THE NEW PARK STREET PULPIT
Sermons Preached By
C. H. SPURGEON

PREFACE

            The Preaching of the Word by the chosen servants of the living God, is the ordained means for the gathering in of the elect. It is not the Word read, so much as that which is heard, which has the promise attached to it; hence the importance of a devout attendance on the ministry of the Gospel. Nevertheless, without doubt, the Holy Ghost who has helped us in the delivery of these Sermons, will also afford his divine assistance now that we send them forth in this volume.

            Little can be said in praise of these Sermons, and nothing can be said against them more bitter than has been already spoken. Happily the author has heard abuse exhaust itself; he has seen its vocabulary used up, and its utmost venom entirely spent; and yet, the printed discourses have for that very reason found a readier sale, and more have been led to peruse them with deep attention.

            One thing alone places this book above contempt--and that accomplishes the deed so triumphantly, that the preacher defies the opinion of man,--it is the fact, that to his certain knowledge, there is scarce a Sermon here which has not been stamped by the hand of the Almighty, by the conversion of a soul. Some single Sermons here brought into the society of their brethren, have been, under God, the means of the salvation of not less than twenty souls; at least, that number have come under the preacher's notice from one Sermon only; and doubtless more shall be discovered at the last day.

            This, together with the fact, that hundreds of the children of God have been made to leap for joy by their message, makes their Author invulnerable either to criticism or abuse.

            We have most certainly departed from the usual mode of preaching, but we do not feel bound to offer even half a word of apology for so doing, since we believe ourselves free to use any manner of speech which is calculated to impress the truth upon our hearers.

            The matter also will afford no small amount of food for controversialists, but concerning it we simply say, that we have learned theology in another school than that of men, so shall we hope ever to declare the whole of what the Lord shall teach us, without tarrying for human opinions.

            The word Calvinism, is frequently used here as the short word which embraces that part of divine truth which teaches that salvation is by grace alone, but it is not hence to be imagined that we attach any authority to the opinion of John Calvin, other than that which is due to every holy man who is ordained of God to proclaim his truth. We use the word simply for shortness of expression, and because the enemies of free grace will then be quite sure of what we mean. It is our firm belief, that what is commonly called Calvinism, is neither more nor less than the good old gospel of the puritans, the Martyrs, the Apostles, and of our Lord Jesus Christ.

            Here, the proud legalist, the conceited believer in the unaided strength of man, and the self-exalting moralist, will discover very little suitable to their corrupt palate and much to excite their enmity; but the humbled sinner may possible find words of comfort, and the self-loathing believer will perhaps obtain a glimpse of his Lord.

            Our hope is, that inferior matters in dispute will not so much be regarded, as "the things which we have spoken touching the king." Jesus is the Truth. We believe in him,--not merely in his words. He himself is Doctor and Doctrine, Revealer and Revelation, the Illuminator and the Light of Men. He is exalted in every word of truth, because he is its sum and substance. He sits above the gospel, like a prince on his own throne. Doctrine is most precious when we see it distilling from his lips and embodied in his person. Sermons are valuable in proportion as they speak of him and point to him. A Christless gospel is no gospel and a Christless discourse is the cause of merriment to devils. The Holy Ghost who has ever been our sole instructor, will we trust, teach us more of Jesus, until we comprehend with all saints, what are the heights, and depths, and know the love of Christ which passeth knowledge. Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, only have we laboured to extol: may the Lord himself succeed our endeavours.

            The reader will, perhaps, remark considerable progress in some of the sentiments here made public, particularly in the case of the doctrine of the Second Coming of our Lord, but he will remember that he who is learning truth will learn it be degrees, and if he teaches as he learns, it is to be expected that his lessons will become fuller every day.

            There are also many expressions which may provoke a smile: but let it be remembered that every man has his moments when his lighter feelings indulge themselves, and the preacher must be allowed to have the same passions as his fellow-men, and since he lives in the pulpit more than anywhere else, it is but natural that his whole man should be there developed; besides, he is not quite sure about a smile being a sin, and, at any rate, he thinks it less a crime to cause a momentary laughter than a half-hour's profound slumber.

            With all faults, the purchaser has bought this book; and, as it was not warranted to be perfect, if he thinks ill of it, he must make the best of his bargain--which can be done, either by asking a blessing on its reading to himself, or entreating greater light for his friend the preacher.

            For the printer we must beg much allowance. The Author sufficiently scolds him for errata, and the public may therefore forgive--the more especially since the Sermons are hastily printed week by week for thousands of eager applicants.

            Let it be understood, until further notice, that no Sermons are genuine reports unless they bear the title "The New Park Street Pulpit;" or, the names of "Alabaster and Passmore;" or else the words "Authorised by Mr. Spurgeon." Necessity compels us thus to act, since, otherwise, prints without our revision or sanction are advertised, and no one can tell what is ours, and what anothers.

            Grace, mercy, and peace, be with all the saints, From their servant in Jesus.

            C. H. Spurgeon

            January, 1856.

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THE IMMUTABILITY OF GOD

A SERMON

Delivered on Sabbath Morning, January 7th, 1855, By The

REV. C. H. SPURGEON,

At New Park Street Chapel, Southwark.

            "I am the Lord, I change not; therefore ye sons of Jacob are not consumed."
--Malachi. iii. 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 thought, 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 conso-atary . 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."

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            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.

            I. 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.

            1. 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 etherial 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 untied 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.

            2. 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. Ws 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 plan? Yes, and he is wise now; he is not less skilful, he has not less knowledge; his eye which seeth all things is undimned; 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."

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            3. 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 he 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."

            4. 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 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 was 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 here is the promise; it is thy business to fulifl 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 for ever.

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            5. 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 thy fleshly 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 dammed." What sayest thou to that, moralist? Oh, thou wishest thou couldst alter it, and say, "He that does not live a holy live 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 offence; but you cannot alter it. You must 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 ages 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 run out, you shall still see it written up there, "SHALL BE DAMNED." O terrific thought! How dare I utter it? But I must. You must be warned, sirs, "lest ye also come into this place of torment." Ye must be told rough things; for it 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.

            6. 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 thing 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 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 to contrary, that I am obliged, when once I say God, to include the idea of an unchanging being.

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            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 to-morrow 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 prefect now--or else from a better state to a worse--and if I were worse, I should not be prefect 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 to-morrow, 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 to day and finite to-morrow, or finite to-day 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 every brow the word "immutability."

            I. 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 ashdol, 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 of 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.

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            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 honors; 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, the next, these "sons of Jacob" were men of peculiar manifestations. Jacob had had peculiar manifestations from his God, and thus he was highly honored. 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; hey 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 alone 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 Leban cheated him all the years he was there--cheated him of his wife, cheated him in his wages, cheated him in his flocks, and cheated him all through the story. By-and-bye 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, Rachael, his dear beloved, died. Then his daughter Dinah is led astray, and the sons murder the Schechemites. 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 this. 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."

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            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 not 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.

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            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 mot 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 our 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."

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THE REMEMBRANCE OF CHRIST

A SERMON

Delivered on Sabbath Evening, January 7, 1855, by the

REV. C. H. SPURGEON,

No. 2

At New Park Street Chapel, Southwark.

            "This do in remembrance of me."
--1 Cor. xi. 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 ho 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 pest-house, a charnel-house within, lusts, vile imaginations, and strong evil passions, which, like wells of poisonous water, sent 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 cage 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 angel's 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.

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            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.

            1. 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 mot 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.

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            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,"--blasphemousif, "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 temper! 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 his 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 manager, 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.

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            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 ere 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 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 communicate 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.

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            Love never says, "Cui buno?" 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 here 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 ecstacy 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 hem 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 honor, 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.

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            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 had 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, and 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 him; his eyes are your eyes; his hands are your hands. 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 alarmed; 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 is see--I seem to see? What 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. Thy 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. All 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.

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            III. We are now arrived at the third portion of our meditation, 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 unmistakeable 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 sings--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 of 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 drawing 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 six-pence? 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 ordinances 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.

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            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 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 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 too 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 you 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 add one thing, and then I have done. When I speak of your taking the ordinance of the Lord's Supper, do no imagine that I wish you for one moment to suppose that there is anything saving in it. Some say that he 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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THE SIN OF UNBELIEF.

A SERMON

Delivered on Sabbath Morning, January 14, 1855, By The

REV. C. H. SPURGEON,

At New Park Street Chapel, Southwark.

No. 3.

            "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 vii. 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 whom 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. Deut. xxviii. 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 had 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.

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            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.

            I. 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 colors 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 not 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 Scriptures say, 'of sin, because them believed not on me?' And is it not the damning 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, "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 master-piece of Satan, the chief work or the devil.

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            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 thin 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 hardoned the heart of Pharaoh--it gave license to the tongue of blaspheming Rabshaketh--yea, it became a deicide, and murdered Jesus. Unbelief!--it has sharpened the knife of the suicide! It had 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'' 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 offence; 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 scape-goat'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.

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            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, but 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 threanting prevents it from having any effect upon him. When our snappers and miners go to work around Sebastopoi, they could not work in front of the walls, if they had not something to keep of 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 not 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 if oft, but who weeps over it? Who cares about it? Sirs, ye sit as unconcerned as if it did not signify to you. Oh! behold and see all ye that pass by. It is 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 wild say they are commendable things; but I will tell you that they are just like the cowries 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 t please God." Do you not 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 of 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, as he cried out, "That will overwhelm me;" and he thought--how could I be so presumptuous as to be walking on the top of these waves? Down 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?

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            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 fir 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 coming; 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 clap 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.

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            And, oh! do you not know that unbelief kept Moses and Aaron out of Canaan? They honored 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 talk 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 dishonors 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."

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            II. 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, here 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 some 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 se 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 hold 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? You 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.

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            But to conclude. Methinks I see thee in some place in hell, tied to a rock, the vulture of remorse knawing 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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THE PERSONALITY OF THE HOLY GHOST

A SERMON

No. 4

Delivered on Sabbath Morning, January 21, 1855, by the

REV. C. H. SPURGEON,

At New Park Street Chapel, Southwark.

            "And I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you for ever: 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 xiv. 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. (Published in No. 5) 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 substance--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 "Man 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. Not 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 out 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 s 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.

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            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 apostolick 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 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 side. 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. Not is this the only time when the Holy Ghost has been manifest in a visible shape. You see 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 marvelous 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 moral eyes, and came under the cognizance of mortal sense.

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            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. ii., 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 an 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 above 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 Rom. xv., 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 herdman, 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 cause 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 read 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.

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            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 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 be 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. lxiii. v. 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. vii. v. 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 upon 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 e'er can know.

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            II. 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 we could 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 no 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 for ever." One person speaks for the other, and how could they if there were any disagreement between them? If one wished to save, and he 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.

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            II. 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 God-bearer, "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. 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 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 fet, 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.

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            But before closing this point, there is one little word which pleases me very much, that is, "for ever." 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.

            IV. 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 it cannot see it. Well, but we feel it. You say that is fanaticism, and that we never felt it. Suppose you tell me 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 you 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 electricty? 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.

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            And now, beloved, it says, "He swelleth with you, and shall be in you." We will close up with that sweet recollection--the Holy Ghost dwells in all believers, and sahll 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 exceedingly 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 premeate 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 be 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 read 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 voce 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. You 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 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.

THE COMFORTER

A SERMON

NO. 5

Delivered on Sabbath Evening, January 21, 1855, by the

REV. C. H. SPURGEON,

At New Park Street Chapel, Southwark.

            "But the Comforter, which is the Holy Ghost, whom the Father will send in my name, he shall teach you all things, and bring all things to your remembrance, whatsoever I have said unto you."
--John xiv. 26.

            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 castle-top 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 hard 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 last 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 alone 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."

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            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 Rhemish 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 meaning 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 sleight 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, the 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 form 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.

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            But, besides this, the Holy Ghost is the advocate in mens' hearts. Ah! I have known men reject a doctrine until the Holy Ghost began to illumine them. We who are the advocate 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? Brethren, 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 are 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 might 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 oe'r 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 some one 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 a 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.

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            But next he is a faithful Comforter. Love sometimes proveth 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 love 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 you 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 one 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.

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            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-righteousness; 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 a 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 believer that what is presumption is the real assurance of the Holy Ghost; thus he deceives many a 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 abut 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.

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            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 a 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 person 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 your 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 tings 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 coins 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 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.

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            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; 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 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.

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            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 exception here. "Whosoever believeth in the name of Jesus Christ shall be saved." Sin is no barrier: thy guilt is no obstacle. Whosoever--thought here 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 aions."

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SWEET COMFORT FOR FEEBLE SAINTS.

A SERMON

No. 6.

Delivered on Sabbath Morning, February 4, 1855, by the

REV. C. H. SPURGEON,

At New Park Street Chapel, Southwark

            "A bruised reed shall he not break, and smoking flax shall he not quench, till he send forth judgment unto victory."
--Matt. xii. 20.

            Babbling fame ever loves to talk of one man or another. Some there be whose glory it trumpets forth, and whose honor it extols above the heavens. Some are her favorites, and their names are carved on marble, and heard in every land, and every clime. Fame is not an impartial judge; she has her favorites. 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."

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1. 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.

            At 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 he 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 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 whey 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 me so strained, 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.

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            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 honor." 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 Issacher, 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.

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            Now we will make another remark. The two things here mentioned are offensive things. A bruised red of offensive, for I believe there is an illusion 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 an 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 abominable offensive s 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 our 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 hollowed 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 materials 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.

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            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 moral frailty; now I mount a 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 way so 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 Ephriam; 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 blackslider! Come at once to him whose arms are ready to receive thee.

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            It ways he will not quench--he will not break. But there is ore 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. Feraing 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 gown 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 want 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.

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            Then one thing more. If you were lost, God's honor would be as much tarnished as if the greatest one were lost. A queer thing I once read on 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 fulness; 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 not 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 they 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 boys grow 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 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, the 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.

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            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, 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 other 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.

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CHRIST CRUCIFIED

A SERMON

No. 7--8.

Delivered on Sabbath Morning, February 11, 1855, By

REV. C. H. SPURGEON,

At Exeter Hall, Strand.

            "But we preach Christ 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."
--1 Cor. I. 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 o'er 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; 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 form 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."

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            Wisdom had had its time, and time enough; it had done it 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 roll 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 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."

            Before I enter upon our text, let me 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 his 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 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."

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            There are three things in the text. First, a gospel rejected--"Christ, crucified, to the Jews a stumbling block, 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."

I. 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, 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 you 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 stumbling block, 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, and who as yet are not called by divine grace.

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            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 his 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 not 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?" "Whey 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 Nazarine! 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 imposter--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 stumbling block, 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 rubic 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 a 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.

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            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.

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            I have found out the Jew, and I have now to discover the Greek. He is a person 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 ahs an intense aversion, in fact, to broadbrimmed 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 Mohommedan, 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.

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            II. 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 send 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.

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            "Unto us who are called." I received a note this week asking me to explain the 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 this 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.

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            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, ou 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 marvelous 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 our 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."

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            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, and 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 ne'er should enter. There came a goodly personage, with loving countenance; his hands were marked with scars, where nails were driven, and his feet had nailprints 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 to 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 his 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 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 can 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."

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            But behold another scene far different. There is no crowd here; 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 sonner:

"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 his enemy. But this is purely a mistake; for the gospel is the sum of wisdom; and 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 of 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.

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            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."

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SPIRITUAL LIBERTY

A SERMON

No. 9

Delivered on Sabbath Morning, February 18th, 1855, by the

REV. C. H. SPURGEON,

At Exeter Hall, Strand.

            "Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty."
--2 Cor. iii. 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 rivetted 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."

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            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 be cast into the lion's den with Daniel, than yield a point of 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 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 is shall speak freely to some of you when I talk about 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 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 saw, 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.

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            2. Liberty form 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 though 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 on 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, nor 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!

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            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 sandles 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 for 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 Bethlem, 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 rivetted 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 indishonesty 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.

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            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 you knee in prayer? It is because you like to talk with our 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."

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            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 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 though 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 your broad wings and lift us 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."

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            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 love 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, they 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 much 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.

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            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 ahs he white stone whereby he shall be known as a ransomed one, and that shall pass him a 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 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 lifted 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."

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THE KINGLY PRIESTHOOD OF THE SAINTS

A SERMON

No. 10

Delivered on Sabbath Morning, January 28, 1855 by the

REV. C. H. SPURGEON

At New Park Street Chapel, Southwark.

            "And hast made us unto our God kings and priests; and we shall reign on the earth."
--Rev. v. 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' honors--"and hast made us kings and priests unto our God;" and, thirdly, the world's future--"and we shall reign upon the earth."

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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, honor, 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 our 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 honor, 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."

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            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 s 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 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 of 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 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 Honors: "and hast made us unto our God kings and priests." The most honorable 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 honored, 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.

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            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 had 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 re, 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 honor 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 honorable. But since some men will glory in their descent, I will glory that the saints have 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.

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            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 places, 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 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; 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 wouldst 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 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 honorable 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 any one should shout, "here is the Queen!" every one would step aside and make room for her. A monarch generally commands respect. Ah! beloved, we think that worldly princes are the most honorable of the earth; but if you were to ask God, he would reply, "my saints, in whom I delight, these are the honorable 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 honorable 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 honorable 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."

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            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 puling 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 if from the foundation 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.

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            Then, next, we re priests, because we enjoy divine honors. None but a priest might enter within the vail; 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 honorable privileges, which the world wots not of! Hast thou ever been within the vail 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 honors. Thou art divinely honored, 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, "Honor 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 you about your honor 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 honor 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 the 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.

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            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 dishonored, shall be honored; the 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: ye 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 L50, 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 L50 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 L50 0s. 11½ d. 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.

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THE PEOPLE'S CHRIST

A SERMON

No. 11

Delivered on Sabbath Morning, February 25, 1855, by the

REV. C. H. SPURGEON

At Exeter Hall, Strand

            "I have exalted one chosen out of the people."
--Psalm lxxxix. 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 eye 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 this 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 a 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.

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            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, seems 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 aristrocrat'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 honored 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. If 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 nor 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 every one; 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."

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            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 now-a-day, 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 read 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 Whitfield, uses "market language," for it is a sad fact that high places and the gospel seldom well agree, and, however, 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 here 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 coizers! 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 fisherman? Ah! no, until ye doff your grandeur, and, like the fishermen, come out, the people's men, and preach to the people, instead of lolling on your splendid seats, and making yourselves rich at the expense of your pluralites! 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.

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            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 the 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 always is 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 of 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 honor. 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 are the representatives of the whole church, were honored 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 honor, and hath set us at his right hand in heavenly places, in Christ Jesus, that in the ages to come he might shew the exceeding riches of his grace in his kindness towards us through Christ Jesus.

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            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 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 best 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 labor for her, or defend her; that his heart ever throbs with love to her, and that all he has, and is, belongs to her, s 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, [???] 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 labor 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 place 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 labor, to put on the vestments of eternal rest. In all places withersoever 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.

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            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 foot-note 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 he 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 to-morrow 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.

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1. First, dear friends, it was exaltation enough for the body of Christ to be exalted into union with the divinity. That was honor 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 womb 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 eye-lids, 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 by 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 host 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."

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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 one 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 want you of it. You have all read the story of the lady, who, on her marriage-day steeped 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 for ever; 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 for ever. Young man! take heed that you are not locked down for ever 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's 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 for ever. 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 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. Some one 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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THE PECULIAR SLEEP OF THE BELOVED

A SERMON

No. 12

Delivered on Sabbath Morning, March 4, 1855, by the

REV. C. H. SPURGEON,

At Exeter Hall, Strand.

            "For so he giveth his beloved sleep."
–Psalm cxxvil. 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 to-morrow'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.

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            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 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 he 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 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.

            1. 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 of 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 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."

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            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 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 dammed 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."

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            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 is 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 though 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 not 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."

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            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 easy as e'er thou has 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 by 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 my 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 al." "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."

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            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 to 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 once loved me--to know that I must enter the kingdom of glory--is not this enough to make all burden 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."

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            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.

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            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 Whitfield, "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 you 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 ye 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.

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CONSOLATION PROPORTIONATE TO SPIRITUAL SUFFERINGS

A SERMON

No. 13

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, i. 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 Behtesda, 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 the 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 honored--"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 colors, 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 serieant, 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 coloring 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; or 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 is 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."

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            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 honor 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.

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            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 is 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 councilors, 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, harrass 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 battle-field; when thou walkest believe that there is an ambush in ever 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 watch-tower, reckon surely that trouble cometh.

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            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 not 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 bomb-shell, 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; 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 fall 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 honor be unto God alone. Expect suffering--this is our first point.

            II. Now, secondly, there is A Distinction to be Noticed. Our sufferings 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 sys 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 Cor. xii., 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 as the sufferings of Christ, as the agonies of Calvary.

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            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 now-a-days? 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, or 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 t 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 haven'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 honor 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 honor 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 may 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 calvary; but how many do you count me for--me, your mighty captain, who have 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 re most cast down, then it is that we are most lifted up by the consolations of Christ. Let me show you how.

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            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; than 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 grace, 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 shall 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 honor 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; crust 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.

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            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 gentleman 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 honor? 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 up stairs, 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 fountain head 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 withersoever 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 how have never been entranced by the precious sonnet contained in that one word Jesu, ye how 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 charcters--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.

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            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 honor 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. 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 life-boat 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 you 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 gentleman 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.

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THE VICTORY OF FAITH

A SERMON

No. 14

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."
--John v. 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 shows. 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.

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            As God shall help me, I shall speak to you of three things to be found in the next. 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 this 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 t 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 to-day, 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.

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            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 you see that the majority of mankind have certain habits, ye succomb, 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 in 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 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 know 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 or 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 yielded 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 brad 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 pavillion, in the secret of his taberncle doth he hide me, and set me up upon a rock." Thus, again, we conquer the world, by not caring for its frowns.

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            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 arm, 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; 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 honor 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 his 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 as 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.

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            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 over cometh 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 area 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, abut 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 unpalateable 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.

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            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