I’m going to start with something that is extremely important to believers. In today’s day and time there are numerous belief systems. Some (like Christianity, Judaism, and Hinduism) have been around for centuries. Others (Islam, Mormonism, Jehovah’s Witness, Jediism) are rather recent. Some of these religions (Hinduism, Mormonism) have many gods. Others (Judaism, Christianity, Islam) have only one. Some even make claims to Christianity (Mormonism, Catholicism, JWs).

With the many different religions and the many different secular ideas vying people’s attention, it is vital that Christians understand what they believe and are able to articulate it. It is also important that Christians make sure that their beliefs line up with what scripture says. The different religious groups that make a claim to biblical Christianity (Mormons, JWs, Catholics) are very different in their own right, but they do have one in common – they all place something above the scriptures:

•             Jehovah’s Witnesses have a ruling body of 12-18 men that basically determine what all JWs believe and what doctrines they follow.
•             Mormons place a number of things above scripture. They have The Book of Mormon, The Pearl of Great Price, and Doctrines and Covenants that are all considered to be above the authority of scripture. They also have a president who is considered to be a prophet/apostle and the sole authority of the Mormon church.
•             Catholics have a ruling body called the Magisterium, which is headed by the pope. This group of men decides what Catholics have to believe (dogmas) as well as giving a specific interpretation of verses/passages in the Bible (which they don’t seem to have too many of). Catholics also claim to have what is called Sacred Tradition. For Roman Catholics this tradition is on par with (or above) the authority of the Bible.

Unlike the groups mentioned above conservative Protestant Christianity holds to a view commonly known as Sola Scriptura. This view and four others make up what is known as the 5 solas of the Protestant Reformation. These 5 solas are:

•             sola gratia – grace alone
•             sola fide – faith alone
•             soli Deo gloria – the glory of God alone
•             solus Christus – Christ alone
•             sola scriptura – scripture alone

Sadly, there are numerous church-going Christians who attend a Protestant church that have no idea what they’re protesting! The Protestant Reformation came as a result of the abuses of the Roman Church against the people in its flock. The Roman Church had been growing in power for centuries as authority was consolidated in Rome. The extent of this power was so great that they could forbid the celebration of the mass in the common language until 1967 and Vatican II. They also didn’t allow the Bible to be in the common language, which brought about the death of men like Jan Hus and William Tyndale. The focus of the Reformers was to bring the Bible to the people and to return scripture to its place of authority (among other things). This is where sola scriptura comes in.

Part of the problem is that many people don’t understand or know what the doctrine of sola scriptura actually is and they misrepresent it in their attacks on it. The doctrine of sola scriptura says that the scriptures found in the Protestant Bible are the ultimate infallible authority for Christian faith and living. There is nothing above them in terms of authority and everything that involves faith and living is judged by what the scriptures say. Sola scriptura is not the idea that the scriptures are the only authority. There are other authorities (parents, pastors, elders) that can help us to grow and mature in our faith, but even these authorities are subject to the scriptures. In Acts 17, the Bereans are commended for comparing everything that Paul preached to the scriptures. If this was commended when it happened to Paul, it should be no different today. We should be comparing everything we read and hear with what the scriptures say. If something doesn’t make sense, then we should go through the work/effort to make sure that we understand scripture correctly and then take another look at what we heard/read.

The Bible makes the claim to be the inspired Word of God early and often. The phrase “thus says the LORD” appears 413 times. In the very first chapter of the first book we see God saying something and it happening. From the lives of Adam to Abraham to Jacob to Moses, we see God speaking to men. The prophets were the actual mouthpieces for God. In the New Testament, it’s no different. Jesus Christ, God made flesh, walked the earth for thirty-three and a half years teaching and preaching. When He died, arose, and ascended; He promised that He would send a comforter/helper in His place. This happened on Pentecost when the Holy Spirit came down and the church got its beginnings. The Holy Spirit inspired the scriptures to be written. When Paul writes his second letter to Timothy, he makes this clear:

All Scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness; so that the man of God may be adequate, equipped for every good work. (2 Timothy 3:16-17)

The Greek term for the phrase “inspired by God” is theopneustos, or “God breathed”. God Himself is the author of scripture. Of course there is the argument “but it was written by men!”. Yes…it was written by men. Over 1500 years, in 3 different languages, on 3 different continents, by 40 different men from all walks of life (kings, priests, shepherds, government officials, musicians, fishermen, and doctors) as they were moved by the Holy Spirit. It was written in times of peace, times of war, times of exile; in numerous styles/genres. In spite of all of this, the scriptures are consistent in their teachings, unified in their stance on a myriad of issues, and unique in their historical accuracy and prophetic precision. It is for these reasons and many others that Protestants (sadly, not all of them) hold to the view of Sola Scriptura.

There are many reasons why people reject the idea of sola scriptura. For some it is a matter of power/fame. There are many worldly things to be gained by preaching a false gospel. Those who adhere to the Word of Faith (WoF) teachings believe that they can speak things into existence (like God did), claim wealth and riches as belonging to them “by fiath”, rebuke Satan, and command God to act on their behalf. None of this is based on a proper understanding of scripture and require that the teachers take the scriptures out of context. For others, it is a matter of ignorance. They don’t believe in sola scriptura because they’ve never been taught it. No one has taken the time to show them both the importance and the wonder of the revelation of the scriptures. The last group we’ll talk about are those that reject sola scriptura out of pride. These people believe that they know better than God does. Some may even claim to hold to what the Bible says; but then their beliefs are compared to the scriptures taken in context, they don’t stand up to the scrutiny. Others believe that they are free to interpret the scriptures by their own feelings or “promptings”. Unfortunately, this is all to common in churches today:

- “What does this scripture say to you?”

- “I believe that this scripture says  God is a God of love and that He only wants the best for me.”

They read into the text their own biases and beliefs, thereby making God love what they love and hate what they hate. If they are ok with homosexuality, then so it God. They will ignore that fact that in both the Old and New Testaments God calls it an abomination or unnatural (Leviticus 18:22/Romans 1:16-32/1 Corinthians 6:9-10). If they believe that something is unjust, so does God. Many of those doing this fail to realize that it is no different than going outside, picking up a stone or a slab of wood, and carving a god to suit themselves – it’s idolatry.

The sad part about all of this is that it causes confusion in both the church and the world. The new Christians get confused because they don’t see a consistent view and aren’t taught that scripture is clear the majority of the time. The world is confused by this as well and they mock the idea that an all-powerful God would have such a schizophrenic bride. Not to mention the fact that it places burdens on people, discourages them, and obfuscates the truth. The scriptures are the very revelation of God! He has revealed Himself in them and given us a solid foundation to build our lives on. They are deep and life-giving. They satisfy the soul, bring peace to the fearful, and comfort the hurting. They are (for the most part) easily understood and change lives through their application.

It is my prayer that the churches around the world that have abandoned the authority of scripture to would repent and return to the ultimate authority found in the scriptures. I pray that those that hold to doctrines that can’t be found in scripture would stop muddying the waters and start preaching what they really say, regardless of how difficult it may be to accept. Through this, God will be glorified and Christ will be lifted up. The world will see and hear the truth of God and be forced to recognize Him alone as God.

Delivered in the year 1862
by
C. H. SPURGEON
(1834-1892)

“We know, brothers loved by God, that he has chosen you, because our gospel came to you not simply with words, but also with power, with the Holy Spirit and with deep conviction. You became imitators of us and of the Lord; in spite of severe suffering, you welcomed the message with the joy given by the Holy Spirit.” [1 Thessalonians 1:4-6]

 “Knowing, brethren beloved, your election of God. For our gospel came not unto you in word only, but also in power, and in the Holy Spirit, and in much assurance. And ye became followers of us, and of the Lord having received the word in much affliction, with joy of the Holy Spirit.”- 1 Thessalonians 1: 4- 6.

At the very announcement of the text some will be ready to say, “Why preach upon so profound a doctrine as election?” I answer, because it is in God’s word, and whatever is in the Word of God is to be preached. But you will say, “But some truths ought to be kept back from the people, lest they would make improper use of it.” That is Roman Catholic doctrine, it was on that very theory that the priests kept the Bible from the people, they did not give it to them lest they should misuse it. “But aren’t some doctrines dangerous?” Not if they are true and correctly handled. Truth is never dangerous, it is error and silence that are filled with peril. “But don’t men abuse the doctrine of grace?” I grant you that they do; but if we destroyed everything that men misuse, we would have nothing left. Are there to be no ropes because some fools will hang themselves? Likewise, must all knives be discarded and denounced, because there are some who will use dangerous weapons for the destruction of their adversaries? Certainly not. Besides all this, remember that men do read the Scriptures and think about these doctrines, and therefore often make mistakes about them; who then will set them right if we, who preach the Word, hold our tongues about the matter?

I know that some men who have embraced the doctrine of election have become Antinomians [those who deny any responsibility to moral law]; such men would probably have found other excuses for their bad behavior if they had not sheltered themselves under the shadow of this doctrine. The sun will ripen the poisonous weed as well as the fruitful plant, but that is not the fault of the sun, but of the nature of the weed itself. We believe, however, that more persons are made Antinomians through those who deny the doctrine than through those who preach it. One evidence of this is that in Scotland you will scarcely find a congregation of Hyper-Calvinists [those who over emphasize the omnipotence of God and the salvation of the elect by God's grace], and the reason for their scarcity is because the Church in Scotland completely embraces the doctrine of election, and her ministers, as a rule, are not ashamed to preach it fearlessly and boldly, and in connection with the rest of the faith.

Take any doctrine, and preach on it exclusively, and you distort it. The most beautiful face in the world, with the most lovely features, would soon become grotesque if one feature were permitted to expand while the rest were kept in their usual form. Proportion, I take it, is beauty, and to preach every truth in its right proportion, neither keeping back any nor giving undue prominence to any, is to preach the whole truth as Christ would have it preached. A Gospel that has the proper proportions is thus complete and harmonious and therefore we may expect it to have the blessing of the Most High.

That, my friends, was my preface, and not in any way an apology. I have no need to offer any apology for speaking the truth.

I. WHAT IS THIS DOCTRINE OF ELECTION? Let us try to understand it as it is spoken of in the text: “We know, brothers loved by God, that he has chosen you.”

There is such a thing as election.

Any person who would deny that man is a free agent might well be thought of as being unreasonable, but freewill is a different thing from free-agency. Luther denounced freewill when he said that “freewill is the name for nothing”; and Jonathan Edwards demolished the idea in his masterful dissertation. God is the universal agent and does as he wills, and his will is supremely good. He is the supreme agent, and man acting according to the plans of his own heart, is nevertheless overruled by the sovereign and wise Creator which causes even the sin and the fury of man to praise him; and he also restrains the rest of man’s actions. I can’t explain how these two things are true. It is not necessary for our good, either in this life or the next, that we would have the skill to solve such problems. I am not sure that in heaven, we will be able to know where the free agency of man and the sovereignty of God meet, but both are great truths.

God has predestined everything, yet man is responsible, for he acts freely, and no constraint is put on him even when he willfully and wickedly disobeys the will of God. But all those who are saved, you will say, are saved because they believe. Certainly it is true; it is absolutely true – God forbid that I should ever deny it – but wherefore do they believe? They believe as a direct result of the working of the grace of God in their hearts. Since every person who is saved confesses this, since every true believer in the world acknowledges that something special has been done for him more than for the unrepentant, the fact is established that God does make a difference. No one has ever accused the Lord that he has made such a difference, so I cannot see why he should be accused for intending to make that difference, which is just the doctrine of election. I am saved, but I know it is not because of any goodness in me, and if you are saved you will freely confess that it is the distinguishing love of God that has made you to be different. The doctrine of election is simply God’s intention to make the difference between people, and you know that this difference exists. While he gives mercy to everyone, he gives more mercy to some so that the mercy already received will be made effective for their eternal salvation.

This election of God is sovereign.

He chooses as he will. Who will call him to account? “Can I not do as I want with my own creatures?” is his answer to every critic. “Who are you, O man, to talk back to God?” is the solemn utterance that silences every one who would point the finger at the justice of the Most High. He has a right, seeing we are all criminals, to punish whom he wants. Without question, as king of the universe he acts with discretion, but still according to his sovereignty. He rules wisely and not recklessly, but always in accordance to his own perfect will. Election, then, is sovereign.

Again, election is free.

Whatever may be God’s reason for choosing a person, certainly it is not because of any good thing in that person. They are chosen because it pleases God to do so. We can go no further. We go as far as those words of Christ, “Yes, Father, for this was your good pleasure,” and there we stop for no philosophy and no Scripture can take us beyond that.

Just as election is sovereign and free, it is also irreversible.

Having chosen his people, he does not cast them away nor go back on the words that it gone out of his lips, for it is written, “He hates divorce.” He has determined in his mind to save some, and no one can change his mind!

Once more, election is effective.

For “those he predestined, he also called; those he called, he also justified; those he justified, he also glorified.”

And this election is personal.

 For he calls out his children, by name, one by one. He calls them just like “he determines the number of the stars and calls them each by name,” and so he brings them every one of his “called children” to the Father’s house above.

We have thus given a statement as to what this doctrine is. There we will leave it. Our present object is not so much to expound the doctrine, as to strike a blow or two at certain errors which are very common and which spring out of it. I know, dear friends, there are some who are so afraid of this doctrine that the mention of it produces alarm. If they were to meet a lion face-to-face, they would not be more terrified than they are when they see this doctrine in Scripture or hear it from the pulpit.

II. Therefore, secondly, we will NOTICE WHAT THE DEFENSES OF THIS DOCTRINE ARE, and try, if we can, should you be struggling under any distress of mind about it, to remove your difficulties. Will you please remember then that this is not a point which you can understand at the beginning of your spiritual and religious life?

 You would not teach your children, I suppose, to say their prayers backwards, that is to say “Amen” first; likewise you are beginning at the wrong end when you want first of all to know all about your election instead of beginning with repentance towards God and faith in our Lord Jesus Christ. Election is a lesson for the more advanced students. Faith and hope must be learned, first of all, in the infant class, to which we all must attend if we would be wise unto salvation; Now, if a child should have a book of algebra put into his hand, and should puzzle himself and say, “I will never get an education, for I cannot understand this;” and then take down some ancient classic, and say, “I cannot comprehend this;” you would say, “Dear child, have nothing to do with these yet. Here is a book for you – an elementary textbook. Here you have the A, B, C’s; learn this first, and then, step by step, you will attain to the rest.” This is the same way it is with us. Simple trust in Christ is the first thing you have to understand, after that you will know the lofty, the sublime, and the glorious doctrine of God’s decrees; but do not begin with these. You will mystify and ruin yourself; you will lose your way in a fog and not get any good out of it.

Again, it is very certain, that whatever this doctrine is-and we will have no dispute about it just now – this doctrine cannot possibly be inconsistent with certain clear promises in God’s Word.

 Such promises are these, “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.” “Whoever wishes, let him take the free gift of the water of life.” “He is able to save completely those who come to God through him.” Why, I might quote by the hour together some of these promises which are as wide as the distance between the North and South poles; invitations that must not be narrowed, exhortations which are addressed to every man and woman under heaven, in which every one of them is commanded to listen and live. “”Come, all you who are thirsty, come to the waters.” You know the class of promises to which I allude. Now, these are the words of God which are for you; grab hold of them; come to Jesus Christ with them in your hand; and rest assured the doctrine of election, instead of pushing you back, will stand like the servants around your father’s table to make music, while your whole being will dance to the glorious tune; it will be like a dish on the table at the feast of the returning prodigal, of which you will eat till you are very full; it will by no means repulse you or show anything to you which may keep you from hoping in Christ.

Once more, it is quite certain that, whatever it may be, this doctrine of election does not release you from your duty.

Now what is your duty? “The work of God is this: to believe in the one he has sent.” This is so much your absolute duty that, “Whoever does not believe stands condemned already because he has not believed.” This more than anything else is the reason for men’s condemnation. The Scripture says this is the one great sin. We read, concerning the Spirit of truth that “When he comes, he will convict the world of guilt in regard to sin – in regard to sin, because men do not believe in me.” Very well, then; in as much as God has so put it, that he commands you this day to trust Christ and to believe on him, that is what you have to do, and you may rest perfectly sure that falling back on the doctrine of election in order to exonerate you from what God commands you to perform is but a pitiful pretense. You are commanded to believe, and what God commands no doctrine may teach otherwise. May God help you to believe, for the doctrine of election does not excuse you. The gospel commands you, and election through the Holy Spirit enables you. It is your duty to believe, but no man ever was saved as a matter of duty, for that which saves is the gift of God. But your business now is with Christ only, and not with the decrees of the Father, which are all in the keeping of Christ, and will presently be revealed to you. You have to go to Christ first, and to his Father afterwards, for he said, “No one comes to the Father except through me.” You must go the cross to get to the decree; you must go by way of redemption to get to election; there is no other way.

 III. In the third place let us see WHAT THE EVIDENCES OF ELECTION ARE.

 Our text says, very clearly, that the apostle knew that the Thessalonians were elect. How did he know it? The way by which the apostle knew it must be the method by which you and I know that we too are the elect of God.

We have seen more than once in our day, some men who pretended to be certain of their election by their offensively bold behavior. They had in their minds the presumption that they were elected, and though they lived on in sin, and still did as they liked, they imagined they were God’s chosen ones. This is what I call presuming upon election by sheer impudence.

Sadly, we know of others, who have imagined themselves to be elect, because of the visions that they have seen when they have been asleep or when they have been awake – and they have presented these as evidences of their election. These evidences are of no more value than cobwebs would be for a garment, they will be as much service to you in the day of judgment as a thief’s long list of crimes would be to him if he were to use them to show that he deserved mercy. You may dream for a long time before you can ever dream yourself into heaven, and you may have as many stupid notions in your head as there are romance novels in your libraries, but because they are in your head does not mean that they are therefore in God’s book. We want a more positive word of testimony than this, and if we don’t have it, God forbid that we should indulge our vain heart with the flimsy thought that we are chosen of God.

I have heard of one who said, as he sat in a bar room, that he prove more than any of the rest, that he was one of God’s children; meanwhile he drank deeper into intoxication than the rest; Surely he might have said, with an emphasis, that he was one of the devil’s children; he would have been correct. When immoral men and women and men and women who live constantly in sin, babble on about being God’s children, we recognize them at once. Just as we know a crabapple tree when we see the fruit hanging on it, we understand what spirit these men and women are of when we see their walk and conversation. Oh, it is detestable, hateful above all hatefulness, to hear men and women, whose characters in secret are notorious, and whose lives are destitute of every Christian virtue, boasting as though they had the keys of heaven , and could admit or keep out any they chose. But, blessed be God, we are not under their domination, for the world has never known a more wicked set of tyrants than they are, nor a more frightful reign of vice than they could initiate, if they had their way, I am sure that they would bring on a greater wickedness than we could ever conceive. “Be do not be deceived, God is not mocked.” “Without holiness no one will see the Lord.” If grace does not make us holy, teaching us to deny ungodliness and worldly lusts, then it is not worth having. Brothers and sisters, if we are God’s elect we must have some substantial evidence to attest to it.

According to our text, what are these evidences? There seems to be four.

The first evidence appears to be the Word of God coming home with power.

 If you will turn to the verse you will see how the apostle says, “Our gospel came to you not simply with words, but also with power, with the Holy Spirit.” The Gospel is preached in the ears of everyone; it only comes with power to some. The power that is in the Gospel does not lie in the eloquence of the preacher, otherwise men would be the converters of souls. Nor does it lie in the preacher’s education, otherwise it would consist of the wisdom of man. The power which converts souls does not even lie in the preacher’s simplicity or understanding of his task; that is a secondary agency, but not the cause. Again, the power which converts souls does not even lie in the emotional appeal which the speaker may employ. Men and women may weep over the tragic scene in a theater as well as to the preaching of coming judgment in the church. Their mortal passions may be impressed through the acting on the stage as well as by the utterance of God’s own servants. No; there is something more than this that is needed, and where it is absent all preaching is a null and void. We might preach till our tongues rotted, till we should exhaust our lungs and die, but never would a soul be converted unless there were the mysterious power of the Holy Spirit going with it, changing the will of man. O my friends! we might as well preach to stone walls as preach to humanity unless the Holy Spirit is with the Word, to give it power to convert the soul. We are reminded of Mr. Rowland Hill, who once met a man in the street at night, not quite drunk, but almost so. The man said, “Mr. Hill, I am one of your converts.” “Yes,” he said, “I dare say you are one of mine; because if you were one of God’s you would not be in the state in which you are now.” Our converts are worth nothing. If they are converted by man they can be unconverted by man. If some charm or power of one preacher can bring them to Christ, then some charm or power of another preacher can take them from Christ. True conversion is the work of the Holy Spirit, and of the Holy Spirit alone.

Well, then, my friends did you ever, when listening to the Word, feel a divine power coming with it? Never mind where you were, whether in Westminster Abbey, St. Paul’s Cathedral, in this Church, or at some special service being held at one of the theatres; the place matters nothing. “Well,” perhaps you will say, “I have felt some influence.” Ah, but that may be wiped away. Have you ever felt something coming with the Word which you could not understand; which, while it wooed you and won your heart, inflicted a heavy blow on you, as though a sword had gone through you, and that not with a simple flesh wound, but with a wound that divides between soul and spirit, between joint and marrow, as if the truth were, as indeed it is a discerner of the thoughts and attitudes of the hearts.

Those who are really God’s elect can tell a story something like this. “There was a time when the Word was to me like a great ten thonged-whip; my shoulders were stripped bare, and every time the Word was preached it seemed to make a gash within my soul. I trembled; I saw God at war against me; I understood that I was in debt to justice and could not pay; that I was involved in a controversy against my Maker, and could not conquer. I saw myself stripped naked to my shame, leprous from head to foot, a bankrupt and a felon ready to be given over to a traitor’s doom.” Truly the Word came with power to your soul. “And,” you continue, “I remember too when the truth came home to my heart, and made me leap for great joy, for it took all my burdens away; it showed me Christ’s power to save. I had known the truth before, but now I felt it. I had understood that Christ could save, but, now that fact came home to me. I went to Jesus just as I was; I touched the hem of his garment; I was made whole. I found now that the Word was not fiction – that it was the one true reality. I had listened scores of times, and he that spoke was like one that played a tune on an instrument; but now he seemed to be dealing with me, putting his hand right into my heart, and getting hold of me. He brought me first to God’s judgment-seat, and there I stood and heard the thunders roll; then he brought me to the mercy-seat and I saw the blood sprinkled on it, and I went home triumphing because my sin was washed away.” Oh, again I ask you, did the Word ever come home with this power to your souls?

Since the day of your conversion has the Word ever rebuked you? Has it sometimes cut down your hopes! Do you sometimes, after hearing a sermon, feel as if it had been like a great hurricane bearing right through the forest of your thoughts, cutting its own course, and leaving many dead things that you thought were alive, laying dead on the ground? Do you feel, too, when you go home from church, as if God himself had been there, you didn’t know what else it could be. It couldn’t have been the speaker nor the words he uttered, but the Living God coming and looking into your eyes, and searching the thoughts of your mind, and turning your heart upside down, and then filling it full again with his love and with his light, with his truth and with his joy, with his peace and with his desire after holiness? Is it this way with you? When the Word does not come with power to your souls, then you lack the proof of election.

Remember, I don’t say that it will always be this way. You must not expect that same power every time that God will speak with you; in fact, the preacher himself often fails, and is painfully conscious of it. How will one man always speak without sometimes feeling that he himself is not in a fit frame to be God’s mouthpiece. But though the preacher is nothing but a simple country preacher, if he preaches God’s Word, the Spirit will go with it. It is not the simple preacher, nor yet the archbishop that does the work; it is the Word that is quick and powerful. Your evidence of election is blotted and blurred, unless the Word has come to you with a demonstration of the Spirit and with power. People come and hear sermons in this place, and then they go out and say, “How did you like it?” and one says, “Oh, I liked it a lot;” and another says, “Oh, I didn’t like it at all.” Do you think we live on the breath of your nostrils? Do you believe that God’s servants, if they are really his, care for what you think of them? No, truly not, but if you should reply, “I enjoyed the sermon,” they are inclined to say, “Then we must have been unfaithful or else you would have been angry, we must surely have slurred over something, or else the Word would have cut your conscience as with the jagged edges of a knife. You would have said, ‘I did not think how I liked the sermon; I was thinking how I liked myself, and about my own state before God; that was the matter that concerned me, not whether he preached well, but whether I stood accepted in Christ, or whether I was a castaway. “My dear friends, are you learning to listen like that? If you are not, if going to church is to you like going to an opera, or like listening to some speaker who speaks on worldly matters, then you lack the evidence of election; the Word has not come to your souls with power.

But there is yet a second evidence of election. Those whom God has chosen receive the word “with deep conviction.”

 They do not all receive it with full and complete conviction; that is a grace they get afterwards – but they receive it with deep conviction. There are some who profess to be Christians who go live by very strange principles. It is indeed somewhat difficult to know what principles are enforced and acknowledged in this age, for there are persons whose principles allow them to say black and white at the same time, and there are certain persons whose religious principles are not much different than this. They sing the Christian hymns when they are at church; they sing the ungodly songs of the world when they are somewhere else; they can act very conservative and they can act very wild. Such people as these never have any very great confidence in their religion; and it is very proper that they should not, for their religion is not worth the time they spend in making a profession of it. But the true Christian, when he gets hold of principles, keeps them, and there is no mistake about the grip with which he maintains his hold of them. “Ah!” he says, “that Word which I have heard with my ears is the very truth of God, and it is true to me, real and substantial to me, and here I clutch it with both my hands, with a clutch that neither time, nor tribulation, nor death, will ever cause me to let go.” To a Christian his religion is a part of himself; he believes the truth, not because he has been told it or taught it by mother or friend, but because it is true to him in his inmost soul. He is like the servant girl who, when she could not answer her infidel master, said, “Sir, I cannot answer you, but I have a something in here that would if it could speak.” There is “deep conviction.”

Sinners who have once felt their need of a Savior feel very deep conviction about his preciousness, and saints that have once found him precious have very deep conviction about his divinity, about his atonement, about his everlasting love, about his immortal dignity as a prophet, a priest, and a king. They are sure of it. I know some persons who say if a man speaks positively he is dogmatical. Glorious old dogmatism, when will you come back to earth again? It is these “ifs,” and “buts,” and qualifications, these “perhapses” and “may be so’s” that have ruined our pulpits. Look at Luther, when he stood up for the glory of his God, was there ever such a dogmatist? “I believe it,” he said, “and therefore I speak it.” For when he was trying to earn his own salvation by creeping up and down the staircase to heaven with his good works, it was then that the sentence out of the clouds came before him, “When we are justified by faith, then we will have peace with God,” it was then that Luther was just as positive that works could not save him as he was of his own existence. Now, if he had come out and said, “Gentlemen, I have a theory to offer that may be correct; excuse me for doing so,” and so on, then the Roman Catholic Church would have still been dominant to this day. But he knew God had said it, and he felt that that was God’s own way to his own soul, and he could not help being dogmatic with that glorious message which soon laid his foes prostrate at his feet.

Now have you received the gospel “with deep conviction?” If you have, and you can say, “Christ is mine; I trust in him, and though I may sometimes have doubts about my own interest in him, yet I do know by experience in my soul that he is a precious Christ-I don’t know it by other peoples experiences, but I know it by my heart’s inward evidence, I know it by the analogy of my own soul’s experience, that the truth which I have received is no cunningly devised fable, but something that came from God to draw my soul up to God” – that is another evidence of election. If you have that, never mind the rest; I hardly care whether you believe the doctrine of election or not; you are elect. As I have sometimes told a brother who has denied the doctrine of final perseverance of the saints (the doctrine of eternal security), when I have seen his holy life, “Never mind, my brother, you will persevere to the end, and you will prove the doctrine that you do not believe. You may not be able to receive the doctrine of election that I now preach, but if such has been your experience, when you get to heaven you will wake up and say, ‘Well, I am one of the elect. I made a great deal of fuss about it while on the earth, and I will make a great deal of music about it now that I have arrived in heaven, and I will sing more sweetly and loudly than all the rest, “Unto him that has loved me and washed me from my sins in his blood, unto him be glory forever and ever.”

But there is a third evidence. Those who are chosen of the Lord desire to be like him. “You became imitators of us and of the Lord.”

 The apostle says in the text; by which he does not mean that they said, “I am of Paul, I am of Silas, I am of Timothy,” but that they imitated Paul so far as he imitated Christ. Thomas aˆKempis wrote a book about the imitation of Christ, and in some respects it is a blessed book; but I would like the Holy Spirit to write in your hearts the imitation of Christ. It will be to you a sweet proof that you are chosen of God. Are you Christlike or do you want to be? Can you forgive your enemy, and can you love him and do good to him? Can you say tonight, “I am no more any man’s enemy than is the newborn baby?” and do you desire now to live unselfishly, to live for others, to live for God? Are you prayerful? Do you come to God in prayer as Jesus did? Are you careful of your words and of your acts as Christ was? I do not ask you if you are perfect, but I do ask whether you follow the Perfect One? We are to be followers of Christ, if not with equal steps, still with steps that would be equal if they could. If we follow Christ, that will be to others one of the surest proofs of our election, though perhaps to ourselves, if we are humble minded, it will be no proof, since we will rather see our blemishes than our virtues, and mourn over our sins more than we rejoice in our graces. If a man does not follow Christ, those who look on will be safe in concluding that, whatever he may say about election, and however much he may shout about it, he is not the Lord’s. On that point I will not say anything more, because I have already enlarged on it in a former part of the sermon.

In the last place I will say, the fourth evidence of being elected is the existence of spiritual joy in spiritual service. If you look further, it seems that those of whose election the apostle was sure of, received the Word of God “in spite of severe suffering,” and “welcomed the message with the joy given by the Holy Spirit.”

 What do you say to this, you whose religion consists of nothing but mindless attendance to forms that you detest? See how many there are who go to a place of worship just because it is not respectable to stay away, but who often wish it were. And when many of these so-called Christians travel far away from here, what do they do with Sunday worship then? Where is their concern for worshipping with God’s people? See, too, with what reluctance some people, here at home, go to church. Why? Because they have come to regard it as a place where they ought to be very solemn. It is not a home to them; it is a prison. How different it is with your children when they come home for their holidays. How do they come to their father’s house? Gloomy, sedate, as if they could not speak? No, bless their little hearts, they come running up to their father’s knees, so glad to be there, so glad to be home. That is how a man whose religion is his delight comes to the place where God’s children gather to worship and honor their Holy Father. He feels that it is his Father’s house. He will be reverent, for his Father is God, but he must be happy, for God is his Father.

Also notice the Christian when he goes to his closet. Ungodly persons will not go there at all; or, if they do, it is because they want to earn heaven by it. But see, they go through their dreary prayers; and what a dreary thing it must be for a man to pray when he never expects to be heard, and when he has no spirit of prayer! It is like a horse going around a mill grinding for somebody else, and never getting any farther, doing the same tomorrow, the same the day after, and ever on and on. When the church has prayer meetings, it would be a very great thing, if those who attended went there with holy joy; but there is the deacon, and he says it is a great trouble to be always opening the doors when nobody comes except three old women. Do you think that is an acceptable service to God? But they who go because they would not stay away if they could, they who worship God because it is an instinct, and a pleasure, a holy thing, and honorable – these are men and women who delight in God’s Word, and they give the best evidence of being chosen of God.

Woe to you, Scribes and Pharisees, you who disfigure your faces to show men you are fasting. I tell you the truth, he that reads the heart does not ask that your head hangs down like one in mourning, but that you may do deeds of mercy, and walk humbly with your God, and you who can delight yourselves in your God will have the desires of your heart. You that rejoice in the Lord always, and triumph in his name will go from strength to strength, and going at last to glory, you will find that you came there as the result of his divine purpose and decree and you will give him all the praise.

But now, I think, I hear some say, “Oh, I want to know whether I am elect. I cannot say that the Word ever came to me with power, I cannot say I received it with deep conviction, I cannot say I am a follower of Christ, I cannot say I have received the Word with joy.” Well, dear one, then leave that question alone. Instead of that, let me put forward another, “Do you believe in the Lord Jesus Christ? Will you now trust Christ to save your soul?” He will do it, if, just as you are, whoever you may be, if you will just come to Christ, and give yourself up to him to save you, to have you, to hold you for better, for worse, in life and through death. The moment you believe you are saved. That act of faith, through the precious blood of Christ will wash away your every sin. You will not begin to be saved; you are saved. You will not be put into a salvable condition, but you will be saved the moment you believe – completely and perfectly saved. “Oh,” says one, “I would if I could trust Christ.” Do you mean that? “Whoever wishes, let him take,” let him trust, Christ. God help you to do it now. Trust Jesus, and you are saved. This is addressed to every one of you without exception, for “Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life.” The Lord help you to trust Jesus, and then you may go on your way with joy, “knowing, brothers and sisters, loved by God, that he has chosen you, and that your election is sure.” Amen.

by

George Whitefield

(1714-1770)

2 Timothy 3:12, “Yes, and all that will live godly in Christ Jesus, shall suffer persecution.”

When our Lord was pleased to take upon himself the form of a servant, and to go about preaching the kingdom of God; he took all opportunities in public, and more especially in private, to caution his disciples against seeking great things for themselves, and also to forewarn them of the many distresses, afflictions and persecutions, which they must expect to endure for his name’s sake. The great apostle Paul therefore, the author of this epistle, in this, as in all other things, following the steps of his blessed Master, takes particular care, among other apostolical admonitions, to warn young Timothy of the difficulties he must expect to meet with in the course of his ministry: “This know also, that in the last days perilous times shall come. For men shall be lovers of their ownselves, covetous, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, without natural affection, truce-breakers, false accusers, incontinent, fierce, despisers of those that are good, traitors, heady, high-minded, lovers of pleasure more than lovers of God; having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof: from such turn away. For of this sort are they who creep into houses, and lead captive silly women laden with sins, led away with divers lusts, ever learning, and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth. Now, as Jannes and Jambres (two of the Egyptian magicians) withstood Moses (by working sham miracles) so do they also resist the truth; and (notwithstanding they keep up the form of religion) are men of corrupt minds, reprobate concerning the faith.” But, in order to keep him from sinking under their opposition, he tells him, that though God, for wise ends, permitted these false teachers, as he did the magicians, to oppose for some time, yet they should now proceed no farther: “For their folly (says he) shall be made manifest unto all men, as theirs (the Magicians) also was,” when they could not stand before Moses because of the boil; for the boil was upon the Magicians, as well as upon all the Egyptians. And then, to encourage Timothy yet the more, he propounds to him his own example; “But thou hast fully known my doctrine, manner of life, purpose, faith, long-suffering, charity, patience, persecutions, afflictions, which came unto me at Antioch, at Iconium, at Lystra; what persecutions I endured; but out of them all the Lord delivered me.” And then, lest Timothy might think that this was only the particular case of Paul, says he, in the words of the text, “Yea, and all that will live godly in Christ Jesus, shall suffer persecution.”

The words, without considering them as they stand in relation to the context, contain an important truth, that persecution is the common lot of every godly man. This is a hard saying, How few can bear it? I trust God, in the following discourse, will enable me to make it good, by showing,

I. What it is to live godly in Christ Jesus.

II. The different kinds of persecution to which they, who live godly, are exposed.

III. Why it is, that godly men must expect to suffer persecution.

LASTLY, We shall apply the whole.

I. FIRST, Let us consider what it is to live godly in Christ Jesus. This supposes, that we are made the righteousness of God in Christ, that we are born again, and are one with Christ by a living faith, and a vital union, even as Jesus Christ and the Father are One. Unless we are thus converted, and transformed by the renewing of our minds, we cannot properly be said to be in Christ, much less to live godly in him. To be in Christ merely by baptism, and an outward profession, is not to be in Him in the strict sense of the word: no; “They that are in Christ, are new creatures; old things are passed away, and all things are become new” in their hearts. Their life is hid with Christ in God; their souls daily feed on the invisible realities of another world. To “live godly in Christ,” is to make the divine will, and not our own, the sole principle of all our thoughts, words, and actions; so that, “whether we eat or drink, or whatsoever we do, we do all to the glory of God.” Those who live godly in Christ, may not so much be said to live, as Christ to live in them: He is their Alpha and Omega, their first and last, their beginning and end. They are led by his Spirit, as a child is led by the hand of its father; and are willing to follow the Lamb withersoever he leads them. They hear, know, and obey his voice. Their affections are set on things above; their hopes are full of immortality; their citizenship is in heaven. Being born again of God, they habitually live to, and daily walk with, God. They are pure in heart; and, from a principle of faith in Christ, are holy in all manner of conversation and godliness.

This is to “live godly in Christ Jesus:” and hence we may easily learn, why so few suffer persecution? Because, so few live godly in Christ Jesus. You may live formally in Christ, you may attend on outward duties; you may live morally in Christ, you may (as they term it) do no one an harm, and avoid persecution: but they “that will live godly in Christ Jesus, shall suffer persecution.”

2. SECONDLY, What is the meaning of the word Persecution, and how many kinds there are of it, I come now to consider.

The word Persecution, is derived from a Greek word signifying to pursue, and generally implies pursuing a person for the sake of his goodness, or God’s good-will to him. The

FIRST kind of it, is that of the HEART. We have an early example of this in the wicked one Cain, who, because the Lord had respect to Abel and his offering, and not to him and his offering, was very wroth, his countenance fell, and at length he cruelly slew his envied brother. Thus the Pharisees hated and persecuted our Lord long before they laid hold on him: and our Lord mentions being inwardly hated of men, as one kind of Persecution his disciples were to undergo. This heart-enmity (if I may so term it) is the root of all other kinds of Persecution, and is, in some degree or other, to be found in the soul of every unregenerated man; and numbers are guilty of this persecution, who never have it in their power to persecute any other way. Nay, numbers would actually put in practice all other degrees of persecution, was not the name of Persecution become odious amongst mankind, and did they not hereby run the hazard of losing their reputation. Alas! how many at the great day, whom we know not now, will be convicted and condemned, that all their life harbored a secret evil-will against Zion! They may now screen it before men; but God seeth the enmity of their hearts, and will judge them as Persecutors at the great and terrible day of judgment.

SECOND degree of Persecution is that of the tongue; “out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaketh.” Many, I suppose, think it no harm to shoot out arrows, even bitter words, against the disciples of the Lord: they scatter their firebrands, arrows and death, saying, “Are we not in sport?” But, however they may esteem it, in God’s account evil-speaking is a high degree of Persecution. Thus Ishmael’s mocking Isaac, is termed persecuting him. “Blessed are ye (says out Lord) when men shall revile you and persecute you, and shall say all manner of evil against you falsely for my name’s sake.” From whence we may gather, that reviling, and speaking all manner of evil for Christ’s sake, is a high degree of persecution. For “a good name, *says the wise man) is better than precious ointment,” and, to many, is dearer than life itself. It is a great breach of the sixth commandment, to slander any one; but to speak evil of and slander the disciples of Christ, merely because they are his disciples, must be highly provoking in the sight of God; and such who are guilty of it (without repentance) will find that Jesus Christ will call them to an account, and punish them for all their ungodly and hard speeches in a lake of fire and brimstone. This shall be their portion to drink. The

THIRD and LAST kind of Persecution, is that which expresses itself in ACTIONS: as when wicked men separate the children of God from their company; “Blessed are ye, (says our Lord) when they shall separate you from their company:” or expose them to church-censures. “They shall put you out of their synagogues;” threatening and prohibiting them from making an open profession of his religion or worship; or interdicting ministers for preaching his word, as the high-priests threatened the apostles, and “forbad them any more to speak in the name of Jesus;” and Paul breathed out threatenings and slaughters against the disciples of the Lord: or when they call them into courts; “You shall be called before governors,” says our Lord: or when they fine, imprison, or punish them, by confiscation of goods, cruel scourging, and, lastly, death itself.

It would be impossible to enumerate in what various shapes persecution has appeared. It is a many-headed monster, cruel as the grave, insatiable as hell; and, what is worse, it generally appears under the cloak of religion. But, cruel, insatiable, and horrid as it is, they that live godly in Christ Jesus, must expect to suffer and encounter with it in all its forms.

This is what we are to make good under our next general head.

3. THIRDLY, Why is it that godly men must expect to suffer persecution? And,

FIRST, This appears from the whole tenor of our Lord’s doctrine. We will begin with his divine sermon on the mount. “Blessed are they who are persecuted for righteousness sake; for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.” So that, if our Lord spoke truth, we are not so blessed as to have an interest in the kingdom of heaven, unless we are or have been persecuted for righteousness sake. Nay, our Lord (it is remarkable) employs three verses in this beatitude, and only one in each of the others; not only to show that it was a thing which men (as men) are unwilling to believe, but also the necessary consequence of it upon our being Christians. This is likewise evident from all those passages, wherein our Lord informs us, that he came upon the earth, “not to send peace, but a sword;” and that the father-in- law should be against the mother-in-law, and a man’s foes should be those of his own household. Passages, which though confined by false prophets to the first, I am persuaded will be verified by the experience of all true Christians in this, and every age of the church. It would be endless to recount all the places, wherein our Lord forewarns his disciples, that they should be called before rulers, and thrust out of synagogues, nay, that the time would come, wherein men should think they did God service to kill them. For this reason he so frequently declared, that “unless a man forsake all that he had, and even hated life itself, he could not be his disciple.” And therefore it is worthy our observation, that in the remarkable passage, wherein our Lord makes such an extensive promise to those who left all for him, he cautiously inserts persecution. “And Jesus answered and said, Verily I say unto you, there is no man that hath left house, or brethren, or sisters, or father, or mother, or wife, or children, or lands, for my sake and the gospel’s, but he shall receive an hundred-fold now in this time; houses and brethren, and sisters and mothers, and children and lands, with persecutions; (the word is in the plural number, including all kinds of persecution) and in the world to come eternal life.” He that hath ears to hear, let him hear what Christ says in all these passages, and then confess, that all who will godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution.

As this is proved from our Lord’s doctrine, so it is no less evident from his life. Follow him from the manger to the cross, and see whether any persecution was like that which the Son of God, the Lord of glory, underwent whilst here on earth. How was he hated by wicked men? How often would that hatred have excited them to lay hold of him, had it not been for fear of the people? How was he reviled, counted and called a Blasphemer, a Wine-bibber, a Samaritan, nay, a Devil, and, in one word, had all manner of evil spoken against him falsely? What contradiction of sinners did he endure against himself? How did men separate from his company, and were ashamed to walk with him openly? Insomuch that he once said to his own disciples, “Will you also go away?” Again, How was he stoned, thrust out of the synagogues, arraigned as a deceiver of the people, a seditious and pestilent fellow, an enemy of Caesar, and as such scourged, blind-folded, spit upon, and at length condemned, and nailed to an accursed tree? Thus was the Master persecuted, thus did the Lord suffer; and the servant is not above his Master, nor the disciple above his Lord: “If they have persecuted me, they will also persecute you,” says the blessed Jesus. And again, “Every man that is perfect (a true Christian) must be as his Master,” or suffer as he did. For in all these things our Lord has set us an example, that we should follow his steps: and therefore, far be it that any, who live godly in Christ Jesus, should henceforward expect to escape suffering persecution.

But farther: not only our Lord’s example, but the example of all the saints that ever lived, evidently demonstrates the truth of the apostle’s assertion in the text. How soon was Abel made a martyr for his religion? How was Isaac mocked by the son of the bond-woman? And what a large catalogue of suffering Old Testament saints, have we recorded in the 11th chapter of the Hebrews! Read the Acts of the Apostles, and see how the first Christians were threatened, stoned, imprisoned, scourged, and persecuted even unto death. Examine Church History in after-ages, and you will find the murder of the innocents by Herod, was but an earnest of the innocent blood which should be shed for the sake of Jesus. Examine the experience of saints now living on earth; and, if it were possible to consult the spirits of just men made perfect, I am persuaded each would concur with the apostle in asserting, that “all who will live godly in Christ Jesus, shall suffer persecution.”

How can it be otherwise in the very nature of things? Ever since the fall, there has been a irreconcilable enmity between the seed of the woman and the seed of the serpent. Wicked men hat God, and therefore cannot but hate those who are like him: they hate to be reformed, and therefore must hate and persecute those, who, by a contrary behavior, testify of them, that their deeds are evil. Besides, pride of heart leads men to persecute the servants of Jesus Christ. If they commend them, they are afraid of being asked, Why do not you follow them? And therefore because they dare not imitate, though they may sometimes be even forced to approve their way, yet pride and envy make them turn persecutors. Hence it is, that as it was formerly, so it is now, and so will it be to the end of time; “He that is born after the flesh, (the natural man, does and) will persecute him that is born after the Spirit,” the regenerate man. Because Christians are not of the world, but Christ hath chosen them out of the world, therefore the world will hate them. If it be objected against this doctrine, that we now live in a Christian world, and therefore must not expect such persecution as formerly; I answer, All are not Christians that are called so; and, till the heart is changed, the enmity against God (which is the root of all persecution) remains: and consequently Christians, falsely so called, will persecute as well as others. I observed therefore, in the beginning of this discourse, that Paul mentions those that had a form of religion, as persons of whom Timothy had need be chiefly aware: for, as our Lord and his apostles were mostly persecuted by their countrymen the Jews, so we must expect the like usage from the Formalists of our own nation, the Pharisees, who seem to be religious. The most horrid and barbarous persecutions have been carried on by those who have called themselves Christians; witness the days of queen Mary; and the fines, banishments and imprisonments of the children of God in the last century, and the bitter, irreconcilable hatred that appears in thousands who call themselves Christians, even in the present days wherein we live.

Persons, who argue against persecution, are not sufficiently sensible of the bitter enmity of the heart of every unregenerate man against God. For my own part, I am so far from wondering that Christians are persecuted, that I wonder our streets do not run with the blood of the saints: was mens power equal to their wills, such a horrid spectacle would soon appear. But,

Persecution is necessary in respect to the godly themselves. If we have not all manner of evil spoken of us, how can we know whether we seek only that honor which cometh from above? If we have no persecutors, how can our passive graces be kept in exercise? How can many Christian precepts be put into practice? How can we love; pray for; and do good to; those who despitefully use us? How can we overcome evil with good? In short, how can we know we love God better than life itself? Paul was sensible of all this, and therefore so positively and peremptorily asserts, that “all who live godly in Christ Jesus, shall suffer persecution.”

Not that I affirm, all are persecuted in a like degree. No: this would be contrary both to scripture and experience. But though all Christians are not really called to suffer every kind of persecution, yet all Christians are liable thereto: and notwithstanding some may live in more peaceful times of the church than others, yet all Christians, in all ages, will find by their own experience, that, whether they act in a private or public capacity, they must, in some degree or other, suffer persecution.

Here then I would pause, and, LASTLY, by way of application, exhort all persons,

FIRST, To stand a while and examine themselves. For, by what has been said, you may gather one mark, whereby you may judge whether you are Christians or not. Were you ever persecuted for righteousness sake? If not, you never yet lived godly in Christ our Lord. Whatever you may say to the contrary, the inspired apostle, in the words of the text (the truth of which, I think, I have sufficiently proved) positively asserts, that all who will live godly in Him, shall suffer persecution. Not that all who are persecuted are real Christians; for many sometimes suffer, and are persecuted, on other accounts than for righteousness sake. The great question therefore is, Whether you were ever persecuted for living godly? You may boast of your great prudence and sagacity (and indeed these are excellent things) and glory because you have not run such lengths, and made yourselves so singular, and liable to such contempt, as some others have. But, alas! this is not a mark of your being of a Christian, but of a Laodicean spirit, neither how nor cold, and sit only to be spewed out of the mouth of God. That which you call prudence, is often, only cowardice, dreadful hypocrisy, pride of heart, which makes you dread contempt, and afraid to give up your reputation for God. You are ashamed of Christ and his gospel; and in all probability, was he to appear a second time upon earth, in words, as well as works, you would deny him. Awake therefore, all ye that live only formally in Christ Jesus, and no longer seek that honor which cometh of man. I do not desire to court you, but I entreat you to live godly, and fear not contempt for the sake of Jesus Christ. Beg of God to give you his Holy Spirit, that you may see through, and discover the latent hypocrisy of your hearts, and no longer deceive your own souls. Remember you cannot reconcile two irreconcilable differences, God and Mammon, the friendship of this world with the favor of God. Know you not who hath told you, that “the friendship of this world is enmity with God?” If therefore you are in friendship with the world, notwithstanding all your specious pretenses to piety, you are at enmity with God: you are only heart-hypocrites; and, “What is the hope of the hypocrite, when God shall take away his soul?” Let the words of the text sound an alarm in your ears; O let them sink deep into your hearts; “Yea, and all that will live godly in Christ Jesus, shall suffer persecution.”

SECONDLY, From the words of the text, I would take occasion to speak to those, who are about to list themselves under the banner of Christ’s cross. What say you? Are you resolved to live godly in Christ Jesus, notwithstanding the consequence will be, that you must suffer persecution? You are beginning to build; but have you taken our Lord’s advice, to “sit down first and count the cost?” Have you well weighed with yourselves that weighty declaration, “He that loveth father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me;” and again, “Unless a man forsake all that he hath he cannot be my disciple?” Perhaps some of you have great possessions; will not you go away sorrowful, if Christ should require you to sell all that you have! Others of you again may be kinsmen, or some way related, or under obligations, to the high-priests, or other great personages, who may be persecuting the church of Christ: What say you? Will you, with Moses, “rather choose to suffer affliction with the people of God, than enjoy the pleasures of sin for a season?” Perhaps you may say, my friends will not oppose me. That is more than you know: in all probability your chief enemies will be those of your own household. If therefore they should oppose you, are you willing naked to follow a naked Christ? And to wander about in sheep-skins and goats-skins, in dens and caves of the earth; being afflicted, destitute, tormented, rather than not be Christ’s disciples? You are now all following with zeal, as Ruth and Orpah did Naomi, and may weep under the word; but are not your tears crocodiles tears? And, when difficulties come, will you not go back form following your Lord, as Orpah departed form following Naomi? Have you really the root of grace in your hearts? Or, are you only stony-ground hearers? You receive the word with joy; but, when persecution arises because of the word, will you not be immediately offended? Be not angry with me for putting these questions to you. I am jealous over you, but it is with a godly jealousy: for, alas! how many have put their hands to the plough, and afterwards have shamefully looked back? I only deal with you, as our Lord did with the person that said, “Lord, I will follow thee withersoever thou wilt. The foxes have holes, and the birds of the air have nests, but the son of man, (says he) hath not where to lay his head.” What say you? Are you willing to endure hardness, and thereby approve yourselves good soldiers of Jesus Christ? You now come on foot out of the towns and villages to hear the word, and receive me as a messenger of God: but will you not by and by cry out, Away with him, away with him; it is not fit such a fellow should live upon the earth? Perhaps some of you, like Hazael, may say, “Are we dogs, that we should do this?” But, alas! I have met with many unhappy souls, who have drawn back unto perdition, and have afterwards accounted me their enemy, for dealing faithfully with them; though once, if it were possible, they would have plucked out their own eyes, and have given them unto me. Sit down therefore, I beseech you, and seriously count the cost, and ask yourselves again and again, whether you count all things but dung and dross, and are willing to suffer the loss of all things, so that you may win Christ, and be found in him: for you may assure yourselves, the apostle hath not spoken in vain, “All that will live godly in Christ Jesus, shall suffer persecution.”

THIRDLY, The text speaks to you that are patiently suffering for the truth’s sake: “Rejoice, and be exceeding glad; great shall be your reward in heaven.” For to you it is given, not only to believe, but also to suffer, and perhaps remarkably too, for the sake of Jesus! This is a mark of your discipleship, an evidence that you do live godly in Christ Jesus. Fear not, therefore, neither be dismayed. O be not weary and faint in your minds! Jesus, your Lord, your life, cometh, and his reward is with him. Though all men forsake you, yet will not he: no; the Spirit of Christ and of glory shall rest upon you. In patience therefore possess your souls. Sanctify the Lord God in your hearts. Be in nothing terrified by your adversaries: on their part Christ is evil spoken of; on your part his is glorified. Be not ashamed of your glory, since others can glory in their shame. Think it not strange concerning the fiery trial, wherewith you are or may be tried. The Devil rages, knowing that he hath but a short time to reign. He or his emissaries have no more power than what is given them from above: God sets them their bounds, which they cannot pass; and the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Fear not; no one shall set upon you to hurt you, without your heavenly Father’s knowledge. Do your earthly friends and parents forsake you? Are you cast out of the synagogues? The Lord shall reveal himself to you, as to the man that was born blind. Jesus Christ shall take you up. If they carry you to prison, and load you with chains, so that the iron enter into your souls, even there shall Chris send an angel from heaven to strengthen you, and enable you, with Paul and Silas, to “sing praises at midnight.” Are you threatened to be thrown into a den of lions, or cast into a burning fiery furnace, because you will not bow down and worship the beast? Fear not; the God, whom you serve, is able to deliver you: or, if he should suffer the flames to devour your bodies, they would only serve, as so many fiery chariots, to carry your souls to God. Thus it was with the martyrs of old; so that once, when he was burning, cried out, “Come, you Papists, if you want a miracle, here, behold one! This bed of flames is to me a bed of down.” Thus it was with almost all that suffered in former times: for Jesus, notwithstanding he withdrew his own divinity from himself, yet has always lifted up the light of his countenance upon the souls of suffering saints. “Fear not therefore those that can kill the body, and after that have no more that they can do; but fear Him only, who is able to destroy both body and soul in hell.” Dare, dare to live godly in Christ Jesus, though you suffer all manner of persecution. But,

FOURTHLY, Are there any true ministers of Jesus Christ here? You will not be offended if I tell you, that the words of the text are, in an especial manner, applicable to you. Paul wrote them to Timothy; and we, of all men, that live godly in Christ Jesus, must expect to suffer the severest persecution. Satan will endeavor to bruise our heels, let who will escape: and it has been the general way of God’s providence, in times of persecution, to permit the shepherds first to be smitten, before the sheep are scattered. Let us not therefore show that we are only hirelings, who care not for the sheep; but, like the great Shepherd and Bishop of souls, let us readily lay down our lives for the sheep. Whilst others are boasting of their great perferments, let us rather glory in our great afflictions and persecutions for the sake of Christ. Paul rejoiced that he suffered afflictions and persecutions at Iconium and Lystra: out of all, the Lord delivered him; out of all, the Lord will deliver us, and cause us hereafter to sit down with him on thrones, when he comes to judge the twelve tribes of Israel.

I could proceed; but I am conscious, in this part of my discourse, I ought more particularly to speak to myself, knowing that Satan has desired to have me, that he may sift me as wheat. Without a spirit of prophecy, we may easily discern the signs of the times. Persecutions even at the doors: the tabernacle of the Lord is already driven into the wilderness: the ark of the Lord is fallen into the unhallowed hands of uncircumcised Philistines. They have long since put us out of their synagogues, and high- priests have been calling on civil magistrates to exert their authority against the disciples of the Lord. Men in power have been breathing out threatenings: we may easily guess what will follow, imprisonment and slaughter. The storm has been gathering some time; it must break shortly. Perhaps it may fall on me first.

Brethren therefore, whether in the ministry or not, I beseech you, “pray for me,” that I may never suffer justly, as an evil-doer, but only for righteousness sake. O pray that I may not deny my Lord in any wise, but that I may joyfully follow him, both to prison and to death, if he is pleased to call me to seal his truths with my blood. Be not ashamed of Christ, or of his gospel, though I should become a prisoner of the Lord. Though I am bound, the word of God will not be bound: no; an open, an effectual door is opened for preaching the everlasting gospel, and men or devils shall never be able to prevail against it. Only pray, that, whether it be in life or death, Christ may be glorified in me: then I shall rejoice, yea, and will rejoice.

And now, to whom shall I address myself next?

FIFTHLY, To those, who persecute their neighbors for living godly in Christ Jesus. But, what shall I say to you? Howl and weep for the miseries that shall come upon you; for a little while the Lord permits you to ride over the heads of his people; but, by and by, death will arrest you, judgment will find you, and Jesus Christ shall put a question to you, which will strike you dumb, WHY PERSECUTED YOU ME? You may plead your laws and your canons, and pretend what you do is out of zeal for God; but God shall discover the cursed hypocrisy and serpentine enmity of your hearts, and give you over to the tormentors. It is well, if in this life God does not send some mark upon you. He pleaded the cause of Naboth, when innocently condemned for blaspheming God and the king; and our Lord sent forth his armies, and destroyed the city of those who killed the prophets, and stoned them that were sent unto them. If you have a mind therefore to fill up the measure of your iniquities, go on, persecute and despise the disciples of the Lord: but know, “that for all these things, God shall bring you to judgment.” Nay, those you now persecute, shall be in part your judges, and sit on the right-hand of the Majesty on high, whilst you are dragged by infernal spirits into a lake that burneth with fire and brimstone, and the smoke of your torment shall be ascending up for ever and ever. Lay down therefore, ye rebels, your arms against the most high God, and no longer persecute those who live godly in Christ Jesus. The Lord will plead, the Lord will avenge, their cause. You may be permitted to bruise their heels, yet in the end they shall bruise your accursed heads. I speak not this, as though I were afraid of you; for I know in whom I have believed: only out of pure love I warn you, and because I know not but Jesus Christ may make some of you vessels of mercy, and snatch you, even you persecutors, as fire-brands out of the fire. Jesus Christ came into the world to save sinners, even persecutors, the worst of sinners: his righteousness is sufficient for them; his Spirit is able to purify and change their hearts. He once converted Saul: may the same God magnify his power, in converting all those who are causing the godly in Christ Jesus, as much as in them lies, to suffer persecution! The Lord be with you all.

Amen.

by

C. H. SPURGEON

1834-1892

“He that sat upon the throne said, Behold I make all things new.”–

Revelation 21:5.

Men generally venerate antiquity. It were hard to say which has the stronger power over the human mind–antiquity or novelty. While men will frequently dote upon the old, they are most easily dazzled by the new. Anything new has at least one attraction. Restless spirits consider that the new must be better than the old. Though often disappointed, they are still ready to be caught by the same bait, and, like the Athenians of Mars Hill, spend their time in nothing else but either to tell or to hear some new thing. And as for ourselves, dear friends, mournfully as we sometimes think of the flight of time, we are wont cheerfully to look out upon the new epochs as they begin to dawn upon us. If our calendar suggests some dismal memories in the past, our calculation forestalls some happier prospects in the future. And it will sometimes happen that we leave so much anxiety, adversity, and chastisement behind us, that it is a relief to hope that the tide has turned, and that a course of comfort, prosperity, and mercy lies before us. One weeps over the past and the lost. I suppose the best of men must do so at times. I am sure those of us who are not the best, feel often constrained to pour out some such a lamentation as this:–

“Much of our time has run to waste;

Our sins, how great the sum!

Lord, give us pardon for the past,

And strength for days to come.”

I do not know but it is sometimes as well, when one has been plunged in sorrow, or feels ashamed of his past life–after having regretted that which is bygone and repented of it, and sorrowed over it–to feel as if he breathed another atmosphere, and had started on a fresh career. Having thrown away the old sword, he is now about to see what he can do with the new: having put off an old garment, he is desirous to walk more worthily of his vocation with fresh ones that are provided for him. Perhaps the thought of freshness, the fact of new time having dawned on our path, may be a little help to those of us who are dull and heavy, and we may be stirred up to action, or, if not to action, it may awaken earnest hope that the infusion of a new start into our lives, new vigour instead of the old lethargy, new love instead of the old lukewarmness, new zeal instead of the old deathlikeness; new, pertinacious, persevering industry for Christ, instead of the old idleness, may result. God grant that it may be so!

Looking at the text in this light, I think it speaks to everyone here present–Would you begin anew, lo, there is one who can help you to do so! From the throne where sits the once crucified but now glorified Saviour, there comes a whisper of hope to each and every soul who would be made new, and would begin life anew. “Behold I make all things new.” In trying to bring out the thoughts contained in this exclamation from the throne, from the Emperor of the Universe, from the court of the King of Kings, we shall first speak, very briefly, of the new creation; secondly, we should bid you adore the great Regenerator; and, in the third place, we shall ask you to behold with attention the fact before you, with a view of receiving benefit from it. Observe the text speaks of:–

I. A New Creation.

“I make.” That is a divine word. “I make all things.” That, also, is divine. “I make all things new.” This our Lord Jesus Christ has done upon the greatest scale. We must view his purpose. It is the purpose and intention of the Lord Jesus to make this world entirely new. You recollect how it was made at first–pure and perfect. It sang with its sister-spheres the song of joy and reverence. It was a fair world, full of everything that was lovely, beautiful, happy, holy. And if we might be permitted to dream for a moment of what it would have been if it had continued as God created it, one might fancy what a blessed world it would be at this moment. Had it possessed a teeming population like its present one, and if, one by one, those godly ones had been caught away, like Elijah, without knowing death, to be succeeded by pious descendants–oh! what a blessed world it would have been! A world where every man would have been a priest, and every house a temple, and every garment a vestment, and every meal a sacrifice, and every place holiness to the Lord, for the tabernacle of God would have been among them, and God himself would have dwelt among them! What songs would have hailed the rising of the sun–the birds of paradise carolling on every hill and in every dale their Maker’s praise! What songs would have ushered in the stillness of the night! Ay, and angels, hovering over this fair world, would oft have heard the strain of joy breaking the silence of midnight, as glad and pure hearts beheld the eyes of the Creator beaming down upon them from the stars which stud the vault of heaven. But there came a serpent, and his craft spoiled it all. He whispered into the ears of a mother Eve; she fell, and we fell with her, and what a world this now is! If a man walks about in it with his eyes open, he will see it to be a horrible sphere. I do not mean that its rivers, its lakes, its valleys, its mountains are repulsive. Nay, it is a world fit for angels, naturally; but it is a horrible world morally. As I walked the other day down the streets of Paris, and saw the soldiers with their pretty dresses, and the knives and forks which they carried with them to carve men and make a meal for death, I could not help thinking–this is a pretty world, this is. Only let one man lift his finger, and a hundred thousand men are ready to meet a hundred thousand other men, all intent upon doing–what? Why, upon cutting each other’s throats, upon tearing out each other’s bleeding hearts, and wading up to their knees in each other’s gore, till the ditches be full of blood, horses and men all mingled, and left to be food for dogs and for carrion crows. And then the victors on either side in the fray, return, and beat the drums, and sound the trumpets, and say, “Glory! glory! see what we have done.” Devils could not be worse than men when their passions are let loose. Dogs would scarce tear each other as men do. Men of intellect sit down, and put their fingers to their foreheads, racking their brains to find out new ways of using gunpowder, and shot, and shell, so as to be able to blow twenty thousand souls into eternity as easily as twenty might be massacred by present appliances. And he is considered a clever man, a patriot, a benefactor of his own nation, who, by dint of genius, can discover some new way of destroying his fellow creatures. Oh! it is a horrible world, appalling to think of. When God looks at it, I wonder he does not stamp it out, just as you and I do a spark of coal that flies upon our carpet from the fire. It is a dreadful world. But Jesus Christ, who knew that we should never make this world much better, let us do what we would with it, designed from the very first to make a new world of it. Truly, truly, this seems to me to be a glorious purpose. To make a world is something wonderful, but to make a world new is something more wonderful still. When God spake and said, “Let there be light,” it was a fiat which showed him to be divine. Yet there was nothing then to resist his will; he had no opponent; he could build as he pleased, and there was none to pluck down. But when Jesus Christ comes to make a new world, there is everything opposed to him. When he saith, “Let there be light,” darkness saith, “There shall not be light.” When he says, “Let there be order,” chaos says, “Nay, I will maintain confusion.” When he says, “Let there be holiness, let there be love, let there be truth,” the principalities and powers of evil withstand him, and say, “There shall not be holiness, there shall be sin; there shall not be love, there shall be hate; there shall not be truth, there shall be error; there shall not be the worship of God, there shall be the worship of stocks and stones; men shall bow down before idols which their own hands have made.” And yet, for all that, Jesus Christ, coming in the form of a man, revealing himself as the Son of God, determines to make all things new; and be assured, brethren and sisters, he will do it. What though he pleases to take his time, and to use humble instrumentalities to effect his purposes, yet do it he will. The day shall come when this world shall be as fair as it was at the primeval Sabbath; when there shall be a new heaven and a new earth, wherein shall dwell righteousness. The ancient prophecy shall be fulfilled to the letter. God shall dwell among men, peace shall be domiciled on earth, and glory shall be ascribed to God in the highest. This great work of Christ, this grand design of making this old world into a new one, shall be carried into effect.

In order to accomplish this, it hath come to pass that Christ has made for us a new covenant. The old covenant was, “Do this and live.” That covenant was a sentence of death upon us all. We could not do, therefore we could not live, and so we died. The new covenant has nothing in it contingent upon creature doing, but it bases all its provisions upon Christ having done the world. “I will, and you shall,” this is the language of the new covenant. The covenant of law, in which we were weak through the flesh, left us mangled and broken. The covenant of grace reveals God’s kindness towards us, and our part thereof has been fulfilled for us by our surety, Christ Jesus. Thus it runs, “Their sins and their iniquities will I remember no more for ever; a new heart also will I give them, and a right spirit will I put within them.” The old world is still under the old covenant of works, and its children perish, for they cannot carry out the conditions of the covenant, they cannot keep God’s law, they break it constantly, and they die. But the children of grace are under the new covenant of grace, and through the precious blood, which is the penalty of the old broken covenant, and through the spotless righteousness of Christ, which is the fulfilment and magnifying of the old covenant, the Christian stands secure, and rejoices that he is saved. Christ has thus made his people dwell under a new covenant, instead of under the old one.

In addition to the new covenant, Christ has been pleased to make us new men. His saints are “new creatures in Christ Jesus.” They have a new nature. God has breathed into them a new life. The Holy Spirit, though the old nature is still there, has been pleased to put within them a new nature. There is now a contending force within them–the old carnal nature inclining to evil, and the new God-given nature panting after perfection. They are new men, “begotten again unto a lively hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.” This new nature is moved by new principles. The old nature needed to be awed with threatenings, or bribed with rewards; the new nature feels the impulse of love. Gratitude is its mainspring: “We love him because he first loved us.” No mercenary motive now stirs the new creature:–

“My God, I love thee–not because

I hope for heaven thereby,

Nor yet because who love thee not

Must burn eternally.”

I love thee, O my Saviour, because on the cross thou didst bear shame, and spitting, and manifold disgrace for me. New principles stir the new nature which God has given. And this new nature is conscious of new emotions. It loves what once it hated; it hates what once it loved. It finds blight where once it sought for bliss, and finds bliss where once it found nothing but bitterness. It leaps at the sound which was once dull to its ears–the name of a precious Christ. It rejoices in hopes which once seemed idle as dreams. It is filled with a divine enthusiasm which it once rejected as fanatical. It is conscious now of living in a new element, breathing a fresh air, partaking of new food, drinking out of new wells not digged by men or filled from the earth. The man is new–new in principles, and new in emotions.

And now the man is also new in relationship. He was an heir to wrath; he is now a child of God. He was a bond-slave; he is now a freeman. He was the Ishmael who dwelt in the wilderness; he is now the Isaac, and dwells with Sarah after the tenor of the new covenant. He rejoices in Christ Jesus, and feasts to the full. He was the citizen of earth once; he is now a citizen of heaven. He once found his all beneath the clouds; but now his all is beyond the stars. He has new relationships. Christ is his brother; God is his father; the angels are his friends; and the despised people of God are his best and nearest kinsfolk. And hence the man has new aspirations. He now pants to glorify God. What cared he about the glory of God once? He now pants to see God; once he would have paid the fare, if it had cost his life, that he might escape from the presence of the Lord. Now he hungers and thirsts after the living God; yea, if his soul had wings, and he could break the fetters of this mortality, he would mount at once to dwell where Jesus is. Dear friends, are you new men? If you are, you understand what it is; if you are not, I know I cannot explain it to you. Oh! to be born again is a great mystery; blessed is the soul that comprehends it! But he that knows it not will never learn it by the lip; he can only know it by the Spirit of God causing him also to be made a new creature in Christ Jesus.

Thus far I have said that the object of Christ was to make a new world, and he began by making a new covenant. Then, through his Spirit, he goes on to make new men under the new covenant, and you will see that by this means he makes a new society. Swelling words have been spoken and great attempts taken in hand to renovate society, but you can never renovate society till you have renovated the individual members who compose society. You may build a brick house, if you please; but, build it as you like, it will be a house of brick upon whatever principles of architecture it may be constructed; not until that brick shall be transformed to marble can you hope to “dwell in marble halls.” So men may launch their divers theories, and patent their social inventions, but after they have re-shaped the society of sinners, they will leave it a sinful society still. It is otherwise with Christ. By making new men he makes a new society, which society he calls his “Church”. That Church he sends into the world to act upon the rest of mankind. Verily the day will come–whether it shall be at his second advent or before his second advent, I do not know–the day when from the east to the west, and from the north to the south, there shall be a new world as far as men are concerned. There shall be no injustice towards the poor; there shall be no envying of the rich; there shall be no law to make men slaves; there shall be no power to oppress, because there shall be no will to do it. Our Lord Jesus Christ shall put a new heart into earth’s kings, and then he shall come himself to take their thrones and their crowns, and to be himself our Universal King, and in his day shall the righteous flourish.

Now I believe the way for us to regard that happy day in which he will make all things new; that happy day when the lion shall eat straw like the ox, and the leopard shall lie down with the kid, when the sword shall be turned into the sickle, and the spear into the pruning hook–the way for us to regard that day, I think, is not standing with our mouths open expecting it, but by setting to work after the Master’s own fashion, seeking to bring it about, to gather out the elect from mankind, to illustrate the gospel practically in our lives, and so to do as Jesus did among the sons of men; promoting light, and peace, and truth, and holiness, and happiness as God may help us.

I wish we had more time to enter fully into this part of the subject. We have not, and, therefore, we must leave it, but may you and I have a part in this new creation! Turning to our second point, I want you to:–

II. Adore This Great Regenerator.

He says, “Behold I make all things new.” Behold him! He is a man dressed in the common garments of the poor! He hath no form nor comeliness, and when you shall see him there is no beauty in him that you should desire him. He has come to make the world new. He has no soldiery, no book of laws, no new philosophy. He had come to make the world new, and to do this he has brought with him–what? Why, himself. He spends a life of weariness and sorrow amongst those who despise him, and if you want to know first and foremost how he makes all things new, you must see him sweating great drops of blood in the garden–that is the blood of the new world which he is pouring forth! You must see him bound, scourged, spat upon, led to the accursed tree. While God’s wrath for sin is yet unspent, the world cannot be new; but when that wrath on account of sin is all poured upon the head of the great Substitute, then the world stands in a new relation to God, and it can be a new world. See the Saviour then, in groans and pangs which cannot be described, bearing the curse of God, for he made him to be sin for us, though he knew no sin. The curse fell on him, as it is written, “Cursed is every one that hangeth on a tree.” It pleased the Father to bruise him; he hath put him to grief; he hath made his soul to be an offering for sin.” That dolorous pain, then, of the Master was the world’s new- making. It was then and there that the world was born again. No mother’s pangs, when she brought forth a man-child, were such as those of Christ when he brought forth the new creation. It was there in the travail of his soul–did you ever catch that idea, the travail of his soul?–it was there that the new world was born! “Behold I make all things new” is a mysterious voice from the broken heart of a dying Saviour. From the empty tomb, as he rises, I hear it come in silvery notes, “Behold I make all things new.” You must trace the birth of the new creation up to the grave of our Lord Jesus Christ, to the place where the cross stood, and where his body lay.

But the actual operations of new-making the world takes place through the truth which Christ promulgated. After the relation of the world to God had been changed by the sufferings of Jesus, the world’s thought concerning God came to be changed by the preaching of Jesus. He came and revealed God to man as man had never seen God before. It was through him we learned that “God is love.” It was through him that we understood that “God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” It is the preaching of the cross of Jesus that is to make the world new. It is not the philosophies of men, but the wisdom of God which effects the change. In the presence of Christ your philosophies must sink into darkness as stars in the presence of the sun.

And it is also by the giving of the Holy Ghost, as the result of the ascension of Christ on high, that the world is made new. Thus he gives power to the ministry. There were three thousand new creations in one day when Peter preached the gospel under the influence of the Holy Spirit. And that blessed Spirit of God is here tonight. Oh! I would that there might be some new creations tonight, that that divine heavenly Spirit would come into some of your souls, and drop there that vital spark of heavenly flame which shall never be quenched, but shall burn brightly in heaven for ever. Wherever the gospel is preached, the Spirit is present in that gospel, and he gives faith to men, gives life to men, and so they are made new, and the new-making thus goes on.

I have not time–though thoughts crowd into my mind–to speak about the way in which Christ thus new-makes the world. It is quite certain that three parts of his history are connected with it. I have only referred to his death, his burial, and his resurrection, but I might go on to speak of his constant and prevalent intercessions, for his pleading before the throne is also a part of the mighty operation; nor can I doubt but that his Second Advent will be the bringing out of the topstone with shoutings of “Grace, grace unto it!” Then shall be fulfilled–finally and exhaustively fulfilled–the saying that is written, “Behold I make all things new.” The text begins with “Behold!” and I am going to close with that same note of admiration. I want you to:–

III. Behold and to Believe.

Behold, the Lord Jesus is now enthroned in heaven. He it is who makes all things new. Is not this what some of you here present deeply need? If you look within, yourselves will see much to disgust and alarm you. Peradventure, you dare not take stock of yourselves now; you dare not consider where you are, nor what you are, nor whither you are bound. “To speak candidly,” you say, “I want reforming.” Very likely, but you want a great deal more than mere reformation. I have heard of a being who used habitually to swear, “God mend me!” Somebody said, “Better make a new one.” That is the case with full many of you. You are saying, “Well, I will turn over a new leaf.” You had better shut the book up altogether, and never turn over any more leaves, for all the pages are alike bad. “Oh! well,” says one, “I shall try if I cannot alter.” I wish you would try God’s altering of you, instead of altering yourselves. “Well, but surely, surely, I may wash and be clean; I will try to make myself as clean as possible?” Yes, yes, that is all very well; but what if you have a corpse in the house? I would have you make it clean, yet that will not make it live. However much you may wash it, it is corrupt still. You may reform yourselves as much as ever you please, all your reformation will be futile; you need more, a great deal more than that. The fact is, you must be made new. Nothing less will do; you must be made new; you must be born again. “Ah!” says one, “if I could be made new, there might be a chance for me.” Well now, Christ looks down from this throne in heaven, and he says, “Behold I will make all things new.” “Yes,” you say, “but he will not make me new.” Why not? Does he not say, “I make all things new”? “But my heart is as hard as a rock,” say you. Well, but he says, “I will make all things new,” so he can give you a new heart. “Oh! but I am so very stubborn. Aye, aye, but he makes all things new, and he can make you as tender and sensitive as a little child. Oftentimes a grey-headed sinner has looked back to his childhood, and remembered the time when he used to sing his little hymn at his mother’s knee, and he has said, ‘Ah! I have been in many strange places since then, and my heart has got seared and hard; I wish I could get back to what I was then!” Well, you can, you can. Christ can bring you there. Nay, he can bring you to something better than you ever were when those golden ringlets hung so plentifully about that pretty little head of yours, for you were not so innocent then as you now think you were. Christ can make you really pure in heart; he can make you a new creature, so that you shall be converted and become as a little child. “Oh!” say you, “how can I get it? How can I prepare myself for him?” You do not want to prepare yourself for him. God to him just as you are; trust him to do it, and he will do it. That is faith, you know–trust, dependence. Canst thou believe that Christ can save thee? Oh! thou canst believe that; well now, wilt thou trust him to save thee? Wilt thou trust him to deliver thee from thy drunkenness, from thine angry temper, thy pride, thy love of self, thy lusts? Dost thou desire to be a new creature in Christ Jesus? If so, that very desire must have come from heaven. I could fain hope that he has already begun the good work in you, and he that begins it will carry it on. Do not be afraid, however bad thy character, or however vicious thy disposition. “Behold,” says Christ, “I make all things new.” What a wonder it is that a man should ever have a new heart! You know if a lobster loses its claw in a fight it can get a new claw, and that is thought to be very marvellous. It would be very wonderful if men should be able to grow new arms and new legs, but who ever heard of a creature who grew a new heart? You may have seen a bough lopped off a tree, and you may have thought that, perhaps, the tree will sprout again, and there will be a new limb, but who ever heard of old trees getting new sap and a new core? But my Lord and Master, the crucified and exalted Saviour, has given new hearts and new cores; he has put the vital substance into man afresh, and made new creatures of them. I am glad to notice the tear in your eye, when you think on the past, but wipe it away now, and look up to the cross and say:–

“Just as I am, without one plea,

But that thy blood was shed for me,

And that thou bid’st me come to thee,

O Lamb, O God, I come.”

“Oh! make me a new creature!” If you have said that from your heart, you are a new creature, dear brother, and we will rejoice together in this regenerating Saviour.

Let me just say a few words to those of you who love the Lord. You may have some very bad children, or you have some relatives who are going on in sin from bad to worse. I earnestly recommend you attentively to consider my text. “Behold,” says Christ, “I make all things new.” “No, no,” says the old father, “I used to pray for my boy; he broke my heart; he brought his mother’s grey hairs with sorrow to the grave; but he has gone away, and I have not heard of him for years, and I am almost afraid to wish I ever may hear of him again, for he did seem so reckless, that my only comfort is in trying to forget him.” “Yes,” says a husband here, “I have prayed for my wife o many times, that I do feel tempted to give it up; it is not likely that I shall ever live to see her saved.” Oh! but, brethren and sisters, we do not know; since the Lord saved us, there cannot be any limits as to what he can do. Look at the text, “Behold I make all things new.” I will pray, “Lord, make my children new.” You shall pray, “Lord,make my wife new.” You godly wives, who have ungodly husbands, you shall pray, “Lord, make our husbands new.” You who have dear friends who lie upon your bosom, as you anxiously think of them, pray the Lord Jesus to make them new. When our friends are made new, oh! what a great comfort they are; just as much so as they formerly were a sorrow. The greater the sinner, the greater the joy to loving believers when they see him saved. “Behold,” says Christ–I do like that word– “Behold it! Stand and look at it! See how I took the man when he was up to his neck in sin, and made him preach the gospel. Can I not do the same again? Look there and see the dying thief upon the cross, black with a thousand crimes: I washed him and took him to Paradise the same day; what can I not do? Behold I make all things new.” Courage, my brethren and sisters. We will not entertain any more doubt about Christ’s power to save. Rather, by God’s grace, may we henceforth believe more in him, and, according to our faith, so shall it be done unto us. If we can only trust him for those of our friends whose faults seem to us few and light, our little trust will reap little reward; but if we can go with strong faith in a great God, and bring great sinners in our arms, and put them down before this mighty Regenerator of men, and say, “Lord, if thou wilt thou canst make them new”; and if we will never cease the pleading till we get the blessing, then we shall see ever-accumulating illustrations of the fact that Jesus makes all things new; and calling up the witnesses of his redeeming power, we shall cry in the ears of a drowsy Church and an incredulous world, “Behold, behold, behold! He makes all things new.” The Lord give us eyes to see it.

Amen.

Indonesia: Pastor Arrested

After closing the Indonesia Pentecost Church (Gpdi) in Sumedang, Indonesia, for using an illegal building permit, authorities arrested the church’s pastor for forcing others to attend church. The church was built more than 24 years ago, and it has experienced threats only within the last few months.

“This church building is a permanent building, and it has been there for more than 24 years,” said Theophilus Belo, director of Jakarta Christian Communication Forum (FKKJ). “During that time, everything was going well. But on July this year, this congregation got a problem. Their church has been closed by local administration.”

On Tuesday, Sept. 20, 2011, a local administrative group threatened to close the church. The church had previously received a letter urging them to stop Christian activities, and the district head of Jatinangor in Sumedang, Nandang Suparman, said the church building had no legal building permit.

“Until today we have not yet received their building permit documentation application,” Suparman said. “We have checked if they are already submitting it from a district administrative level. On May this year, if I’m not mistaken, we sent them a letter to urge them to start applying for their building permit. We are already giving them a chance to start applying, but they don’t do it.”

Suparman urged the church to move its services into a church building belonging to the Institute of Public Administration (IPND). “I’ll talk with the leaders of IPND that this congregation is permitted to use their institute’s church building,” he said.

The Indonesian Christian organization Kabar Gereja reports that the IPND cannot accommodate the congregations of any more closed churches. At least 14 churches have been relocated to the IPND’s church building.

Gpdi’s pastor was put on trial on Oct. 3 at Sumedang Government Court, and he faces up to three months in prison for forcing others to attend church. The church’s closure adds to the long list of churches that have been closed by Indonesian authorities. Other church leaders have also been arrested after their churches closed, according to Kabar Gereja. According to the FKKJ, at least 30 churches have been closed or burned in Indonesia in 2011.

Egypt: Video Sparks Protests

A YouTube video of 25 Egyptian soldiers beating Coptic Christian Raef After Faheem prompted a protest by thousands of Coptic Christians on Sunday, Oct. 9.

“[I] would like to let you know that millions of Egyptian Christians will go out to the streets all over Egypt — from all the cities — to demonstrate against the army leaders because of the video,” a VOM contact wrote the day before the protests. “The Muslim group and Salafi movement are threatening the Christians, saying that we do not have any rights in the country. We do not know what could happen tomorrow, but we decided to go out and [use] our voices against persecution.”

The military fired at demonstrators when the protests began Sunday afternoon, and videos posted online show increased violence as military vehicles ran over protestors. According to VOM contacts, the Egyptian military eventually attacked the hospital where injured Christians were being treated and even tried to kill hospital employees. International news agencies report that at least 24 people have been killed, including at least 17 Christians.

The violence began after Muslim extremists attacked a recently rebuilt Christian church in Sohag, near Cairo. The governor of Sohag protected the church’s attackers and said, “If the Muslims did not destroy the church on that day, I would go destroy it myself.” Shocked by the governor’s comment, the Christians held a demonstration at a TV and radio building, and the Egyptian army responded to the demonstrations. A VOM contact said, “They were very [tough] in beating and attacking the Christians instead of restoring their rights. [This] situation is too hard and really unbelievable. We are waiting for the Lord to show mercy on the martyrs’ families. Please keep praying for us, and ask our beloved friends everywhere to pray.”

by

J. C. Ryle

(1816-1900)

If you are a thoughtless, careless man about your soul, you will take no interest in the subject of this sermon. Faith and assurance are mere names and words to you: they are neither land, nor money, nor horses, nor dress, nor meat, nor drink: like Gallio, you care not for them. Alas, poor soul! I mourn over you. The day will come when you will think differently.

Reader, if you really desire to go to heaven, and to go there in the Bible way, you will find the subject of this sermon of the deepest importance. Believe me, your own comfort in religion, and your peace of conscience, depend exceedingly on understanding the matter about which I am going to speak.

I say then, that faith in Christ, and a full assurance of being saved by Christ, are two distinct things.

A man may have saving faith in Christ, and yet never enjoy an assured hope, like the Apostle Paul. To believe, and have a glimmering hope of acceptance, is one thing; to have joy and peace in our believing, and abound in hope, is quite another. All God’s children have faith: not all have assurance. I think this ought never to be forgotten.

I know some great and good men have held a different opinion: I believe that many excellent ministers do not allow the distinction I have stated; but I desire to call no man master. I dread as much as anyone the idea of healing the wounds of conscience slightly; but I should think any other view than that I have given a most uncomfortable gospel to preach, and one very likely to keep souls back a long time from the gate of life.

I would not desire to make one contrite heart sad that God has not made sad, or to discourage one fainting child of God, or to give a soul the impression that you have no part or lot in Christ, except you feel assurance.

I do not shrink from saying, that by grace a man may have sufficient faith to flee to Christ, really to lay hold on Him, really to trust in Him, really to be a child of God, really to be saved; and yet to his last day be never free from much anxiety, doubt, and fear.

“A letter,” says an old writer, “may be written which is not sealed; so grace may be written in the heart, yet the Spirit may not set the seal of assurance to it.”

A child may be born heir to a great fortune, and yet never be aware of his riches, live childish, die childish, and never know the greatness of his possessions.

And so also a man may be a babe in Christ’s family; think as a babe, speak as a babe, and, though saved, never enjoy a lively hope, or know the full privileges of his inheritance.

Faith in the Lord Jesus Christ a man must have, beyond all question, if he is to be saved. I know no other way of access to the Father: I see no intimation of mercy excepting through Christ. A man must  feel his sins and lost estate, must come to Jesus for pardon and salvation, must  rest his hope on Him and on Him alone. But if he only have faith to do this, however weak and feeble that faith may be, I will engage, from Scripture warrants, he shall not miss heaven.

Never, never let us curtail the freeness of the glorious gospel, or clip its fair proportions. Never let us make the gate more strait, and the way more narrow, than pride or love of sin have made it already. The Lord Jesus is very pitiful and of tender mercy. He does not regard the quantity of faith, but the quality He does not measure its degree, but its truth. He will not break any bruised reed, nor quench any smoking flax. He will never let it be said that any perished at the foot of the cross. “Him that cometh unto Me,” He says, “I will in no wise cast out” (John vi. 37).¹

Yes, reader! though a man’s faith be no bigger than a grain of mustard seed, if it only brings him to Christ, and enables him to touch the hem of His garment, he shall be saved: saved as surely as the oldest saint in paradise; saved as completely and eternally as Peter, or John, or Paul. There are degrees in our sanctification: in our justification there are none. What is written is written, and shall never fail: “Whosoever believeth on Him,” not whosoever has a strong and mighty faith,  “Whosoever believeth on Him shall not be ashamed” (Rom. x. 11).

But all this time, I would have you take notice, the poor soul may have no full assurance of his pardon and acceptance with God. He may be troubled with fear upon fear, and doubt upon doubt. He may have many a question and many an anxiety, many a struggle, and many a misgiving, clouds and darkness, storm and tempest to the very end.

I will engage, I repeat, that bare simple faith in Christ shall save a man, though he may never attain to assurance; but I will not engage it shall bring him to heaven, with strong and abounding consolations. I will engage it shall land him safe in harbour, but I will not engage he shall enter that harbour under full sail, confident and rejoicing. I shall not be surprised if he reaches his desired haven weather-beaten and tempest-tossed, scarcely realising his own safety till he opens his eyes in glory.

Reader, I believe it is of great importance to keep in view this distinction between faith and assurance. It explains things which an inquirer in religion some times finds it hard to understand.

Faith, let us remember, is the root, and assurance is the flower. Doubtless you can never have the flower without the root; but it is no less certain you may have the root and not the flower.

Faith is that poor trembling woman who came behind Jesus in the press and touched the hem of His garment (Mark v. 25). Assurance is Stephen standing calmly in the midst of his murderers, and saying, “I see the heavens opened, and the Son of man standing on the right hand of God” (Acts vii. 56).

Faith is the penitent thief crying, “Lord, remember me” (Luke xxiii. 42). Assurance is Job sitting in the dust, covered with sores, and saying, “I know that my Redeemer liveth” (Job xix. 25). “Though He slay me, yet will I trust in Him” (Job xiii. 13).

Faith is Peter’s drowning cry as he began to sink: “Lord, save me!” (Matt. xiv. 30). Assurance is the same Peter declaring before the Council, in after times, “This is the stone which was set at nought of you builders, which is become the head of the corner. Neither is there salvation in any other: for there is none other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved” (Acts iv. 11, 12).

Faith is the anxious, trembling voice: “Lord, I believe; help Thou mine unbelief” (Mark ix. 24). Assurance is the confident challenge: “Who shall lay anything to the charge of God’s elect? Who is he that condemneth?” (Rom. viii. 33, 34).

Faith is Saul praying in the house of Judas at Damascus, sorrowful, blind, and alone (Acts ix. 11). Assurance is Paul, the aged prisoner, looking calmly into the grave, and saying, “I know Whom I have believed,” “There is laid up for me a crown” (2 Tim. i. 12; iv. 8).

Faith is life. How great the blessing! Who can tell the gulf between life and death? And yet life may be weak, sickly, unhealthy, painful, trying, anxious, worn, burdensome, joyless, and smileless to the very end.

Assurance is more than life. It is health, strength, power, vigour, activity, energy, manliness, and beauty.

Reader, it is not a question of saved or not saved that lies before us, but of privilege or no privilege, it is not a question of peace or no peace, but of great peace or little peace, it is not a question between the wanderers of this world and the school of Christ, it is one that belongs only to the school, it is between the first form and the last.

He that has faith does well. Happy should I be if I thought all readers of this sermon had it. Blessed, thrice blessed are they that believe: they are safe; they are washed; they are justified. They are beyond the power of hell. Satan, with all his malice, shall never pluck them out of Christ’s hands.

But he that has assurance does far better, sees more, feels more, knows more, enjoys more, has more days like those spoken of in Deuteronomy, even “the days of heaven upon the earth” (Deut. xi. 21).2

Reader, whoever you may be, I exhort you never to be satisfied with anything short of a full assurance of your own salvation. With faith, no doubt, you must begin, with simple, child-like faith: “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved.” But from faith go on to assurance. Rest not till you can say, “I know Whom I have believed.”

Believe me, believe me, assurance is worth the seeking. You forsake your own mercies when you rest content without it. The things I speak are for your peace. It is good to be sure in earthly things; how much better is it to be sure in heavenly things!

Make it then your daily prayer that you may have an increase of faith. According to your faith will be your peace. Cultivate that blessed root more, and sooner or later, by God’s blessing, you may hope to have the flower. You may not perhaps attain to full assurance at once: it is good sometimes to be kept waiting; we do not value things that we get without trouble. But though it tarry, wait for it. Seek on, and expect to find.

Myanmar: Faith over Family

A young Christian in Myanmar was forced to choose between faith and family recently when her relatives demanded that she recant her faith. On Sept. 19, 2011, 21-year-old Ying was preparing to leave for classes at an underground seminary when her relatives locked her in the house. They threatened to disown her, beat her and withdraw support — including food — if she continued to attend seminary or church. In addition, they threatened to send her to a remote village with no known Christians if she did not recant her faith. Instead of giving in to their demands, Ying ran away from home and left her family behind.

Ying’s mother died when Ying was young, and her father left her with an aunt and two stepsisters. Although she grew up and lived in a Buddhist family, Ying became interested in Christianity. When she was 20 years old, she overheard an evangelist telling a neighboring family about Christ. Ying approached the evangelist and asked him questions about Christianity. At 20 years old, she became a Christian.

Ying began to attend seminary immediately after her conversion. Since leaving her family last month, she has had no means of support. VOM is now helping pay Ying’s seminary fees and living expenses. After she completes seminary, Ying hopes to serve as a missionary to people who have never heard about Christ.

Then the men rose up from there, and looked down toward Sodom; and Abraham was walking with them to send them off. The LORD said, “Shall I hide from Abraham what I am about to do, since Abraham will surely become a great and mighty nation, and in him all the nations of the earth will be blessed? “For I have chosen him, so that he may command his children and his household after him to keep the way of the LORD by doing righteousness and justice, so that the LORD may bring upon Abraham what He has spoken about him.” And the LORD said, “The outcry of Sodom and Gomorrah is indeed great, and their sin is exceedingly grave. “I will go down now, and see if they have done entirely according to its outcry, which has come to Me; and if not, I will know.” Then the men turned away from there and went toward Sodom, while Abraham was still standing before the LORD.

Abraham came near and said, “Will You indeed sweep away the righteous with the wicked? “Suppose there are fifty righteous within the city; will You indeed sweep it away and not spare the place for the sake of the fifty righteous who are in it? “Far be it from You to do such a thing, to slay the righteous with the wicked, so that the righteous and the wicked are treated alike. Far be it from You! Shall not the Judge of all the earth deal justly?” So the LORD said, “If I find in Sodom fifty righteous within the city, then I will spare the whole place on their account.” And Abraham replied, “Now behold, I have ventured to speak to the Lord, although I am but dust and ashes. “Suppose the fifty righteous are lacking five, will You destroy the whole city because of five?” And He said, “I will not destroy it if I find forty-five there.” He spoke to Him yet again and said, “Suppose forty are found there?” And He said, “I will not do it on account of the forty.” Then he said, “Oh may the Lord not be angry, and I shall speak; suppose thirty are found there?” And He said, “I will not do it if I find thirty there.” And he said, “Now behold, I have ventured to speak to the Lord; suppose twenty are found there?” And He said, “I will not destroy it on account of the twenty.” Then he said, “Oh may the Lord not be angry, and I shall speak only this once; suppose ten are found there?” And He said, “I will not destroy it on account of the ten.” As soon as He had finished speaking to Abraham the LORD departed, and Abraham returned to his place.

Last week, we saw how God came to Abraham and promised that he and Sarah would have a son of their own who would be the heir that would eventually become a might nation of people. When Abraham heard this, he laughed at the thought of him having a child at 100, but he didn’t doubt. Sarah laughed too, but she doubted, and God called her out on it. The announcement of Isaac coming at the same time next year wasn’t the only reason that they came though….

Abraham is walking with God and the two angels to see them off after they’ve refreshed themselves. The LORD rhetorically asks if He should hide what He is about to do to Sodom and Gomorrah. He reiterates His promise and then expounds on why He chose Abraham. Abraham was chosen to be in covenant with God so that “he may command his children and his household after him to keep the way of the LORD by doing righteousness and justice”, so that God’s promise will come to pass. He then tell Abraham what His plans are for both Sodom and Gomorrah. The sins of Sodom and Gomorrah are so vile and wicked, they have so permeated the culture and lifestyle of the people that the outcry of those sins has been heard by God. He tells Abraham that He will go down and see if they have truly done all that He has heard they have done. This doesn’t mean that God didn’t know what was going on or if the sins of the two cities were as terrible as He said they were. Instead, this only means that God’s timing was complete. The sins of the two cities had put them so far away from God that they had no way to return. This would also be true of the Amorites when Israel would get released from Egypt. The sins of Sodom and Gomorrah had reached their fulfillment and God’s time of judgment had come.

Abraham clearly knew what God was talking about and his response to God shows this. “Will you indeed sweep away the righteous with the wicked?” This response also shows that Abraham understands the character of God and how He will not condemn the righteous for the sins of the wicked. Abraham then begins to ask God if He will destroy Sodom and Gomorrah if there are fifty righteous people in the cities. God says that if He finds (He already knows) fifty righteous people, He will not destroy the cities. During the entire discussion, Abraham remembers and recognizes his position in the conversation (I am but dust and ashes). Even so, he continues to whittle the number of righteous down to ten people. It may be that this is the number of people who were in Lot’s family (remember that Lot moved from the valley to the city itself).

Regardless of the reason, ten is the lowest number of righteous people that the Lord allows Abraham to reach. Despite the number of righteous in the city, the judgment has been determined. After this dialogue, God departs and Abraham returns to his tent.

God’s judgment is sure. When God decides to judge, that judgment will come to pass. God has decided to judge sin. He has determined that the just punishment for sin is an eternity of conscious torment in hell. This judgment will come to pass upon those who meet the necessary criteria. To meet the criteria, you don’t have to do anything. You and I start out at birth meeting the criteria. We are conceived in sin and it is this sin that will send us to hell. Unless something about us is changed, we will automatically receive the judgment God has planned for those who live in sin. For us to escape the wrath of God’s judgment our sins must be erased. The problem is, there is nothing that you and I can do to erase that sin. The only thing that can remove our sins and allow us to be free of God’s just judgment is our repentance and faith in Christ. Some might ask, “But, aren’t repentance and faith things we do to get saved?” No. Both repentance and faith are gifts given to us by God which allow us to be saved.

Please. If you aren’t born-again, if you haven’t repented of your sins and put your faith in Jesus Christ alone to save you; do so now. While you have time….

September 10th, 1876
by
C. H. SPURGEON
(1834-1892)

“For I know that my Redeemer liveth,”—Job 19:25.

I daresay you know that there are a great many difficulties about the translation of this passage. It is a very complicated piece of Hebrew, partly, I suppose, owing to its great antiquity, being found in what is, probably, one of the oldest Books of the Bible. Besides that, different persons have tried to translate it according to their own varying views. The Jews stiffly fight against the notion of the Messiah and his resurrection being found in this verve, while many Christian commentators see here everything that we can find in the New Testament, and translate the passage as though Job were as well instructed in this matter as we are now that Christ “hath brought life and immortality to light through the gospel.” Others say that, while there is, no doubt, a reference to the person and the resurrection of Christ, yet it is not so vivid as some seem to think.

Personally, I am quite satisfied with the translation given in our Authorized Version; yet it has occurred to me that, possibly, Job himself may not have known the full meaning of all that he said. Imagine the patriarch driven into a corner, badgered by his so-called friends, charged by them with all manner of evils until he is quite boiling over with indignation, and, at the same time, smarting under terrible bodily diseases and the dreadful losses which he has sustained; and, at last, he bursts out with this exclamation, “I shall be vindicated one day; I am sure I shall. I know that my Vindicator liveth. I am sure that, there is One who will vindicate me; and if he never clears my name and reputation as long as I live, it will be done afterwards. There must be a just God, in heaven, who will see me righted; and even though worms devour my body until the last relic of it has passed away, I do verily believe that, somehow, in the far-off ages, I shall be vindicated.” He, throws his faith forward to some tremendous era which he anticipates, and he declares that there will be found then, as he believes there is alive even now, a Goel, a Kinsman, an Avenger, who will stand up for him, and set right all this wrong. He cannot conceive that God will permit such gross injustice to be done as for a man, who has walked as he has walked, to be brought so low, and then to be stung with such unfounded accusations; he is positive that there must be a Vindicator for him somewhere, and he appeals to that last dread tribunal, which he dimly sees in the far-off future, and he believes that someone will be found to stand up successfully for him there.

If that be the case, you will see that Job was driven, perhaps beyond his former knowledge, by his very pains and trials. He may but dimly have perceived a future state, but his condition revealed to him the necessity for such a state. He felt that, if the righteous suffer so much in this life, often apparently without any just cause, and if the wicked prosper, then there must be another state in which God will set right the wrongs of this, and rectify the apparent inequalities of his providence here. Job realized that; and, possibly, his deep griefs may have been the channel of another revelation to him, namely, that there was a mysterious Divine Being, concerning whom that dark prophecy had been handed down from the garden of Eden itself, “The Seed of the woman shall bruise the serpent’s head.” He felt sure that, for those who were wronged as he had been, there must be an Advocate provided. He had before complained that there was no Umpire—no “Daysman”—to stand between them both; but now he asks for an Advocate, and he feels that there must be one, yea, he knows that there is, and he declares that, somewhere or other, there is an Advocate who will, some day or other, set right all that concerns him, let things go now as they may. So, possibly, Job was seeing more than he had ever seen before of that mysterious One who pleads the cause of those who are oppressed, and shows himself strong, on their behalf, at the right hand of God.

I am not going to enter into any discussion of the matter, but shall use the passage in the full Evangelical sense. Job may have known all that we now know concerning Christ, for he may have had special revelations and manifestations. We do not find all that we know in his Book, yet he may have meant all that I shall say in this discourse. If he did not mean it, I trust that we shall, under the gracious guidance of the Holy Spirit.

I. I shall speak first upon this point,—JOB HAD A TRUE FRIEND AND HIS MISTAKEN FRIENDS.

These men were miserable comforters, but Job had a real Comforter, they were estranged from him, but he had a true Friend left; so he said, “I know that my Goel liveth.” That is the Hebrew word; I suppose you all know that it means the person nearest akin to him, who, because he was nearest akin, was bound to take up his cause. If a man was slain by misadventure, the goel pursued the one who had slain him, and endeavored to avenge his death. If a person fell into debt, and was sold into slavery because of the debt, his goel, if he was able, had to redeem him; and hence we get the word “redeemer.” Or if estates became mortgaged through poverty, it was the duty of the next of kin to redeem them, if possible; so again we get the idea of redeemer. But the word “goel” is more comprehensive than the word redeemer, so we will begin with its first meaning.

Job, in the midst of his false friends, had One whom he called his kinsman. “I know,” he said, “that my Kinsman liveth.” We interpret that word “Kinsman” as meaning our Lord Jesus Christ, and we sing,—

“Jesus, our Kinsman and our God,
Arrayed in majesty and blood,
Thou art our life, our souls in thee
Possess a full felicity.”

I want you, just now, to think of Jesus Christ as your Kinsman if you are really in him, for he is indeed the nearest akin to you of any,—bone of your bone, and flesh of your flesh. “Forasmuch then as the children are partakers of flesh and blood, he also himself likewise took part of the same.” Now, your own flesh and blood, as you call them, are not so near to you in real kinship as Jesus is; for, often, you will find flesh and blood near akin by birth but not by sympathy. Two brothers may be, spiritually, very different from one another, and may not be able to enter into each other’s trials at all; but this Kinsman participates in every pang that rends your heart; he knows your constitution, your weakness, your sensitiveness, the particular trial that cuts you to the quick, for in all your afflictions he was afflicted. Thus he is nearer to you than the nearest of earthly kin can possibly be, for he enters more fully into the whole of your life; he seems to have gone through it all, and he still goes through it all in his constant sympathy with you.

Christ’s kinship with his people is to be thought of with great comfort because it is voluntary. We have some, perhaps, who are akin to us, yet, who wish they were not. Many a time, when a rich man has poor relations, he is half ashamed of the kinship between them, and wishes that it did not exist. Shame upon him for thinking so! But our Lord Jesus Christ’s relationship to us is no accident of birth; it was voluntarily assumed by him. He would be one with us because he loved us; nothing could satisfy him till he had come to this earth, and been made one flesh with his Church. “For this cause,” it is said concerning marriage, “shall a man leave his father and mother, and shall be joined unto his wife, and they two shall be one flesh. This is a great mystery,” said Paul; “but I speak concerning Christ and the Church.” And, verily, so was it with Christ, as the poet sings,—

“‘Yea,’ saith the Lord, ‘with her I’ll go
Through all the depths of care and woe;
And on the cross will even dare
The bitter pangs of death to bear.’”

This he did because he would be one flesh with his people, and that is a very near kinship which comes as close as that, and which willingly does so,—not by force; but by voluntary choice.

And, further, this is a kinship of which Jesus is never ashamed. We have known or heard of the prosperous man who has been ashamed of his poor old mother, and of the educated young man who has looked down with scorn upon the very father who has toiled and slaved in order to give him the advantages of such an education. It is disgraceful that there should ever be such ingrates; but it is written concerning our great Kinsman, “He that sanctifieth and they who are sanctified are all of one; for which cause he is not ashamed to call them brethren.” He declares to the whole universe, concerning those persecuted ones, those who are ridiculed as being fools, “They are my brethren.” The Prince of glory, whose fingers are adorned with stars of light like rings of priceless value, calls the poor bedridden woman, who, is a child of God, his sister, and calls the humble, toiling, laboring man, who walks with him, his brother; and he is not ashamed to do so. Think, beloved, with intensest gratitude, of this great Kinsman of yours, who is so near of kin to you,—voluntarily near of kin, and not ashamed to own the kinship.

Remember, too, that your Kinsman liveth in this respect,—that he will always be your Kinsman. The closest ties of earthly relationship must, to a great extent, end in death, for there are no husbands and wives, as such, in heaven. There cannot be, “for in the resurrection they neither marry, nor are given in marriage, but are as the angels of God in heaven.” There are other ties, of a spiritual kind, that, will far outshine the best of bonds that linked us together here; but, when all other ties are broken, Jesus will always be our Kinsman, our Brother. We shall find the fraternal relationship better understood, more fully enjoyed, and more clearly manifested up there than it ever can be here. When all other relationships are growing dim, this blessed eternal kinship will shine out the more brightly. So I want all of you, who truly love, the Lord Jesus Christ, to interpret my text in this way: “I know that my Kinsman liveth,” and to feel how honored you are to have such a Kinsman as Christ is. Ruth was highly privileged in having such a kinsman as Boaz, who was not content, for her to glean in his fields, but who took her as his wife; and your great Kinsman intends that you should be betrothed unto him for ever, and he will bring you to his heavenly home at the marriage supper of the Lamb.

There was a second meaning to the word goel, arising out of the first,—Job’s kinsman would become his Vindicator. It was the kinsman’s duty to defend the rights of his needy relative, so Job intended here to say, “I know that my Vindicator liveth;” and the Lord Jesus Christ is the Vindicator of his people from all false charges. It is not easy for Christians to live in this world without being slandered and misrepresented; certainly, those of us who live in the full blaze of public life can hardly utter a word without having it twisted, and tortured, and misconstrued. We are often represented as saying what we loathe even to think; yet we must not be surprised at that. The world loves lying,—it always has done so, and it always will. Even in private life you may meet with similar cruel treatment; there are some of God’s best children who lie under reproach by the year together. The very things which they would not tolerate for a moment are laid to their charge, and they are thought to be guilty of them, and even good people hold up their hands in pious horror at them, though they are perfectly innocent all the while. Well, beloved, ever remember that your Vindicator liveth. Do not, be too much concerned to clear your own character; above all, do not attempt to vindicate yours in a court of law, but say to yourself, “I know that my Vindicator liveth.” When he cometh, “then shall the righteous shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father.” His people may be under a cloud now; but, when he appeareth, the cloud shall break, and their true glory shall be seen. The greater the obloquy under which any of us have unjustly lived on earth, the greater will be the joy and the honor which will be vouchsafed to us in the day when Christ shall clear our character from all the shameful aspersions that have been brought against us. All will be cleared up in that day, so leave the accusations alone, knowing that your Vindicator liveth.

There is another most comforting thought,—that our Vindicator will clear us from true charges as well as false ones. As for the false charges, what do they matter? It is the true ones that really concern us: can Christ clear us from them? Yes, that he can. Remember how the apostle John writes, “If any man sin, we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous.” You see, it is not merely, if we have been said to sin when we did not, but if we really sin, “we have an Advocate with the Father.” O blessed Advocate, how dost thou clear thy people of the sin which they have actually committed? Why, in this way; he took it up himself,—the awful load of their guilt,—and suffered the full penalty far it. So there he stands before the eternal throne, to plead their cause; and, as he does so, he says, “Those sins, committed by my people,—I have taken them upon myself, and suffered in the room, and place, and stead of all who will believe in me.” O thou blessed Kinsman, how glorious art thou in thy grace, in that thou hast so completely undertaken our cause that thou hast been made sin for us, that we might be made the righteousness of God in thee! Yes, beloved, Jesus will plead the merit of his precious broad and his spotless righteousness; and, before that powerful pleading, our sins and our transgressions shall sine beneath the flood, and shall not be remembered against us any more for ever.

In that day, too, our Vindicator will defend us against all the accusations of Satan. Our great adversary often assails and attacks us here, and the Lord says to him, as he did concerning Joshua the high priest, “The Lord rebuke thee, O Satan; even the Lord that hath chosen Jerusalem rebuke thee! “We may tell the devil, when we stand foot to foot with him, and are sore beset, that our Vindicator liveth, and we may quote to him that grand promise, “The God of peace shall bruise Satan under your feet shortly,” because our Vindicator, who is to bruise the serpent’s head, still liveth. The old serpent may nibble at your heel for a while, as he did at your Master’s, but you, in the strength of your Lord, shall bruise his head; and whatsoever other adversary of your soul there may be, at any time, rest you in quiet confidence. Even if that adversary is permitted to prevail over you for a while, say unto him, “Rejoice not against me, O mine enemy: when I fall, I shall arise; when I sit in darkness, the Lord shall be a light unto me.” So you have two meanings of the word goel,—my Kinsman, my Vindicator, liveth. I hope you who are greatly tempted and tried, and you who are persecuted and oppressed, will catch that second meaning, and commit your cause unto God. “Dearly beloved, avenge not yourselves, but rather give place unto wrath; for it is written, Vengeance is mine; I will repay, saith the Lord.” Be slow to anger; fret not yourselves because of the wicked man that prospereth in his evil way, and think not of being revenged upon your oppressors. In patience and quietness possess your souls, knowing that your time of vindication will surely come, for your Vindicator liveth.

Then the third meaning of the word goel certainly is redeemer, so Job could say, “I know that my Redeemer liveth.” As I have already said, the next of kin, in the process of vindicating his poor Kinsman, was accustomed to redeem him from bondage, or to redeem any part of his estate that might be under mortgage. So, let us next think of how the Lord Jesus Christ hath redeemed us from bondage. Having broken the law of God, we were in bondage to that law; we had received the spirit of bondage again to fear. But we, who have believed in Jesus, our Kinsman, can say that he hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us, and that we are no longer in bondage. We were also in bondage under sin, as Paul wrote, “I am carnal, sold under sin;” but Christ has come, and broken the power of sin in us, so that its reigning power is subdued; and though it still striveth to get the mastery, and often maketh us to groan within ourselves, even as Paul did, yet do we, with him, thank God, who giveth us the victory, through Jesus Christ our Lord.

There are two redemptions,—redemption by price and redemption by power, and both of these Christ hath wrought for us;—by price, by his sacrifice upon the cross of Calvary; and by power, by his Divine Spirit coming into our heart, and renewing our soul. Ought we not unceasingly to bless the Lord who hath redeemed us from under the law, having paid the penalty for the commands which we had broken, and who hath also redeemed us from the power of sin? “I know that my Redeemer liveth,” then I know that I am a free man; for if the Son makes us free, then are we free indeed. I know that he paid the price for my soul’s eternal redemption, then may my soul continually exult in him, and rejoice in the liberty wherewith he hath made me free.

But, as I have already reminded you, the redeemer was also accustomed to redeem the estate as well as the person of his kinsman. We had lost everything. Father Adam had put everything under a heavy mortgage, and we could not even meet the interest on it; but the whole estate is unmortgaged now, even to paradise itself. Does someone ask, “Is there not any mortgage even upon paradise?” I answer,—No; for Christ said to the dying thief, “Today shalt thou be with me in paradise;” so it is clear that he has entered paradise, and claimed it on his people’s behalf. Jesus Christ hath said, in the words of the psalmist, “I restored that which I took not away.” Bankrupt debtors, through the Lord’s sovereign grace, you are no longer under any liabilities because of your sin if Christ be accepted by you as your Goel and Redeemer. He hath restored to you the estates which your first father, Adam, had lost; and he hath made you heirs of God, and joint heirs with Jesus Christ, through the wondrous redemption which he wrought for you upon the cross of Calvary.

Suck the honey, if you can, out of these three glorious truths, and you will be able to do so in proportion as you can personally use the words of the text, “‘I know that my Redeemer liveth.’ I know that he lives who will vindicate my character, and rectify my wrongs. I know, too, that he lives who hath redeemed me from sin and hell; and even though I die, I know that he will redeem me from the power of the grave, and that he will enable me to say, ‘O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?’”

Dwell on the remembrance that you have such a Divine Helper, and then let us pass on to another thought, at which I will only briefly hint as I proceed to another part of my theme.

II. The second point, is this,-JOB HAD REAL PROPERTY AMID ABSOLUTE POVERTY.

Job had lost everything,—every stick and stone that he possessed, he had lost his children, and he had lost his wife, too, for all practical purposes, for she had not acted like a wife to him in his time of trial. Poor Job, he had lost everything else, but he had not lost his Redeemer. Notice, he does not say, “I know that my wife and my children live;” but he says, “I know that my Redeemer liveth.” Ah! “my Redeemer,”—he has not lost him, so he has the best of all possessions still left. Looking up to him, by faith, with the tears of joy standing in his eyes, he says, “Yes, he is my Redeemer, and he still lives; I accept him as mine, and I will cling to him for ever.” Can you, beloved friends, not merely rejoice in Christ as the Redeemer, but also as your Redeemer? Have you personally accepted him as your Redeemer? Have you personally trusted him with your soul, wholly and really; and do you already feel in your own heart, a kinship to this great Kinsman, a trust in this great Vindicator, a reliance upon his great redemption? Another man’s redemption is of no value to my soul; the sweetness lies in the little word “my”—”my Redeemer.” Luther used to say that the marrow of the gospel is found in the pronouns, and I believe it is: “my Redeemer.” Say, with me, each one of you for himself or herself,—

“My faith would lay her hand
On that dear head of thine,
While like a penitent I stand,
And there confess my sin.

“My soul looks back to see
The burdens thou didst bear,
When hanging on the cursed tree
And hopes her guilt was there.”

If you really do rely upon Christ’s atoning sacrifice, and so take him as your Redeemer, you may not only hope your guilt was there, but you may know that it was. There, poor man, you may not have a penny in your pocket, but if you can truly say, “my Redeemer,” you are infinitely better off than a millionaire who cannot say that. Thou, who knowest not where thou wilt have a lodging to-night, if thou canst truly say, “my Redeemer,” thou needest not envy the very angels of God, for, in this respect, thou art ahead even of them, for they can call him “Lord”, but not “Redeemer.” He is not so near akin to them as he is to thee, “for verily he took not on him the nature of angels; but he took on him the seed of Abraham.” He took your nature and mine, beloved, for Christ became a man.

So Job had something real and valuable left even when he had lost all his property.

III. Thirdly, Job seems to lay stress upon the word “liveth”: “I know that my Redeemer liveth.” This teaches us that JOB HAD A LIVING KINSMAN AMID A DYING FAMILY.

All his children were dead. We cannot easily estimate the full force of that blow upon the patriarch’s heart. The loss of one child is a very painful event, even when the child is a very little one, and the parents have many others left; but it is a far worse bereavement when the children, who are taken away, are grown up, as Job’s were. They were evidently a very united family, who used to meet in each other’s houses for mutual fellowship. They seem to have been a very happy family, and they were certainly a family under very gracious influences, for Job was accustomed, after their days of festival, to offer sacrifices for them, lest they should have sinned against the Lord. Altogether, it was a fine family,—seven sons and three daughters;—and now they were all gone at once! To lose all one’s family at once, like that, is a heavy stroke that nose can measure but those who have felt it. All were! gone,—the whole ten at once! That was sad for poor Job, but it was most blessed that he was able to say, “Though my children are all dead, ‘I know that my Redeemer liveth.’ He, is not dead, and in him I find more than all that I have lost.”

Look at your Lord, dear friend, if you are mourning, just now, the sons of loved ones, and see whether he is not better to you than ten sons and daughters. See whether there is not, in his heart, room enough for that affection, which has been so rudely snapped, to grow again. The tendrils of your soul want something to cling to, and to twist around; then let them swine around him. Rejoice that he lives in a dying world. If you walk through the cemetery, or stand by the open grave, how blessedly these words seem to fall upon your spirit, like the music of angels, “These are dead, but ‘I know that my Redeemer liveth,’—liveth on, liveth in power, liveth in happiness, liveth with a life which he communicates to all who trust him. He lives, and therefore I shall live with him. He lives, and therefore the dead, who are in him, shall live for ever.” O blessed truth!

You will yourself die soon, dear friend; no, I must correct myself, you will not die, for it is not death for one who knows the Savior to die. You will fall asleep in him, one of these days, at the very hour that God has appointed; and when you open your eyes, it will not be in the narrow death-chamber, you will not be on the bed of sickness. Methinks you will be startled to find yourself amid such new surroundings. “What is this I hear?” you will say. “Such music as this has never charmed me before, and what is that I see?”. “But you will not need to enquire, for you will know that face at once. You knew, while on earth, that Jesus still lived; but you will know it better then, when you lay aside these heavy optics that do but dim our sight, and get into the pure spirit state, and then see HIM. Oh, the bliss of that first sight of Christ! It seems to me as if that would gather up an eternity of delight into a single moment; that first glimpse of him will be enough to make us swoon away with excessive rapture. I do verily think that some, saints, whom I have known, have done just that,—swooned away with the excess of joy that they have felt in their departing moments. I have, sounding in my ears just now, the voice of a dear brother, by whose bedside I sate for a little while before I came to this service. He said to me, “I shall be home to-night, pastor. I wanted to see your face once more before I went; but I shall be home to-night, and see the face of Jesus.” I hope you will all be prepared to die after that fashion. The godly old negro said, “Our minister is dying full of life.” That is the way to die,—full of life. Because Jesus lives, we shall live also, and we may well die full of life because of our union to him.

IV. The last thought I want to leave with you is this, JOB HAD ABSOLUTE CERTAINTY AMID UNCERTAIN AFFAIRS.

He said, “I know that my Redeemer liveth.” Why, Job, I should have thought you would not have known anything for certain now. I should not have liked to insure Job’s sheep, and oxen, and asses, and camels, or the houses in which his children met together to feast. Nothing seemed to be certain with Job but uncertainty; yet there was one thing, concerning which he felt that he could put his foot down firmly, and say, “‘I know.’ The winds may rage, and the tempests roar, but they cannot shake this rock. ‘I know.’ ‘I know.’ ‘I know.’” Beloved, is everything uncertain with you in this world? Of course it is, for it is so with everybody. But does it appear to be more uncertain with you than it does with anybody else? Does your business seem to be slipping away, and every earthly comfort be threatening to disappear? Even if it is so, there is, nevertheless, something that is certain, something, that is stable,—Jesus your Redeemer lives. Rest on him, and you will never fail. Let your faith in him be firm, and confident; you cannot be too fully established in the belief that Jesus, who once died, has left the grave, to die no more, and that you, in him, must also live eternally. Something may be wrong with you, for the next few days or weeks, but all is right with you for ever, and “all’s well that ends well.” There may be some rough water to be crossed between here and the fair havens of eternal felicity, but all is right there for ever and ever. There may be losses and crosses, there may be tossings and shipwrecks, but all is right for ever with all who are in Christ Jesus. “Some on boards, and some on broken pieces of the ship,”—but all who are in Christ Jesus shall escape “safe to land.” There are uncertainties innumerable, but there is this one certainty: “Israel shall be saved in the Lord with an everlasting salvation: ye shall not be ashamed nor confounded world without end.” Spring on this rock, man! If you are struggling in the sea, just now, and waves of sin and doubt beat over you, leap on to this rock, Jesus lives. Trust the living Christ; and, because he lives, you shall live also. I could cheerfully take my place with Job, if I might be able to say as confidently as he did, “I know that my Redeemer liveth;” and if you, as a poor sinner, are trusting wholly and only in Christ, then he is your Redeemer, and you are saved for ever. If he is the only hope that you have, and you cling to him as the limpet clings to the rock, then all is right with you for ever, and you may know that he is your Redeemer as surely as Job knew that he was his. The Lord bless you, for Jesus Christ’s sake! Amen.