternity—by all that is horrible in hell, or glorious in heaven—by that awful thought, ‘for ever,’—I beseech you lay these things to heart, and remember that if you are damned, it will be unbelief that damns you. If you are lost, it will be because ye believed not on Christ; and if you perish, this shall be the bitterest drop of gall—that ye did not trust in the Saviour.

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‘This do in remembrance of me.’—1 Cor. 11:24.

IT seems, then, that Christians may forget Christ. The text implies the possibility of forgetfulness concerning him whom gratitude and affection should constrain them to remember. There could be no need for this loving exhortation, if there were not a fearful supposition that our memories might prove treacherous, and our remembrance superficial in its character, or changing in its nature. Nor is this a bare supposition: it is, alas, too well confirmed in our experience, not as a possibility, but as a lamentable fact. It seems at first sight too gross a crime to lay at the door of converted men. It appears almost impossible that those who have been redeemed by the blood of the dying Lamb should ever forget their Ransomer; that those who have been loved with an everlasting love by the eternal Son of God, should ever forget that Son; but if startling to the ear, it is alas, too apparent to the eye to allow us to deny the fact. Forget him who ne’er forgot us! Forget him who poured his blood forth for our sins! Forget him who loved us even to the death! Can it be possible? Yes it is not only possible, but conscience confesses that it is too sadly a fault of all of us, that we can remember anything except Christ. The object which we should make the monarch of our hearts, is the very thing we are most inclined to forget. Where one would think that memory would linger, and unmindfulness would be an unknown intruder, that is the spot which is desecrated by the feet of forgetfulness, and that the place where memory too seldom looks. I appeal to the conscience of every Christian here: Can you deny the truth of what I utter? Do you not find yourselves forgetful of Jesus? Some creature steals away your heart, and you are unmindful of him upon whom your affection ought to be set. Some earthly business engrosses your attention when you should have your eye steadily fixed upon the cross. It is the incessant round of world, world, world; the constant din of earth, earth, earth, that takes away the soul from Christ. Oh! my friends, is it not too sadly true that we can recollect anything but Christ, and forget nothing so easy as him whom we ought to remember? While memory will preserve a poisoned weed, it suffereth the Rose of Sharon to wither.

The cause of this is very apparent: it lies in one or two facts. We forget Christ, because regenerate persons as we really are, still corruption and death remain even in the regenerate. We forget him because we carry about with us the old Adam of sin and death. If we were purely new-born creatures, we should never forget the name of him whom we love. If we were entirely regenerated beings, we should sit down and meditate on all our Saviour did and suffered; all he is; all he has gloriously promised to perform; and never would our roving affections stray; but centred, nailed, fixed eternally to one object, we should continually contemplate the death and sufferings of our Lord. But alas! we have a worm in the heart, a pesthouse, a charnel-house within, lusts, vile imaginations, and strong evil passions, which, like wells of poisonous water, send out continually streams of impurity. I have a heart, which God knoweth, I wish I could wring from my body and hurl to an infinite distance; a soul which is a cave of unclean birds, a den of loathsome creatures, where dragons haunt and owls do congregate, where every evil beast of ill-omen dwells; a heart too vile to have a parallel—‘deceitful above all things and desperately wicked.’ This is the reason why I am forgetful of Christ. Nor is this the sole cause. I suspect it lies somewhere else too. We forget Christ because there are so many other things around us to attract our attention. ‘But,’ you say, ‘they ought not to do so, because though they are around us, they are nothing in comparison with Jesus Christ: though they are in dread proximity to our hearts, what are they compared with Christ?’ But do you know, dear friends, that the nearness of an object has a very great effect upon its power? The sun is many, many times larger than the moon, but the moon has a greater influence upon the tides of the ocean than the sun, simply because it is nearer, and has a greater power of attraction. So I find that a little crawling worm of the earth has more effect upon my soul than the glorious Christ in heaven; a handful of golden earth, a puff of fame, a shout of applause, a thriving business, my house, my home, will affect me more than all the glories of the upper world; yea, than the beatific vision itself: simply because earth is near, and heaven is far away. Happy day, when I shall be borne aloft on angels’ wings to dwell for ever near my Lord, to bask in the sunshine of his smile, and to be lost in the ineffable radiance of his lovely countenance. We see then the cause of forgetfulness; let us blush over it; let us be sad that we neglect our Lord so much, and now let us attend to his word, ‘This do in remembrance of me,’ hoping that its solemn sounds may charm away the demon of base ingratitude.

We shall speak, first of all, concerning the blessed object of memory; secondly, upon the advantages to be derived from remembering this Person; thirdly the gracious help, to our memory—‘This do in remembrance of me;’ and fourthly, the gentle command, ‘This do in remembrance of me.’ May the Holy Ghost open my lips and your hearts, that we may receive blessings.

I. First of all, we shall speak of THE GLORIOUS AND PRECIOUS OBJECT OF MEMORY—‘This do in remembrance of me.’ Christians have many treasures to lock up in the cabinet of memory. They ought to remember their election—‘Chosen of God ere time began.’ They ought to be mindful of their extraction, that they were taken out of the miry clay, hewn out of the horrible pit. They ought to recollect their effectual calling, for they were called of God, and rescued by the power of the Holy Ghost. They ought to remember their special deliverances—all that has been done for them, and all the mercies bestowed on them. But there is one whom they should embalm in their souls with the most costly spices—one who, above all other gifts of God, deserves to be had in perpetual remembrance. One I said for I mean not an act, I mean not a deed; but it is a Person whose portrait I would frame in gold, and hang up in the state-room of the soul. I would have you earnest students of all the deeds of the conquering Messiah. I would have you conversant with the life of our Beloved. But O forget not his person; for the text says, ‘This do in remembrance of ME.’ It is Christ’s glorious person which ought to be the object of our remembrance. It is his image which should be enshrined in every temple of the Holy Ghost.
But some will say, ‘How can we remember Christ’s person, when we never saw it? We cannot tell what was the peculiar form of his visage; we believe his countenance to be fairer than that of any other man—although through grief and suffering more marred—but since we did not see it, we cannot remember it, we never saw his feet as they trod the journeys of his mercy; we never beheld his hands as he stretched them out full of lovingkindness; we cannot remember the wondrous intonation of his language, when in more than seraphic eloquence, he awed the multitude, and chained their ears to him; we cannot picture the sweet smile that ever hung on his lips nor that awful frown with which he dealt out anathemas against the Pharisees; we cannot remember him in his sufferings and agonies for we never saw him.’ Well, beloved, I suppose it is true that you cannot remember the visible appearance, for you were not then born, but do you not know that even the apostle said, though he had known Christ after the flesh, yet, thenceforth after the flesh he would know Christ no more. The natural appearance, the race, the descent, the poverty, the humble garb, were nothing in the apostle’s estimation of his glorified Lord. And thus, though you do not know him after the flesh, you may know him after the spirit; in this manner you can remember Jesus as much now as Peter, or Paul, or John, or James, or any of those favoured ones who once trod in his footsteps, walked side by side with him, or laid their heads upon his bosom. Memory annihilates distance and over leapeth time, and can behold the Lord, though he be exalted in glory.

Ah! let us spend five minutes in remembering Jesus. Let us remember him in his baptism, when descending into the waters of Jordan, a voice was heard, saying, ‘This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.’ Behold him coming up dripping from the stream. Surely the conscious water must have blushed that it contained its God. He slept within its waves a moment, to consecrate the tomb of baptism, in which those who are dead with Christ are buried with him. Let us remember him in the wilderness, whither he went straight from his immersion. Oh! I have often thought of that scene in the desert, when Christ, weary and way-worn, sat him down, perhaps upon the gnarled roots of some old tree. Forty days had he fasted, he was an hungered, when in the extremity of his weakness there came the evil spirit. Perhaps he had veiled his demon royalty in the form of some aged pilgrim, and taking up a stone, said, ‘Way-worn pilgrim, if thou be the Son of God command this stone to be made bread.’ Methinks I see him, with his cunning smile, and his malicious leer, as he held the stone, and said ‘If,’—blasphemous if,—‘If thou be the Son of God, command that this stone shall become a meal for me and thee, for both of us are hungry, and it will be an act of mercy; thou canst do it easily, speak the word, and it shall be like the bread of heaven; we will feed upon it, and thou and I will be friends for ever.’ But Jesus said—and O how sweetly did he say it—‘Man shall not live by bread alone.’ Oh! how wonderfully did Christ fight the tempter! Never was there such a battle as that. It was a duel foot to foot—a single-handed combat—when the champion lion of the pit, and the mighty lion of the tribe of Judah, fought together. Splendid sight! Angels stood around to gaze upon the spectacle, just as men of old did sit to see the tournament of noted warriors. There Satan gathered up his strength; here Apollyon concentrated all his satanic power, that in this giant wrestle he might overthrow the seed of the woman. But Jesus was more than a match for him; in the wrestling he gave him a deadly fall, and came off more than a conqueror. Lamb of God! I will remember thy desert strivings, when next I combat with Satan. When next I have a conflict with roaring Diabolus I will look to him who conquered once for all, and broke the dragon’s head with his mighty blows.

Further, I beseech you remember him in all his daily temptations and hourly trials, in that life-long struggle of his, through which he passed. Oh! what a mighty tragedy was the death of Christ! and his life too? Ushered in with a song, it closed with a shriek. ‘It is finished.’ It began in a manger, and ended on a cross; but oh, the sad interval between! Oh! the black pictures of persecution when his friends abhorred him; when his foes frowned at him as he passed the streets; when he heard the hiss of calumny, and was bitten by the foul tooth of envy; when slander said he had a devil and was mad: that he was a drunken man and a wine-bibber—and when his righteous soul was vexed with the ways of the wicked. Oh! Son of God, I must remember thee; I cannot help remembering thee, when I think of those years of toil and trouble which thou didst live for my sake. But you know my chosen theme—the place where I can always best remember Christ. It is a shady garden full of olives. O that spot! I would that I had eloquence, that I might take you there. Oh! if the Spirit would but take us, and set us down hard by the mountains of Jerusalem, I would say, see there runs the brook of Kedron, which the king himself did pass; and there you see the olive trees. Possibly, at the foot of that olive, lay the three disciples when they slept; and there, ah! there, I see drops of blood. Stand here, my soul, a moment, those drops of blood—dost thou behold them? Mark them; they are not the blood of wounds; they are the blood of a man whose body was then unwounded. O my soul picture him when he knelt down in agony and sweat,—sweat, because he wrestled with God,—sweat, because he agonized with his Father. ‘My Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me.’ O Gethsemane! thy shades are deeply solemn to my soul. But ah! those drops of blood! Surely it is the climax of the height of misery; it is the last of the mighty acts of this wondrous sacrifice. Can love go deeper than that? Can it stoop to greater deeds of mercy? Oh! had I eloquence, I would bestow a tongue on every drop of blood that is there; that your hearts might rise in mutiny against your languor and coldness, and speak out with earnest burning remembrance of Jesus. And now, farewell, Gethsemane.

But I will take you somewhere else, where you shall still behold the ‘Man of Sorrows.’ I will lead you to Pilate’s hall, and let you see him endure the mockeries of cruel soldiers: the smitings of mailed gloves, the blows of clenched fists; the shame, the spitting, the plucking of the hair: the cruel buffetings. Oh! can you not picture the King of Martyrs, stript of his garments; exposed to the gaze of fiend-like men? See you not the crown about his temples, each thorn acting as a lancet to pierce his head? Mark you not his lacerated shoulders, and the white bones starting out from the bleeding flesh? Oh, Son of Man! I see thee scourged and flagellated with rods and whips, how can I henceforward cease to remember thee? My memory would be more treacherous than Pilate, did it not ever cry, Ecce Homo,—‘Behold the man.’
Now, finish the scene of woe by a view of Calvary. Think of the pierced hands and the bleeding side; think of the scorching sun, and then the entire darkness; remember the broiling fever and the dread thirst; think of the death shriek, ‘It is finished!’ and of the groans which were its prelude. This is the object of memory. Let us never forget Christ. I beseech you, for the love of Jesus, let him have the chief place in your memories. Let not the pearl of great price be dropped from your careless hand into the dark ocean of oblivion.

I cannot, however, help saying one thing before I leave this head: and that is, there are some of you who can very well carry away what I have said, because you have read it often, and heard it before; but still you cannot spiritually remember anything about Christ, because you never had him manifested to you, and what we have never known, we cannot remember. Thanks be unto God, I speak not of you all, for in this place there is a goodly remnant according to the election of grace, and to them I turn. Perhaps I could tell you of some old barn, hedge-row, or cottage; or if you have lived in London, about some garret, or some dark lane or street, where first you met with Christ; or some chapel into which you strayed, and you might say, ‘Thank God, I can remember the seat where first he met with me, and spoke the whispers of love to my soul, and told me he had purchased me.’

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

Yes, and I would love to build a temple on the spot, and to raise some monument there, where Jehovah-Jesus first spoke to my soul, and manifested himself to me. But he has revealed himself to you more than once—has he not? And you can remember scores of places where the Lord hath appeared of old unto you, saying, ‘Behold I have loved you with an everlasting love.’ If you cannot all remember such things, there are some of you that can; and I am sure they will understand me when I say, come and do this in remembrance of Christ—in remembrance of all his loving visitations, of his sweet wooing words, of his winning smiles upon you, of all he has said and communicated to your souls. Remember all these things to-night, if it be possible for memory to gather up the mighty aggregate of grace.’ Bless the Lord. O my soul, and forget not all his benefits.’

II. Having spoken upon the blessed object of our memory, we say, secondly, a little upon THE BENEFITS TO BE DERIVED FROM A LOVING REMEMBRANCE OF CHRIST.

Love never says, ‘Cui bono?’ [Meaning ‘What’s in it for me?’] Love never asks what benefit it will derive from love. Love from its very nature is a disinterested thing. It loves for the creature’s sake it loves, and for nothing else. The Christian needs no argument to make him love Christ; just as a mother needs no argument to make her love her child. She does it because it is her nature to do so. The new-born creature must love Christ—it cannot help it. Oh! Who can resist the matchless charms of Jesus Christ?—the fairest of ten thousand fairs, the loveliest of ten thousand loves. Who can refuse to adore the prince of perfection, the mirror of beauty, the majestic Son of God? But yet it may be useful to us to observe the advantages of remembering Christ, for they are neither few nor small.

And first, remembrance of Jesus will tend to give you hope when you are under the burden of your sins. Notice a few characters here to-night. There comes in a poor creature. Look at him! He has neglected himself this last month; he looks as if he had hardly eaten his daily bread. What is the matter with you? ‘Oh!’ says he, ‘I have been under a sense of guilt; I have been again and again lamenting, because I fear I can never be forgiven; once I thought I was good, but I have been reading the Bible, and I find that my heart is ‘deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked’; I have tried to reform, but the more I try, the deeper I sink in the mire, there is certainly no hope for me. I feel that I deserve no mercy; it seems to me that God must destroy me, for he has declared, ‘The soul that sinneth it shall die;’ and die I must, be damned I must, for I know I have broken God’s law.’ How will you comfort such a man? What soft words will you utter to give him peace? I know! I will tell him to remember Christ. I will tell him there is one who paid the mighty debt of misery. Yes, I will tell thee drunkard, swearer, whatever thou hast been—I will tell thee that there is one, who for thee hath made a complete atonement; if thou only believest on him thou art safe for ever. Remember him, thou poor dying, hopeless creature, and thou shalt be made to sing for joy and gladness. See, the man believes, and in ecstasy exclaims, ‘Oh! come all ye that fear God, and I will tell you what he hath done for my soul.’

‘Tell it unto sinners, tell,
I am, I am out of hell.’

Hallelujah! God hath blotted out my sins like a thick cloud! That is one benefit to be derived from remembering Christ. It gives us hope under a sense of sin, and tells us there is mercy yet.

Now, I must have another character. And what does he say? ‘I cannot stand it any longer; I have been persecuted and ill-treated, because I love Christ; I am mocked, and laughed at, and despised: I try to bear it, but I really cannot. A man will be a man; tread upon a worm and he will turn upon you; my patience altogether fails me; I am in such a peculiar position that it is of no use to advise me to have patience, for patience I cannot have; my enemies are slandering me, and I do not know what to do.’ What shall we say to that poor man? How shall we give him patience? What shall we preach to him? You have heard what he has to say about himself. How shall we comfort him under this great trial? If we suffered the same, what should we wish some friend to say to us? Shall we tell him that other persons have borne as much? He will say, ‘Miserable comforters are ye all!’ No, I will tell him, Brother, you are persecuted; but remember the words of Jesus Christ, how he spake unto us, and said, ‘Rejoice in that day, and leap for joy, for great is your reward in heaven, for so persecuted they the prophets that were before you.’ My brother! think of him, who when he died, prayed for his murderers, and said, ‘Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.’ All you have to bear, is as nothing compared with his mighty sufferings. Take courage; face it again like a man; never say die. Let not your patience be gone; take up your cross daily, and follow Christ. Let him be your motto; set him before your eyes. And, now, receiving this, hear what the man will say. He tells you at once—‘Hail, persecution; welcome shame; Disgrace for Jesus shall be my honour, and scorn shall be my highest glory.

‘Now, for the love I bear his name,
What was my gain I count my loss,
I pour contempt on all my shame,
And nail my glory to his cross.’

There is another effect, you see, of remembering Christ. It tends to give us patience under persecution. It is a girdle to brace up the loins, so that our faith may endure to the end.

Dear friends, I should occupy your time too much if I went into the several benefits; so I will only just run over one or two blessings to be received. It will give us strength in temptation. I believe that there are hours with every man when he has a season of terrific temptation. There was never a vessel that lived upon the mighty deep but sometimes it has to do battle with a storm. There she is, the poor barque, rocked up and down on the mad waves. See how they throw her from wave to wave, all toss her to mid heaven. The winds laugh her to scorn. Old Ocean takes the ship in his dripping fingers, and shakes it to and fro. How the mariners cry out for fear! Do you know how you can put oil upon the waters, and all shall be still? Yes, One potent word shall do it. Let Jesus come; let the poor heart remember Jesus, and steadily then the ship shall sail, for Christ has the helm. The winds shall blow no more, for Christ shall bid them shut their mighty mouths, and never again disturb his Child. There is nothing which can give you strength in temptation, and help you to weather the storm like the name of Jesus Christ, the incarnate Son of God. Then again, what comfort it will give you on a sick bed—the name of Christ! It will help you to be patient to those who wait upon you, and to endure the sufferings which you have to bear; yea, it shall be so with you, that you shall have more hope in sickness than in health, and shall find a blessed sweetness in the bitterness of gall. Instead of feeling vinegar in your mouth, through your trouble, you shall find honey for sweetness, in the midst of all the trial and trouble that God will put upon you, ‘For he giveth songs in the night.’

But just to close up the advantages of remembering Christ, do you know where you will have the benefit most of all? Do you know the place where chiefly you will rejoice that you ever thought of him? I will take you to it. Hush! Silence! You are going up stairs into a lonely room. The curtains hang down. Some one stands there weeping. Children are around the bed, and friends are there. See that man lying? That is yourself: Look at how his eyes are your eyes; his hands are your hands. That is yourself: You will be there soon Man! that is yourself: Do you see it? It is a picture of yourself: Those are your eyes that soon will be closed in death—your hands that will lie stiff and motionless—your lips that will be dry and parched, between which they will put drops of water. Those are your words that freeze in air, and drop so slowly from your dying lips. I wonder whether you will be able to remember Christ there. If you do not, I will picture you. Behold that man, straight up in the bed; see his eyes starting from their sockets. His friends are all around, they ask him what he sees. He represses the emotion; he tells them he sees nothing. They know that there is something before his eyes. He starts again. Good God! what is that I see—I seem to see? That is it? Ah! one sigh! The soul is gone. The body is there. What did he see? He saw a flaming throne of judgment; he saw God upon it with his sceptre, he saw books opened, he beheld the throne of God, and saw a messenger, with a sword brandished in the air to smite him low. Man! that is thyself; there thou wilt be soon. That picture is thine own portrait. I have photographed thee to the life. Look at it. That is where thou shalt be within a few years—ay, within a few days. But if thou canst remember Christ, shall I tell thee what thou wilt do? Oh! thou wilt smile in the midst of trouble. Let me picture such a man. They put pillows behind him; he sits up in bed, and takes the hand of the loved one, and says, ‘Farewell! weep not for me; the kind God shall wipe away all tears from every eye.’ Those round about are addressed ‘Prepare to meet your God, and follow me to the land of bliss.’ Now he has set his house in order. It is done. Behold him, like good old Jacob, leaning on his staff, about to die. See how his eyes sparkle; he claps his hands; they gather round to hear what he has to say; He whispers ‘Victory!’ and summoning a little more strength, he cries, ‘Victory!’ and at last, with his final gasp, ‘Victory, through him that loved us!’ and he dies. This is one of the great benefits to be derived from remembering Christ—to be enabled to meet death with blessed composure.

III. We are now arrived at the third portion of our meditations which is A SWEET AID TO MEMORY.

At schools we used certain books, called ‘Aids to Memory.’ I am sure they rather perplexed than assisted me. Their utility was equivalent to that of a bundle of staves under a traveller’s arm: true he might use them one by one to walk with, but in the mean time he carried a host of others which he would never need. But our Saviour was wiser than all our teachers, and his remembrancers are true and real aids to memory. His love tokens have an unmistakable language, and they sweetly win our attention.

Behold the whole mystery of the sacred Eucharist. It is bread and wine which are lively emblems of the body and blood of Jesus. The power to excite remembrance consists in the appeal thus made to the senses. Here the eye, the hand, the mouth, find joyful work. The bread is tasted, and entering within, works upon the sense of taste, which is one of the most powerful. The wine is sipped—the act is palpable; we know that we are drinking and thus the senses which are usually clogs to the soul, become wings to lift the mind in contemplation. Again, much of the influence of this ordinance is found in its simplicity. How beautifully simple the ceremony is—bread broken and wine poured out. There is no calling that thing a chalice, that thing a paten, and that a host. Here is nothing to burden the memory—here is the simple bread and wine. He must have no memory at all who cannot remember that he has eaten bread, and that he has been drinking wine. Note again, the mighty pregnancy of these signs—how full they are of meaning. Bread broken—so was your Saviour broken. Bread to be eaten—so his flesh is meat indeed. Wine poured out, the pressed juice of the grape—so was your Saviour crushed under the foot of divine justice; his blood is your sweetest wine. Wine to cheer your heart—so does the blood of Jesus. Wine to strengthen and invigorate you—so does the blood of the mighty sacrifice. Oh! make that bread and wine to your souls to-night a sweet and blessed help of remembrance of that dear Man who once on Calvary died. Like the little ewe lamb, you are now to eat your Master’s bread and drink from his cup. Remember the hand which feeds you.

But before you can remember Christ well here, you must ask the assistance of the Holy Spirit. I believe there ought to be a preparation before the Lord’s Supper. I do not believe in Mrs. Toogood’s preparation, who spent a week in preparing, and then finding it was not the Ordinance Sunday, she said she had lost all the week. I do not believe in that kind of preparation, but I do believe in a holy preparation for the Lord’s Supper: when we can on a Saturday if possible, spend an hour in quiet meditation on Christ, and the passion of Jesus; when, especially on the Sabbath afternoon, we can devoutly sit down and behold him, then these scenes become realities, and not mockeries, as they are to some. I fear greatly that there are some of you who will eat the bread to night, and will not think about Christ; some of you who will drink the wine, and not think of his blood: and vile hypocrites you will be while you do it. Take heed to yourselves, ‘He that eateth and drinketh unworthily, eateth and drinketh—what?—‘damnation to himself.’ This is a plain English word; mind what you are doing! Do not do it carelessly; for of all the sacred things on earth, it is the most solemn. We have heard of some men banded together by draining blood from their arms and drinking it all round; that was most horrid, but at the same time most solemn. Here you are to drink blood from the veins of Christ and sip the trickling stream which gushed from his own loving heart. Is not that a solemn thing? Ought anybody to trifle with it? To go to church and take it for sixpence? To come and join us for the sake of getting charities? Out upon it! It is an awful blasphemy against Almighty God, and amongst the damned in hell, those shall be among the most accursed who dared thus to mock the holy ordinance of God. This is the remembrance of Christ; ‘This do in remembrance of me.’ If you cannot do it in remembrance of Christ, I beseech you, as you love your souls, do not do it at all. Oh! regenerate man or woman, enter not into the court of the priests, lest Israel’s God resent the intrusion.

IV. And now to close up. Here is A SWEET COMMAND: ‘This do in remembrance of me.’ To whom does this command apply? ‘This do YE.’ It is important to answer this question—‘This do YE,’ Who are intended? Ye who put your trust in me. ‘This do ye in remembrance of me.’ Well, now, you should suppose Christ speaking to you to-night; and he says, ‘This do ye in remembrance of me.’ Christ watches you at the door. Some of you go home, and Christ says, ‘I thought I said, ‘This do ye in remembrance of me.’’ Some of you keep your seats as spectators. Christ sits with you, and he says, ‘I thought I said, ‘This do ye in remembrance of me.’’ ‘Lord, I know you did.’ ‘Do you love me then?’ ‘Yes, I love thee; I love, Lord; thou knowest I do.’ ‘But, I say, go down there—eat that bread, drink that wine.’ ‘I do not like to Lord; I should have to be baptized if I joined that church, and I am afraid I shall catch cold, or be looked at. I am afraid to go before the church, for I think they would ask some questions I could not answer.’ ‘What,’ says Christ, ‘is this all you love me? Is this all your affection to your Lord? Oh! how cold to me, your Saviour. If I had loved you no more than this, you would have been in hell: if that were the full extent of my affection, I should not have died for you. Great love bore great agonies; and is this all your gratitude to me?’ Are not some of you ashamed, after this? Do you not say in your hearts, ‘it is really wrong?’ Christ says ‘Do this in remembrance of me,’ and are you not ashamed to stay away? I give a free invitation to every lover of Jesus to come to this table. I beseech you, deny not yourselves the privilege by refusing to unite with the church. If you still live in sinful neglect of this ordinance, let me remind you that Christ has said, ‘Whosoever shall be ashamed of me in this generation, of him will I be ashamed, when I come in the glory of my Father.’ Oh, soldier of the cross, act not the coward’s part!

And not to lead you into any mistakes, I must just add one thing, and then I have done. When I speak of your taking the ordinance of the Lord’s Supper, do not imagine that I wish you for one moment to suppose that there is anything saving in it. Some say that the ordinance of baptism is non-essential, so is the ordinance of the Lord’s Supper, it is non-essential, if we look upon it in the light of salvation. Be saved by eating a piece of bread! nonsense, confounded nonsense! Be saved by drinking a drop of wine! Why, it is too absurd for common sense to admit any discussion upon. You know it is the blood of Jesus Christ; it is the merit of his agonies; it is the purchase of his sufferings; it is what he did, that alone can save us. Venture on him; venture wholly, and then you are saved. Hearest thou, poor convinced sinner, the way of salvation? If I ever meet thee in the next world, thou mightest, perhaps, say to me, ‘I spent one evening, sir, in hearing you, and you never told me the way to heaven.’ Well, thou shalt hear it. Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, trust in his name, find refuge in his cross, rely upon the power of his Spirit, trust in his righteousness, and thou art saved beyond the vengeance of the law, or the power of hell. But trust in thine own works, and thou art lost as sure as thou art alive.

Now, O ever glorious Son of God, we approach thy table to feast on the viands of grace, permit each of us, in reliance upon thy Spirit, to exclaim in the words of one of thine own poets:

‘Remember thee, and all thy pains
And all thy love to me—
Yes, while a pulse or breath remains,
I will remember thee.
And when these failing lips grow dumb
And thought and memory flee
When thou shalt in thy kingdom come,
Jesus, remember me!’

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‘I am the Lord, I change not; therefore ye sons of Jacob are not consumed.’—Malachi 3:6.

IT has been said by some one that ‘the proper study of mankind is man.’ I will not oppose the idea, but I believe it is equally true that the proper study of God’s elect is God; the proper study of a Christian is the Godhead. The highest science, the loftiest speculation, the mightiest philosophy, which can ever engage the attention of a child of God, is the name, the nature, the person, the work, the doings, and the existence of the great God whom he calls his Father. There is something exceedingly improving to the mind in a contemplation of the Divinity. It is a subject so vast, that all our thoughts are lost in its immensity; so deep, that our pride is drowned in its infinity. Other subjects we can compass and grapple with; in them we feel a kind of self-content, and go our way with the thought, ‘Behold I am wise.’ But when we come to this master-science, finding that our plumb-line cannot sound its depth, and that our eagle eye cannot see its height, we turn away with the thoughts that vain man would be wise, but he is like a wild ass’s colt and with the solemn exclamation, ‘I am but of yesterday, and know nothing.’ No subject of contemplation will tend more to humble the mind, than thoughts of God. We shall be obliged to feel

‘Great God, how infinite art thou,

What worthless worms are we!’

But while the subject humbles the mind it also expands it. He who often thinks of God, will have a larger mind than the man who simply plods around this narrow globe. He may be a naturalist, boasting of his ability to dissect a beetle, anatomize a fly, or arrange insects and animals in classes with well nigh unutterable names; he may be a geologist, able to discourse of the megatherium and the plesiosaurus, and all kinds of extinct animals, he may imagine that his science, whatever it is, ennobles and enlarges his mind. I dare say it does, but after all, the most excellent study for expanding the soul is the  science of Christ, and him crucified, and the knowledge of the Godhead in the glorious Trinity. Nothing will so enlarge the intellect, nothing so magnify the whole soul of man, as a devout, earnest, continued investigation of the great subject of the Deity. And, whilst humbling and expanding, this subject is eminently consolatory. Oh, there is, in contemplating Christ, a balm for every wound, in musing on the Father, there is a quietus for every grief; and in the influence of the Holy Ghost, there is a balsam for every sore. Would you lose your sorrows? Would you drown your cares? Then go plunge yourself in the Godhead’s deepest sea; be lost in his immensity; and you shall come forth as from a couch of rest, refreshed and invigorated. I know nothing which can so comfort the soul, so calm the swelling billows of grief and sorrow; so speak peace to the winds of trial, as a devout musing upon the subject of the Godhead. It is to that subject that I invite you this morning. We shall present you with one view of it—that is the immutability of the glorious Jehovah. ‘I am,’ says my text, ‘Jehovah,’ (for so it should be translated) ‘I am Jehovah, I change not; therefore ye sons of Jacob are not consumed.’

There are three things this morning. First of all, an unchanging God; secondly, the persons who derive benefit from this glorious attribute, ‘the sons of Jacob;’ and thirdly, the benefit they so derive, they ‘are not consumed.’ We address ourselves to these points.

1. First of all, we have set before us the doctrine of THE IMMUTABILITY OF GOD. ‘I am God, I change not.’ Here I shall attempt to expound, or rather to enlarge the thought, and then afterwards to bring a few arguments to prove its truth.

2. I shall offer some exposition of my text, by first saying, that God is Jehovah, and he changes not in his essence. We cannot tell you what Godhead is. We do not know what substance that is which we call God. It is an existence, it is a being; but what that is we know not. However, whatever it is, we call it his essence, and that essence never changes. The substance of mortal things is ever changing. The mountains with their snow-white crowns, doff their old diadems in summer, in rivers trickling down their sides, while the storm cloud gives them another coronation; the ocean, with its mighty floods, loses its water when the sunbeams kiss the waves, and snatch them in mists to heaven; even the sun himself requires fresh fuel from the hand of the Infinite Almighty, to replenish his ever-burning furnace. All creatures change. Man, especially as to his body, is always undergoing revolution. Very probably there is not a single particle in my body which was in it a few years ago. This frame has been worn away by activity, its atoms have been removed by friction, fresh particles of matter have in the mean time constantly accrued to my body, and so it has been replenished—but its substance is altered. The fabric of which this world is made is ever passing away; like a stream of water, drops are running away and others are following after, keeping the river still full, but always changing in its elements. But God is perpetually the same. He is not composed of any substance or material, but is spirit—pure, essential, and ethereal spirit—and therefore he is immutable. He remains everlastingly the same. There are no furrows on his eternal brow. No age hath palsied him; no years have marked him with the mementoes of their flight; he sees ages pass, but with him it is ever now. He is the great I AM—the Great Unchangeable. Mark you, his essence did not undergo a change when it became united with the manhood. When Christ in past years did gird himself with mortal clay the essence of his divinity was not changed; flesh did not become God, nor did God become flesh by a real actual change of nature; the two were united in hypostatical union, but the Godhead was still the same. It was the same when he was a babe in the manger, as it was when he stretched the curtains of heaven; it was the same God that hung upon the cross, and whose blood flowed down in a purple river, the self-same God that holds the world upon his everlasting shoulders, and bears in his hands the keys of death and hell. He never has been changed in his essence, not even by his incarnation; he remains everlastingly, eternally, the one unchanging God, the Father of lights, with whom there is no variableness, neither the shadow of a change.

3. He changes not in his attributes. Whatever the attributes of God were of old, that they are now; and of each of them we may sing ‘As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end, Amen.’ Was he powerful? Was he the mighty God when he spake the world out of the womb of non-existence? Was he the Omnipotent when he piled the mountains and scooped out the hollow places for the rolling deep? Yes, he was powerful then, and his arm is unpalsied now; he is the same giant in his might; the sap of his nourishment is undried, and the strength of his soul stands the same for ever. Was he wise when he constituted this mighty globe, when he laid the foundations of the universe? Had he wisdom when he planned the way of our salvation, and when from all eternity he marked out his awful plans? Yes and he is wise now; he is not less skilful, he has not less knowledge; his eye which seeth all things is undimmed, his ear which heareth all the cries, sighs sobs, and groans of his people, is not rendered heavy by the years which he hath heard their prayers. He is unchanged in his wisdom; he knows as much now as ever, neither more nor less; he has the same consummate skill, and the same infinite forecastings. He is unchanged, blessed be his name, in his justice. Just and holy was he in the past, just and holy is he now. He is unchanged in his truth; he has promised, and he brings it to pass; he hath said it, and it shall be done. He varies not in the goodness, and generosity, and benevolence of his nature. He is not become an Almighty tyrant, whereas he was once an Almighty Father; but his strong love stands like a granite rock, unmoved by the hurricanes of our iniquity. And blessed be his dear name, he is unchanged in his love. When he first wrote the covenant, how full his heart was with affection to his people. He knew that his Son must die to ratify the articles of that agreement. He knew right well that he must rend his best beloved from his bowels, and send him down to earth to bleed and die. He did not hesitate to sign that mighty covenant; nor did he shun its fulfilment. He loves as much now as he did then; and when suns shall cease to shine, and moons to show their feeble light, he still shall love on for ever and for ever. Take any one attribute of God, and I will write semper idem on it (always the same.) Take any one thing you can say of God now, and it may be said not only in the dark past, but in the bright future it shall always remain the same: ‘I am Jehovah, I change not.’

4. Then again, God changes not in his plans. That man began to build, but was not able to finish, and therefore he changed his plan, as every wise man would do in such a case- he built upon a smaller foundation and commenced again. But has it ever been said that God began to build but was not able to finish? Nay. When he hath boundless stores at his command, and when his own right hand would create worlds as numerous as drops of morning dew, shall he ever stay because he has not power? and reverse, or alter, or disarrange his plan, because he cannot carry it out? ‘But,’ say some, ‘perhaps God never had a plan.’ Do you think God is more foolish than yourself then, sir? Do you go to work without a plan? ‘No,’ say you, ‘I have always a scheme.’ So has God. Every man has his plan, and God has a plan too. God is a master-mind; he arranged everything in his gigantic intellect long before he did it; and once having settled it, mark you, he never alters it. ‘This shall be done,’ saith he, and the iron hand of destiny marks it down, and it is brought to pass. ‘This is my purpose,’ and it stands, nor can earth or hell alter it. ‘This is my decree,’ saith he, promulgate it angels; rend it down from the gate of heaven ye devils; but ye cannot alter the decree; it shall be done. God altereth not his plans; why should he? He is Almighty, and therefore can perform his pleasure. Why should he? He is the All-wise, and therefore cannot have planned wrongly. Why should he? He is the everlasting God, and therefore cannot die before his plan is accomplished. Why should he change? Ye worthless atoms of existence, ephemera of the day! ye creeping insects upon this bay-leaf of existence! ye may change your plans, but he shall never, never change his. Then has he told me that his plan is to save me? If so, I am safe.

‘My name from the palms of his hands

Eternity will not erase;

Impress’d on his heart it remains,

In marks of indelible grace.’

5. Yet again, God is unchanging in his promises. Ah! we love to speak about the sweet promises of God; but if we could ever suppose that one of them could be changed, we would not talk anything more about them. If I thought that the notes of the bank of England could not be cashed next week, I should decline to take them, and if I thought that God’s promises would never be fulfilled—if I thought that God would see it right to alter some word in his promises—farewell Scriptures! I want immutable things: and I find that I have immutable promises when I turn to the Bible: for, ‘by two immutable things in which it is impossible for God to lie,’ he hath signed, confirmed, and sealed every promise of his. The gospel is not ‘yea and nay,’ it is not promising to-day, and denying to-morrow, but the gospel is ‘yea, yea,’ to the glory of God. Believer! there was a delightful promise which you had yesterday; and this morning when you turned to the Bible the promise was not sweet. Do you know why? Do you think the promise had changed? Ah, no! You changed; that is where the matter lies. You had been eating some of the grapes of Sodom, and your mouth was thereby put out of taste, and you could not detect the sweetness. But there was the same honey there, depend upon it, the same preciousness. ‘Oh!’ says one child of God ‘I had built my house firmly once upon some stable promises; there came a wind and I said, O Lord, I am cast down and I shall be lost.’ Oh! the promises were not cast down; the foundations were not removed; it was your little ‘wood, hay, stubble’ hut, that you had been building. It was that which fell down. You have been shaken on the rock, not the rock under you. But let me tell you what is the best way of living in the world. I have heard that a gentleman said to a negro, ‘I can’t think how it is you are always so happy in the Lord, and I am often downcast.’ ‘Why massa,’ said he, ‘I throw myself flat down on the promise—there I lie; you stand on the promise—you have a little to do with it, and down you go when the wind comes, and then you cry, “Oh, I am down,” whereas I go flat on the promise at once and that is why I fear no fall.’ Then let us always say, ‘Lord there is the promise; it is thy business to fulfil it.’ Down I go on the promise flat! No standing up for me. That is where you should go-prostrate on the promise; and remember, every promise is a rock, an unchanging thing. Therefore, at his feet cast yourself, and rest there forever.

6. But now comes one jarring note to spoil the theme. To some of you God is unchanging in his threatenings. If every promise stands fast, and every oath of the covenant is fulfilled, hark thee, sinner!—mark the word—hear the death-knell of thy carnal hopes; see the funeral of the fleshy trustings. Every threatening of God, as well as every promise shall be fulfilled. Talk of decrees! I will tell you of a decree: ‘He that believeth not shall be damned.’ That is a decree, and a statute that can never change. Be as good as you please, be as moral as you can, be as honest as you will, walk as uprightly as you may,—there stands the unchangeable threatening: ‘He that believeth not shall be damned.’ What sayest thou to that, moralist? Oh, thou wishest thou couldst alter it, and say, ‘He that does not live a holy life shall be damned.’ That will be true; but it does not say so. It says, ‘He that believeth not.’ Here is the stone of stumbling, and the rock of offense; but you cannot alter it. You believe or be damned, saith the Bible; and mark, that threat of God is as unchangeable as God himself. And when a thousand years of hell’s torments shall have passed away, you shall look on high, and see written in burning letters of fire, ‘He that believeth not shall be damned.’ ‘But, Lord, I am damned.’ Nevertheless it says ‘shall be’ still. And when a million acres have rolled away, and you are exhausted by your pains and agonies you shall turn up your eye and still read ‘SHALL BE DAMNED,’ unchanged, unaltered. And when you shall have thought that eternity must have spun out its last thread—that every particle of that which we call eternity must have run out, you shall still see it written up there, ‘SHALL BE DAMNED.’ O terrific thought! How dare I utter it? But I must. Ye must be warned, sirs, ‘lest ye also come into this place of torment.’ Ye must be told rough things for if God’s gospel is not a rough thing; the law is a rough thing; Mount Sinai is a rough thing. Woe unto the watchman that warns not the ungodly! God is unchanging in his threatenings. Beware, O sinner, for ‘it is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.’

7. We must just hint at one thought before we pass away, and that is—God is unchanging in the objects of his love—not only in his love, but in the objects of it.

‘If ever it should come to pass

That sheep of Christ might fall away,

My fickle, feeble soul, alas,

Would fall a thousand times a day.’

If one dear saint of God had perished, so might all; if one of the covenant ones be lost, so may all be, and then there is no gospel promise true; but the Bible is a lie, and there is nothing in it worth my acceptance. I will be an infidel at once, when I can believe that a saint of God can ever fall finally. If God hath loved me once, then he will love me for ever.

‘Did Jesus once upon me shine,

Then Jesus is for ever mine.’

The objects of everlasting love never change. Those whom God hath called, he will justify; whom he has justified, he will sanctify; and whom he sanctifies, he will glorify.

1. Thus having taken a great deal too much time, perhaps, in simply expanding the thought of an unchanging God, I will now try to prove that he is unchangeable, I am not much of an argumentative preacher, but one argument that I will mention is this: the very existence, and being of a God, seem to me to imply immutability. Let me think a moment. There is a God; this God rules and governs all things- this God fashioned the world- he upholds and maintains it. What kind of being must he be? It does strike me that you cannot think of a changeable God. I conceive that the thought is so repugnant to common sense, that if you for one moment think of a changing God, the words seem to clash, and you are obliged to say, ‘Then he must be a kind of man,’ and get a Mormonite idea of God. I imagine it is impossible to conceive of a changing God; it is so to me. Others may be capable of such an idea, but I could not entertain it. I could no more think of a changing God, than I could of a round square, or any other absurdity. The thing seems so contrary, that I am obliged, when once I say God, to include the idea of an unchanging being.

2. Well, I think that one argument will be enough, but another good argument may be found in the fact of God’s perfection. I believe God to be a perfect being. Now, if he is a perfect being, he cannot change. Do you not see this? Suppose I am perfect to-day. If it were possible for me to change, should I be perfect tomorrow after the alteration? If I changed, I must either change from a good state to a better—and then if I could get better, I could not be perfect now—or else from a better state to a worse—and if I were worse, I should not be perfect then. If I am perfect, I cannot be altered without being imperfect. If I am perfect to-day, I must keep the same to-morrow if I am to be perfect then. So, if God is perfect, he must be the same; for change would imply imperfection now, or imperfection then.

3. Again, there is the fact of God’s infinity, which puts change out of the question. God is an infinite being. What do you mean by that? There is no man who can tell you what he means by an infinite being. But there cannot be two infinities. If one thing is infinite, there is no room for anything else, for infinite means all. It means not bounded, not finite, having no end. Well, there cannot be two infinities. If God is infinite to-day, and then should change and be infinite tomorrow there would be two infinities. But that cannot be. Suppose he is infinite and then changes, he must become finite, and could not be God, either he is finite to-day and finite to-morrow, or infinite today and finite to-morrow, or finite today and infinite to-morrow—all of which suppositions are equally absurd. The fact of his being an infinite being at once quashes the thought of his being a changeable being. Infinity has written on its very brow the word ‘immutability.’

4. But then, dear friends, let us look at the past: and there we shall gather some proofs of God’s immutable nature. ‘Hath he spoken, and hath he not done it? Hath he sworn, and hath it not come to pass?’ Can it not be said of Jehovah, ‘He hath done all his will, and he hath accomplished all his purpose?’ Turn ye to Philistia; ask where she is. God said, ‘Howl Ashdod, and ye gates of Gaza, for ye shall fall,’ and where are they? Where is Edom? Ask Petra and its ruined walls. Will they not echo back the truth that God hath said, ‘Edom shall be a prey, and shall be destroyed?’ Where is Babel, and where Nineveh? Where Moab and where Ammon? Where are the nations God hath said he would destroy? Hath he not uprooted them and cast out the remembrance of them from the earth? And hath God cast off his people? Hath he once been unmindful of his promise? Hath he once broken his oath and covenant, or once departed from his plan? Ah! no. Point to one instance in history where God has changed! Ye cannot sirs; for throughout all history there stands the fact, that God has been immutable in his purposes. Methinks I hear some one say, ‘I can remember one passage in Scripture where God changed!’ And so did I think once. The case I mean, is that of the death of Hezekiah. Isaiah came in and said, ‘Hezekiah, you must die, your disease is incurable, set your house in order.’ He turned his face to the wall and began to pray; and before Isaiah was in the outer court, he was told to go back and say, ‘Thou shalt live fifteen years more.’ You may think that proves that God changes; but really I cannot see in it the slightest proof in the world. How do you know that God did not know that? Oh! but God did know it; he knew that Hezekiah would live. Then he did not change, for if he knew that, how could he change? That is what I want to know. But do you know one little thing?—that Hezekiah’s son Manasseh, was not born at that time, and that had Hezekiah died, there would have been no Manasseh, and no Josiah, and no Christ, because Christ came from that very line. You will find that Manasseh was twelve years old when his father died; so that he must have been born three years after this. And do you not believe that God decreed the birth of Manasseh, and foreknew it? Certainly. Then he decreed that Isaiah should go and tell Hezekiah that his disease was incurable, and then say also in the same breath, ‘But I will cure it, and thou shalt live.’ He said that to stir up Hezekiah to prayer. He spoke, in the first place as a man. ‘According to all human probability your disease is incurable, and you must die.’ Then he waited till Hezekiah prayed—then came a little ‘but’ at the end of the sentence. Isaiah had not finished the sentence. He said, ‘You must put your house in order for there is no human cure—but’ (and then he walked out. Hezekiah prayed a little, and then he came in again, and said) ‘But I will heal thee.’ Where is there any contradiction there, except in the brain of those who fight against the Lord, and wish to make him a changeable being.

II. Now secondly, let me say a word on THE PERSONS TO WHOM THIS UNCHANGEABLE GOD IS A BENEFIT. ‘I am God, I change not; therefore ye sons of Jacob are not consumed.’ Now, who are ‘the sons of Jacob,’ who can rejoice in an immutable God?

1. First, they are the sons of God’s election; for it is written, ‘Jacob have I loved, and Esau have I hated, the children being not yet born, neither having done good nor evil.’ It was written, ‘The elder shall serve the younger.’ ‘The sons of Jacob’

‘Are the sons of God’s election,

Who through sovereign grace believe;

By eternal destination

Grace and glory they receive.’

God’s elect are here meant by ‘the sons of Jacob,’—those whom he foreknew and fore-ordained to everlasting salvation.

2. By ‘the sons of Jacob’ are meant, in the second place, persons who enjoy peculiar rights and titles. Jacob, you know, had no rights by birth; but he soon acquired them. He changed a mess of pottage with his brother Esau, and thus gained the birthright. I do not justify the means; but he did also obtain the blessing, and so acquired peculiar rights. By ‘the sons of Jacob’ here, are meant persons who have peculiar rights and titles. Unto them that believe, he hath given the right and power to become sons of God. They have an interest in the blood of Christ; they have a right to ‘enter in through the gates into the city;’ they have a title to eternal honours; they have a promise to everlasting glory; they have a right to call themselves sons of God. Oh! there are peculiar rights and privileges belonging to the ‘sons of Jacob.’

3. But, then next, these ‘sons of Jacob’ were men of peculiar manifestations. Jacob had had peculiar manifestations from his God, and thus he was highly honoured. Once at night-time he lay down and slept; he had the hedges for his curtains, the sky for his canopy, a stone for his pillow, and the earth for his bed. Oh! then he had a peculiar manifestation. There was a ladder, and he saw the angels-of God ascending and descending. He thus had a manifestation of Christ Jesus, as the ladder which reaches from earth to heaven, up and down which angels came to bring us mercies. Then what a manifestation there was at Mahanaim when the angels of God met him; and again at Peniel, when he wrestled with God and saw him face to face. Those were peculiar manifestations; and this passage refers to those who, like Jacob, have had peculiar manifestations.

Now then, how many of you have had personal manifestations? ‘Oh!’ you say ‘that is enthusiasm; that is fanaticism.’ Well, it is a blessed enthusiasm too, for the sons of Jacob have had peculiar manifestations. They have talked with God as a man talketh with his friend; they have whispered in the ear of Jehovah; Christ hath been with them to sup with them, and they with Christ; and the Holy Spirit hath shone into their souls with such a mighty radiance that they could not doubt about special manifestations. The ‘sons of Jacob’ are the men who enjoy these manifestations.

4. Then again, they are men of peculiar trials. Ah! poor Jacob! I should not choose Jacob’s lot if I had not the prospect of Jacob’s blessing; for a hard lot his was. He had to run away from his father’s house to Laban’s; and then that surly old Laban cheated him all the years he was there—cheated him of his wife, threatened him in his wages, cheated him in his flocks, and cheated him all through the story. By-and-by he had to run away from Laban, who pursued him and overtook him. Next came Esau with four hundred men to cut him up root and branch. Then there was a season of prayer, and afterwards he wrestled, and had to go all his life with his thigh out of joint. But a little further on, Raphael, his dear beloved, died. Then his daughter Dinah is led astray, and the sons murder the Shechemites. Anon there is dear Joseph sold into Egypt, and a famine comes. Then Reuben goes up to his couch and pollutes it; Judah commits incest with his own daughter-in-law, and all his sons become a plague to him. At last Benjamin is taken away and the old man, almost broken-hearted, cries ‘Joseph is not, and Simeon is not, and ye will take Benjamin away.’ Never was man more tried than Jacob, all through the one sin of cheating his brother. All through his life God chastised him. But I believe there are many who can sympathize with dear old Jacob. They have had to pass through trials very much like his. Well, cross-bearers! God says, ‘I change not; therefore ye sons of Jacob are not consumed.’ Poor tried souls! ye are not consumed because of the unchanging nature of your God. Now do not get fretting, and say, with the self-conceit of misery, ‘I am the man who hath seen affliction.’ Why ‘the Man of Sorrows’ was afflicted more than you; Jesus was indeed a mourner. You only see the skirts of the garments of affliction. You never have trials like his. You do not understand what troubles mean; you have hardly sipped the cup of trouble; you have only had a drop or two, but Jesus drunk the dregs. Fear not saith God, ‘I am the Lord, I change not; therefore ye sons of Jacob,’ men of peculiar trials, ‘are not consumed.’

5. Then one more thought about who are the ‘sons of Jacob,’ for I should like you to find out whether you are ‘sons of Jacob,’ yourselves. They are men of peculiar character; for though there were some things about Jacob’s character which we cannot commend, there are one or two things which God commends. There was Jacob’s faith, by which Jacob had his name written amongst the mighty worthies who obtained not the promises on earth, but shall obtain them in heaven. Are you men of faith, beloved? Do you know what it is to walk by faith, to live by faith, to get your temporary food by faith, to live on spiritual manna—all by faith? Is faith the rule of your life? If so, you are the ‘sons of Jacob.’

Then Jacob was a man of prayer—a man who wrestled, and groaned, and prayed. There is a man up yonder who never prayed this morning, before coming up to the house of God. Ah! you poor heathen don’t you pray? No! he says ‘I never thought of such a thing- for years I have not prayed.’ Well, I hope you may before you die. Live and die without prayer, and you will pray long enough when you get to hell. There is a woman: she did not pray this morning; she was so busy sending her children to the Sunday- school, she had no time to pray. No time to pray? Had you time to dress? There is a time for every purpose under heaven, and if you had purposed to pray, you would have prayed. Sons of God cannot live without prayer. They are wrestling Jacobs. They are men in whom the Holy Ghost so works, that they can no more live without prayer than I can live without breathing. They must pray. Sirs, mark you, if you are living without prayer, you are living without Christ; and dying like that, your portion will be in the lake which burneth with fire. God redeem you, God rescue you from such a lot! But you who are ‘the sons of Jacob,’ take comfort, for God is immutable.

III. Thirdly, I can say only a word about the other point—THE BENEFIT WHICH THESE ‘SONS OF JACOB’ RECEIVE FROM AN UNCHANGING GOD. ‘Therefore ye sons Jacob are not consumed.’ ‘Consumed?’ How? how can man be consumed? Why, there are two ways. We might have been consumed in hell. If God had been a changing God, the ‘sons of Jacob’ here this morning, might have been consumed in hell; but for God’s unchanging love I should have been a faggot in the fire. But there is a way of being consumed in this world; there is such a thing as being condemned before you die—‘condemned already;’ there is such a thing as being alive, and yet being absolutely dead. We might have been left to our own devices; and then where should we have been now? Revelling with the drunkard, blaspheming Almighty God. Oh? had he left you, dearly beloved, had he been a changing God, ye had been amongst the filthiest of the filthy, and the vilest of the vile. Cannot you remember in your life, seasons similar to those I have felt? I have gone right to the edge of sin; some strong temptation has taken hold of both my arms, so that I could not wrestle with it. I have been pushed along, dragged as by an awful satanic power to the very edge of some horrid precipice. I have looked down, down, down, and seen my portion; I quivered on the brink of ruin. I have been horrified, as, with my hair upright, I have thought of the sin I was about to commit, the horrible pit into which I was about to fall. A strong arm hath saved me. I have started back and cried, O God! could I have gone so near sin, and yet come back again? Could I have walked right up to the furnace and not fallen down, like Nebuchadnezzar’s strong men, devoured by the very heat? Oh! is it possible I should be here this morning, when I think of the sins I have committed, and the crimes which have crossed my wicked imagination? Yes, I am here, unconsumed, because the Lord changes not. Oh! if he had changed, we should have been consumed in a dozen ways; if the Lord had changed, you and I should have been consumed by ourselves; for after all Mr. Self is the worst enemy a Christian has. We should have proved suicides to our own souls; we should have mixed the cup of poison for our own spirits, if the Lord had not been an unchanging God, and dashed the cup out of our hands when we were about to drink it. Then we should have been consumed by God himself if he had not been a changeless God. We call God a Father; but there is not a father in this world who would not have killed all his children long ago, so provoked would he have been with them, if he had been half as much troubled as God has been with his family. He has the most troublesome family in the whole world—unbelieving, ungrateful, disobedient, forgetful, rebellious, wandering, murmuring, and stiffnecked. Well it is that he is longsuffering, or else he would have taken not only the rod, but the sword to some of us long ago. But there was nothing in us to love at first, so there cannot be less now. John Newton used to tell a whimsical story, and laugh at it too, of a good woman who said, in order to prove the doctrine of Election, ‘Ah! sir, the Lord must have loved me before I was born, or else he would not have seen anything in me to love afterwards.’ I am sure it is true in my case, and true in respect of most of God’s people; for there is little to love in them after they are born, that if he had not loved them before then, he would have seen no reason to choose them after; but since he loved them without works, he loves them without works still; since their good works did not win his affection, bad works cannot sever that affection; since their righteousness did not bind his love to them, so their wickedness cannot snap the golden links. He loved them out of pure sovereign grace, and he will love them still. But we should have been consumed by the devil and by our enemies—consumed by the world, consumed by our sins, by our trials and in a hundred other ways, if God had ever changed.

Well, now, time fails us, and I can say but little. I have only just cursorily touched on the text. I now hand it to you. May the Lord help you ‘sons of Jacob’ to take home this portion of meat; digest it well, and feed upon it. May the Holy Ghost sweetly apply the glorious things that are written! And may you have ‘a feast of fat things, of wines on the lees well refined!’ Remember God is the same, whatever is removed. Your friends may be disaffected, your ministers may be taken away, every thing may change; but God does not. Your brethren may change and cast out your name as vile: but God will love you still. Let your station in life change, and your property be gone; let your whole life be shaken, and you become weak and sickly; let everything flee away—there is one place where change cannot put his finger; there is one name on which mutability can never be written; there is one heart which never can alter; that heart is God’s—that name Love.

‘Trust him, he will ne’er deceive you,

Though you hardly of him deem;

He will never, never leave you,

Nor will let you quite leave him.’

Banner resources by or about CH Spurgeon:

Arnold Dallimore, Spurgeon: a Biography

C.H. Spurgeon, Autobiography

C.H. Spurgeon, Lectures to My Students

C.H. Spurgeon, Spurgeon’s Practical Wisdom

Iain Murray, The Forgotten Spurgeon

Erratum: an earlier version of this post was entitled ‘The Impassibility of God’, which was an error – the original title was The Immutability of God.

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