Part 12
satisfy the entire man but the Lord's love and the Lord's own Self.
Many saints have tried to anchor in other roadsteads, but all have failed. I believe Solomon was a saint. I know he was a sinner–I believe he was the biggest fool that ever lived. But I believe that he was also the wisest of men. He was, in fact, a mass of contradictions.
Now Solomon was permitted to make experiments for us all and to do for us what we must not dare to do for ourselves. Here is his testimony in his own words–"I said of laughter, It is mad. And of mirth, What does it? I sought in my heart to give myself unto wine, yet acquainting my heart with wisdom. And to lay hold on folly till I might see what was that good for the sons of men, which they should do under the Heaven all the days of their life. I made me great works. I built houses. I planted vineyards–I made gardens and orchards and I planted trees in them of all kind of fruits. I made me pools of water, to water the wood that brings forth trees. I got me servants and maidens and had servants born in my house.
"Also I had great possessions of great and small cattle above all that were in Jerusalem before me. I gathered me also silver and gold and the peculiar treasure of kings and of the provinces. I got men singers and women singers and the delights of the sons of men, as musical instruments and that of all sorts. So I was great and increased more than all that were before me in Jerusalem. Also my wisdom remained with me. And whatever my eyes desired I kept not from them. I withheld not my heart from any joy, for my heart rejoiced in all my labor–and this was my portion of all my labor.
Then I looked on all the works that my hands had worked and on the labor that I had labored to do–and, behold, all was vanity and vexation of spirit and there was no profit under the sun." "Vanity of vanity, all is vanity."
What? The whole of it vanity? Is there nothing in all that wealth, Solomon? What? Nothing in that wide dominion of yours reaching from the river even to the sea? Nothing in Palmyra's glorious seat?
Nothing in the house of the forest of Lebanon? Do you see nothing from Dan to Beersheba when you have made brass to be like pebbles and gold and silver to be but as common dust of the land?
In those sweet sounds that lull you to your rest, in all the music and dancing that delight you, is there nothing?
"Nothing," he says, "but weariness of spirit." This is his verdict when he has tried it all. To get hold of Christ, to have His love and to taste of union with Him–this, dear Brethren–this is everything!
You need not try any other form of life in order to see whether it is better than the Christian's. Let me assure you if you roam the world round and search from Britain to Japan you will see no sights like a sight of the Savior's face! And if you could have all the comforts of life, yet if you lost your Savior you would be wretched! But if you get Him, then should you rot in a dungeon you would find it a paradise! Should you live in obscurity, or die with famine, you would yet be satisfied with favor and full of the goodness of the Lord!
III. Let us spend a moment in considering WHY THE DOVE
COULD FIND NO REST FOR THE SOLES OF HER FEET. Was there a want of will in the dove? Was she one of those discontented birds that will not rest anywhere? Nothing of the kind! She seems to have searched after rest, for otherwise it need not be recorded that she found none. There are certain people in this world who never will rest and they certainly do not deserve it. They always grumble. No matter what you do, or what you do not do, they grumble forevermore.
They grumble at the sun, and call him, as Thompson once did, "a rosy drunkard." They murmur at the moon, her light is too pale and sickly and variable. They murmur at death–it is a dreadful thing to lose one's friends. They murmur at life–everybody seems to die and be happy, they say, except themselves–they are condemned to live on. You never can please them. All things are either too hot or too cold, too young or too old, too rough or too smooth, too high or too low. They have made up their minds that there is nothing on earth that will ever satisfy them. They have set up an ultra standard of what they want and the world does not yield it.
No grass is green enough for them. No milk that is ever given by cows is fit for them to drink. No wine that was ever pressed from grapes is rich enough for their taste. Upon all created things they use the only organ which seems to be of use to them, that is, their nose–and that they turn up! Such people as these will tell you that there is nothing on earth–nothing on earth. They have indigestion, their liver is out of order–and consequently there is nothing on earth–everything here below is mean and despicable.
Now when people talk like that you just measure their talk by the men and make small account of their utterances. These men are not talking from their judgment–they are merely talking under the influence of an absurd, half-mad feeling! But such is not the case with the Christian. I know a considerable number of Christians who are of a cheerful disposition and who would even, as worldlings, have been satisfied with very little. They are a kind of men, (I trust you have some of them for your friends), who are not often put out.
They, on the other hand, always look at the bright side of everything and if there should be a something which is a little amiss, they take it as a variety and only say, "Well, this is a change," and so they make pleasure where others would find pain.
And yet these very people, when they are converted, will tell you that they are not satisfied out of Christ! Now their verdict is worth considering. The dove had a will to find rest for the soles of her feet but she could not. It is not from want of will that I am compelled to say I cannot find anything beneath these stars, nor within the compass of the skies that can satisfy my soul's desires. I must get my God and have Him to fill my large expectations or I shall not be content. I mention these things because people are apt to suppose that Christians are all a set of melancholy dyspeptics who put up with religion because there is nothing else that helps to make them to be so happily miserable and therefore they take to it as congenial with their melancholy disposition! But it is not so. We are a cheerful, genial race and yet for all that we are not resting the soles of our feet anywhere in earthly things.
Again, the reason why the dove could find no rest was not because she had no eyes to see. I know not how far a dove's eyes can discern, but it must be a very vast distance–perfectly incredible
I should think. We see the dove sometimes mount aloft–we can see nothing and yet she perceives her dovecote and darts towards it.
Now the Christian does not say there is no joy on earth for him except in his Lord because he has no power to see things pleasing and delightful. If there is melody in music, the Christian knows it, likes it, rejoices in it. If there is sweetness his palate is as good as another man's. If there is anything to be found in wealth, or what the world calls pleasure, he can see it all–he is not blind!
I know many Christians who are as quick in apprehension, as refined in taste, and as ready to appreciate anything that is pleasurable as other men–and yet these are men who are not fanatics! They are not shut up to a narrow range of things, but their vision can take in the whole circle of sublunary delights. These are men who have not only seen but even tasted, yet bear their witness that like the dove they can find no rest for the soles of their feet.
Moreover, the reason why the dove found no rest was not because she had no wings to reach it. Her wings were strong and swift. She could fly as well as the raven–perhaps she could, in the long run, outstrip him. So the Christian has power to enter into the enjoyments of the world if he likes. It is not because his youth has departed and he has become old and shriveled and therefore the delights of the flesh have ceased to be temptations to him. No! Of course there are some in that condition, who when converted can almost be taunted by sinners with the remark that they have tried the world's pleasures and when they could not enjoy them they then turned away from them.
But some of us are young and strong and full of blood and our bones are full of marrow. And if we willed it we could be ringleaders in all sorts of pleasure and plunge head first into the stream of sensual delight. We lack not courage and we lack not force and yet for all this–we say it solemnly and the God that searches all hearts knows we only say what we feel forced to say– that we can find no rest for the soles of our feet in earthly pleasures. We have tried. We have wished to rest. We have even wanted to be satisfied with the world–but the void within can never be filled out of the mines of earth. We cannot–God has made it all empty to us.
Now what was the reason, then? It was not want of will. It was not want of sight. Nor was it want of wings–what was it? The reason lay in this–she was a dove! If she had been a raven she would have found plenty of rest for the soles of her feet. It was her nature that made her restless. And the reason why the Christian cannot find satisfaction in worldly things is because there is a new nature within him that cannot rest. "Up! Up! Up!" cries the new heart! "What have you to do here?" "Come, strike your tents," cries the new creature. "You have no continuing city here–how is it that you try to make one in this barren wilderness? Away with you!
What are you doing?"
If I could transform myself to an unregenerate man, the world might content me. But if I am regenerate, it matters not into what society I may be thrown away, I never can, I never shall, I must not, I dare not hope for contentment–for to the regenerate, Christ alone is satisfaction–they cannot find it anywhere else. You see, then, that this is a great test–this will try you, dear Friends, and divide you.
If any of you are saying, "Oh, I am satisfied enough. I do not want this Christ the man talks about–give me this and give me that and I shall be quite content." I say, "Very likely–so was the raven content with carrion. But and if you are a child of God, you may seek contentment elsewhere, but you shall be compelled, perhaps by sore and bitter trials, to turn away from all earthly things and fly back again to your ark."
IV. Being disappointed, WHAT DID THE DOVE DO? When she found there was no contentment elsewhere, what then? She flew back to the ark. Josephus tells us that the dove came back to Noah with her wings and feet all wet and muddy. I think it is very likely, but I do not think it any the more likely because Josephus says so.
Some of you have grown wet and muddy. You have been trying to find rest in the world, Christian, and you have got mired with it.
Trying to rest those feet where they could not rest you have collected filth.
What then? Shall I advise you to bathe in the flood? Shall I advise you to cleanse those wings till they are bright as they once were?
No, I do not. I cannot give you any such advice. I can only say to you, "Do what the dove did." She mounted again–she caught sight of the ark and knew the place of safety. I want you once again to get a sight of Christ. Peter had gone far away, as the dove had done–he had denied his Master with oaths and curses–and what brought him back? Why, it was the Lord getting a sight of Peter and Peter getting a sight of the Lord! "The Lord turned and looked upon Peter and he went out and wept bitterly."
Was it not all done as soon as the Lord's eyes and Peter's eyes came into contact? If you are enabled by the Holy Spirit to remember that there was a Savior who loved you so that Heaven could not hold Him. That He had to come to earth and enter into your degradation, and bear your sin, and suffer for your sake, you will be getting right at once, however far off you are! If you look to Jesus, there is life for you in a look at the Crucified One.
Then the dove, after looking, was not content with that–she began to speed with all her might back to the ark. So, when you have a faint view of your Savior and you are once more consciously saved, then fly back to Him! I do not read that the dove made a tour round about, or that she thought she would try something else. No, she took just the straightest line she could, the nearest way between herself and her loved abode and went right straight away to Noah.
Fear may have made her wings heavy, but it did not stop them!
Mire and mud may have made the journey more laborious, but it did not turn her aside!
Come you mired ones! Come you fainting ones, doves as you are!
Though you think yourself to be black as the raven with the mire of sin–back, back to the Savior! Every moment you wait does but increase your misery! Your attempts to plume yourself and make yourself fit for Him are all vanity. Come to Him just as you are!
"Return you backsliding Israel." He does not say, " Return you repenting Israel," (there is such an invitation, doubtless), but, "you backsliding one, as a backslider with all your backslidings about you. Return, return, return!"
I want you now to turn your eyes for a moment to THE VERY
BEAUTIFUL SCENE, so it seems to me to be, at the end of her return journey. Noah has been looking out for his dove all day long.
Here she comes! How heavily she flies! She will drop–she will never reach the ark. Here she comes and Noah is ready to receive her. She looks bespotted with mire and dirt, but Noah waits for her.
She has just strength to get on to the edge of the ark–she can hardly hold on there and is ready to drop when Noah puts forth his hand and pulls her in unto him.
Mark that–"pulled her in unto him." It seems to me to imply that she did not fly right in herself, but was too fearful, or too weary to get right in. She got as far as she could and then he put forth his hand and pulled her in unto him. Did you ever feel that blessed gracious pull, when your heart has been desiring to get near to Christ? Oh, it has been such tugging, such toiling in prayer–you could only say, "I would but cannot pray. My heart is heavy as lead and my soul as hard as adamant and dead as iron. I cannot stir myself and get near to the Savior. Oh that I could! Oh that I had the wings of a dove, for then would I flee away and be at rest."
All of a sudden it comes, that gracious pull! Your heart begins to be on fire! Before you are aware your soul seems to be like the chariots of Aminadab! Now it is all well with you! Now can you sing sweetly to your Beloved who has done great things for you and you are glad. All this was, you perceive, to the wandering dove, to the miry dove speckled with filth. Just as she was, she is pulled into the ark. So you, with all that sin of yours and those wanderings will be received. "Only return"–those are two gracious words in the Bible–"only return"–so it is put. What? Nothing else?
No, only return.
She had no olive branch in her mouth this time. Nothing at all but just herself and her wanderings. But it is, "only return," and she does return and Noah pulls her in. Lord, pull me in! My thirsty spirit faints to reach You! My soul cries out for Your Presence but cannot reach You! I see You, Lord! Pull me in! When like Esther I faint in Your Presence and cannot tell You what I would, stretch out
Your silver scepter–read my heart and grant my desire and show
Yourself to me! Oh, open my eyes to see You and know You!
Thus much concerning the dove and its likeness to our own hearts. Now I close with these three things–First, this becomes first of all a test to you. We can divide the house into two parts by asking the question, "Are you satisfied out of Christ?" Are you satisfied and content with anything short of a conscious knowledge of your union and interest in Christ Jesus? If so, you have no reason to believe that you are a converted man. If this world satisfies you I have no fault to find, no reason to be angry with you.
Who finds fault with horses for being satisfied with hay and oats?
It is their natural food.
Some persons are very indignant with others because they will go to theatres and gay assemblies. They only take what their nature craves after. The raven is now feeding on his carrion. I draw a distinction forevermore between that which men without Divine
Grace may do and that which gracious men may do. The graceless man stands somewhat on the level of the beast that perishes. Well, let the swine have their husks! Let the swine, I say, have their provender. You will never make them any better by denying them their husks! You may excite their angry passions against you, that is all–let them have their husks.
But you, on the other hand, who are a Christian, are a different being. You are lifted into another state. You have another nature.
Now, could you enjoy those things? If you really could find satisfaction in them, you are a hypocrite. If your soul really could stretch herself at rest and find the bed long enough and the coverlet broad enough to cover you in the chambers of sin, then you are a hypocrite and one of these days down to the pit your soul must go!
On the other hand, if you feel sure and certain that if you could indulge in sin without a punishment, it would still be a punishment of itself. And if you feel you could have the whole world and never be parted from it, it would be quite enough misery not to be parted from it–for your God–your God is what your soul craves after, then be of good courage! You are a child of God!
With all your sins and imperfections, take this to your comfort–if your soul has no rest in sin, you are not as the sinner is. If you are still crying after and craving after something better, Christ has not forgotten you for you have not quite forgotten Him. Here is a test, then. And then, secondly, we must use our text as an encouragement. Here we have an encouragement to backsliders to return like the dove. She did not find the ark shut against her–we do not even find there was any delay. Noah pulled her in at once.
To the sinner here is encouragement, too. If you come back to the ark, you shall not be excluded. If any man shall be shut out of Heaven, he shuts the door himself. He who is damned signs his own death warrant. Our verse is true–
"None are excluded from now
But those who do themselves exclude."
If you come–sinner, drunkard, blasphemer, liar, thief–whoever you may be, it is written, "Him that comes to Me I will in no wise cast out." "But here is one," I think I hear someone say, "here is one of such a sort as never came before! Blacker than night. More full of sin than the egg is full of meat! Now, now there is one that will be shut out." I say make way for him, make way for him!
Stand back you common sinners, make a way for him! Now we will see whether Christ is true or not! Brethren, what will be the result? Why we know that in Christ there is love and truth and faithfulness–and that what He says He means and that His promise
He will perform.
When that black sinner comes, the Lord looks upon him with an eye of unutterable love and His first word is, "I have blotted out your iniquity as a cloud and like a thick cloud your transgression."
"I have loved you with an everlasting love," and His next act is to plunge that sinner in the fountain filled with blood and suddenly he comes out whiter than snow, without spot or wrinkle, or any such thing! He is able to cleanse from all iniquity and to deliver from all unrighteousness and to make the foulest and vilest bright as the sun at noonday! This is encouragement–God help you to take it! May the Holy Spirit bring you to Christ today.
And then, lastly, we use our text, I think, as a loud cry for gratitude. Does Christ receive us when we have found Him and is there none on earth like He? Is He the best of all the good, the fairest of all the lovely? Oh then, let us praise Him.! Down with your idols, up with the Lord Jesus! Now let the standard of all pomp and pride be trampled under foot, and let the Cross of Jesus, which the world frowns and scoffs at, be lifted up! Oh for a high throne for the Savior! Let Him be lifted up forever and let my soul sit at His feet and kiss His feet and wash them with my tears.
Oh how precious is Christ! How can it be that I have thought so little of Him? How is it I can go abroad for anything else when He is so full, so rich, so satisfying? Christian, make a covenant with your heart and ask the Lord to ratify it–that you will never depart from Him! Bid Him set you as a signet upon His finger and as a bracelet upon His arm. Ask Him to bind you about Him as the bride decks herself with ornaments and as the bridegroom puts on his jewelry. I would live in Christ's heart–in the clefts of that Rock my soul would abide!
The sparrow has made a house and the swallow a nest for herself where she may lay her young, even Your altars, O Lord of Hosts, my King and my God! And so, too, would I make my nest, my home in You and never from You may the soul of Your turtle dove go forth again! May I nestle close to Jesus who has pulled me back into the ark after my backsliding. May the Holy Spirit so preserve us for His name's sake. Amen.
Ge 8:9 • The Weary Dove's Return
ERMON 2373
The Weary Dove's Return
"But the dove found no rest for the sole of her foot and she returned into the ark to him, for the waters were on the face of the whole earth. So he put out his hand and took her, and drew her into the ark to himself."
Genesis 8:9
NOAH knew that God would, in due time, let him out of the ark.
He was quite sure that the Lord had not put him into the ark to make a great coffin of it–that he and all those living creatures that went in with him should perish there. And, because he believed in God, he, therefore, removed the covering of the ark and looked abroad, expecting, by-andby, to see not only the tops of the mountains, but also a dry and green earth once more. True faith often goes to the window. If your faith turns her face to the wall and expects nothing, I do not think it is genuine faith. Faith has eyes and, therefore, she looks afar off, and she often watches as the watchman of the night looks for the gray dawn of the morning. You remember the story of the child who went to a Prayer Meeting which was called together to pray for rain? She expected that God would send the rain, so she took her umbrella with her because she needed to get home dry. I wish that you and I had learned the same simple art of faith. Having prayed, and having believed, let us expect! Let us open the window and look out! God never failed an expectant people, yet, but a great many of His people fail to expect.
And if you do not expect, you are not likely to receive! David said, "My soul, wait only upon God, for my expectation is from Him."
And when your expectation is from Him, it will not be disappointed. It is a great pity when we keep the shutters up so that we cannot look out of the window to see the dry land.
Next, because Noah expected the earth to be dry, he sent out the raven. And when the raven did not answer his purpose, he sent out the dove. After the dove came back with no tidings, he waited seven days and then sent her out again. And when she returned with only an olive leaf in her mouth, he waited seven more days and then sent her out again. Oh, dear Friends, often send out your doves! Be looking for blessings! You have asked for them–God has promised to give them–send out your doves to see whether the blessings are not there! And if you do so constantly and perseveringly, verily, I say unto you, you shall have your reward!
Still, notice that Noah, when he had the best evidence that he could get that the earth was dry, did not dare to go out of the ark till God opened the door. So, gather all the information you possibly can about your position and act according to the rules of commonsense. But, after you have done that, still wait upon God!
When you know from your ravens and your doves that the earth is getting dry, do not come out till He that shut the door opens it for you. Dear people of God, I wish that we had more of that old habit of looking to Providence! We have become so wise, nowadays, that we do not require the fiery-cloudy pillar! We run without Divine guidance, but, mark you, we often have to run back, again. We are guests at the table of Providence and if we will let God carve for us, our plate will always have plenty of food on it–but if we get to carving for ourselves, we shall cut our fingers–and not cut much else! And we shall have great cause to be ashamed that, instead of trusting God, we took to trusting ourselves! Do not trust your raven or your dove, trust your God! And if you go where He guides you, you will go the right way, even if it should be a rough way. And you will have to say, "Surely, goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life; and I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever."
Now, to come a little closer to the text and to what we are about to say upon it. I do not know where the raven rested, whether he did, as some suppose, alight on the corpses floating on the flood, which I hardly think is likely, for God was preparing the earth for Noah to come back to it, and He would not leave it strewn with carcasses, as some have imagined. Whether the raven returned to the ark, but refused to come in, or whether it found a resting place on the slimy boughs of trees, or on the tops of the mountains, which we are told began to be visible, I cannot tell. This, I do know, that, wherever the raven rested, the dove could not do so– there was no clean place fit for the dove's clean nature. So it had to return to the ark and when, weak and weary, it could hardly reach the ark, being heavy with the damp, perhaps mired with the filthy water into which it may have fallen in its weariness–while just able to get as far as the ark–it might have perished in the waters had not Noah perceived his little bird coming to the window. I suppose he was already there looking out for her and he stretched forth his hand, and caught her, and pulled her in, and she was safe in the ark again.
There are three lessons which I am going to try to teach you from this simple little incident.
The first is, that THUS GOD RECEIVES HIS SERVANTS. He receives them unto Himself, just as Noah received this dove into the ark.
Upon this I remark, first, that sometimes God's servants wander.
How I wish that they never did! Oh, that we so loved our Noah that we never left Him and never went away from Him who is our Rest!
We are tempted and the flesh is frail. Oh, how sadly have some good men wandered! We speak this to our shame. We make no excuse for ourselves. We have wandered like silly doves–we have left the place of peace and safety and joy–and we have gone abroad, flying, we know not where! Perhaps I speak to some such at this time.
Now, if you are one of Christ's doves, you will never rest till you go back to Him. Time was when you could have found pleasure in the ways of sin, but you cannot do so now. You may try to find it, but you cannot. When you were a raven, you might have done so, but now that the Holy Spirit has made a dove of you, you are spoilt for the raven's ways. When a true child of God wanders into sin at any time, and goes back to the old haunts, he thinks to himself, "I used to enjoy myself in this place of amusement. I used to make merry with such and such company. The pipe and the bowl were once like Heaven on earth to me. But now," he says, "I do not know how it is, but these things seem so vapid, so empty. There is not the life, there is not the vivacity about them that I knew in my younger days. It seems to be all a more hollow sham, now." Ah, my Friend, it is not these things that have altered–it is you that the Grace of God has changed! If God means you to live in Heaven, you shall never find your Heaven in this world! If He has chosen you to be His, and means you to be His, and has put His Spirit within you, you must be always restless till you come back and find rest in Him.
"May I come back?" says one. May you come back? Your Noah is at the window waiting for you! Speed towards Him with both your wings! Rest not till He puts forth His hand to you and grasps you, and draws you into Himself. "But will He have me? Will He have me again?" O bird of the weary wing, He is not weary of you!
O bird of the wet wing that has been soiled in the filthy flood, He will not reject you! He washed you once–He will wash you again!
He waits to be gracious! Jesus loves to receive backsliders. It is the joy of His heart, not only to make a sheep out of a goat, but to find one of His sheep that has gone astray! Not only to adopt a stranger into His family, but to restore the prodigal son! That is the meaning of that parable–it is the backslider's parable. Oh, that you would understand it and know that the infinite mercy of God is as ready to receive a returning backslider as Noah was to receive his wandering dove!
Now I will turn to another point. The dove in this narrative was not to blame, for it had not gone astray, but Noah sent it out and, every now and then, the Lord Jesus sends a dove of His to go and spy out the world. It is a business upon which we must go if He sends us. Now, what is our report of the world? Our report is that there is nothing in the world upon which we can rest the sole of our foot. The world is said to be progressing, advancing, improving, but we cannot discover it. The same sin, the same filthiness, the same universally abounding unbelief that our fathers complained of, we are obliged to complain of still! And we are weary with the world, weary with the 19 th Century and all its boasted civilization.
There is nothing upon which the sole of our foot can rest.
"What of the Church?" asks one. Well, look at the Church, too.
There is nothing to rest on. There is much for which to be thankful, but there is nothing that can content a spirit that seeks after the Truth of God and holiness. I speak what I know, for with weary wings have I fled across the waters, and with anxious eyes have I scanned the horizon, but there is no place of rest for the sole of my foot! What then? What then? Is the servant of God weary with his flight? See what Noah did to the dove, for this is what the Lord will do to His servant–"he put forth his hand, and took her, and pulled her in unto him into the ark." O dear child of God, if you cannot rest in the Church, you can rest in Christ! If you cannot rest in the world, you can rest in the Lord! "He pulled her in unto him." It is a delicious sensation to get away from all men and all things to Christ, Himself. He never seems so sweet as when all else is bitter!
He never appears so substantial as when all else melts before you.
"He pulled her in unto him." She had done her work; she had taken her flight; she had made her investigation. Now she has come back and she is in his bosom. "He pulled her in unto him." May that be the portion of all my dear friends in Christ who at this time feel heavy about the signs of the times! May the Lord draw you into nearer, dearer, sweeter fellowship with Himself than you have ever enjoyed before, and this will be your best reward!
Again, to give another case, the Lord's servants are sometimes sent forth that they may bring something back with them. You
Sunday school teachers go out on the Sabbath hoping to bring some child back with you. You streetpreachers (and may your number be multiplied!) are trying to bring something or somebody to Jesus!
Workers of different sorts who are here, tonight, you go flying abroad to try to find someone for Jesus. It may be that you have not picked up even an olive leaf, yet–not one "son of peace" has, at present, received your benediction. Well, this dove was welcome though she brought nothing back. She came back with nothing in her mouth the first time, but then we read, "Noah put forth his hand, and took her, and pulled her in unto him into the ark."
What, though no child is saved as yet? What, though no hearer in the street has responded to the invitation of love? What, though you have labored in vain and spent your strength for nothing? You are accepted of your God if you have done your best, trusting in the power of the Holy Spirit and, tonight He pulls you in unto Himself.
If you are weary, O Martha, come and sit with Mary! If you are encumbered with the serving, come and be refreshed with the communing! After all, you can, perhaps, glorify your Lord more by receiving than by giving. You shall find it more blessed to yourself to receive Christ than if you could bring a soul to Him–He can make it to be so if He pleases. At any rate, your hope of going out, again, and bringing in an olive leaf, by-and-by, will lie in your coming in, now, and getting in unto your Noah and resting on Him until He sends you out again!
Only one more observation will I make on this first point and it shall be a very brief one. As far as I can see, this dove was sent out in the morning and she came back in the evening–and Noah pulled her in unto him. Brothers, let that be a picture of every day in your lives. When you wake in the morning, perhaps the factory bell is ringing. At any rate, it is time for you to be off to business. You must think about your business. Perhaps yours is a work that is mental. You must give your mind to it, so all day long you feel like the dove flying abroad. Well, take good heed that when the sun goes down, you make your way back home to your Lord! Lock up your heart every morning before you go out and give Christ the key to keep till you come home. And then, when He opens it at night, the sweet perfume that you had in the morning will be there in the evening! It is best if we can keep up our thoughts of Christ all day long, but perhaps we cannot–then let the dove, that flew away in the morning, be sure to fly back at night! It is where you go when the day's toil is done that tells what sort of a man you are!
I think I have, before now, used the simile of the crows. You cannot tell where the crows live early in the morning–they are out on the land following the plow. Farther on in the day they are inspecting a field of turnips, perhaps, watching to see if they can find a fly or a worm. Where do they live? Wait until the evening, when they get together, and then you will see that they make a straight line for those tall trees where their nests are! Where do your thoughts go at night? Where do they go when your day's toil is done? When you have done with the business of the day, which is like the crows picking up the worms, which way do you go? That shows where your soul lives, so take care that in the evening you make your way back to your Noah. Oh, how sweetly does Christ come to us in our evening prayer and put out His hand and pull us in unto Himself–and we rest once more–
"As in the embraces of our God,
Or on our Savior's breast."
Thus have I spoken to you upon my first division, showing that God receives His servants as Noah received the dove.
II. I will now go on to the second part of my subject which is equally practical and will be useful to another class of people.
THIS IS WHAT THE LORD JESUS CHRIST DOES TO
SINNERS. I have spoken, first, of His servants. Now I want to speak of sinners who are seeking His face.
Note, then, that the Lord Jesus Christ does not despise the condition of the sinner who comes to Him. I have imagined that this dove might have fouled its wings. Certainly it was not the beauty that it was when Noah sent it out in the morning–but he did not, therefore, refuse to take it into the ark. It was very weary and ready to drop into the waters, yet Noah did not refuse it, but there he stood, at the open window, to meet it when it came! And you feel very foul, very unworthy, very unfit, and very unsafe– nevertheless, Jesus Christ will not refuse you! Whatever your condition may be, He casts out none who come to Him. Come as you are! Come even though you feel that you cannot come! Come anyway, for He will not reject you.
The first thing that Noah did with this dove was to display his power–"He put forth his hand." I have known the Lord display His power very remarkably when poor souls have been coming to Him, putting forth His hand, sometimes in Providence, doing some extraordinary thing to bring them to decision. Sometimes He has used a sermon, or a stray word from some gracious soul, or He has put forth the power of His hand in the preaching of His Word.
Sometimes He has used a religious book, or a little tract as His agent. It has not mattered what the instrumentality has been, it is the power which God has put forth which has been the means of laying hold upon the coming sinner! Sometimes there has been no book and no sermon, but the Holy Spirit, without any apparent means, has made an impression upon the conscience and upon the heart. There has come over the sinner, when he has begun to seek the Lord, a singular melting power, a feeling of solemnity such as he never had before. He cannot understand it. He seems to be on the borders of a new world. He hears the chimes of bells which he never heard before, ringing out of invisible places, and summoning him to his God! I know what this experience means and I pray that some of you may know it–that just now, at this very moment–our blessed Noah may put forth His hand to you poor fluttering doves!
You cannot do anything, but Jesus can! You cannot save yourselves, but He can save you, even as Noah put forth his hand and saved the dove from perishing.
Then we read, next, that Noah took the dove, seized her, captured her, held her. That is what my Lord does. Jesus takes hold of sinners. Oh, that He might get a blessed hold of some of you, tonight! I have sometimes thought that Noah stood something like this [leaning forward, with hands outstretched,] looking out of the window, and when the dove came back and was ready to drop, he caught her between his hands, as one would tenderly hold a dove, encompassing her, and then he pulled her in unto him. What a blessing it is when the Gospel of Christ seems to surround you and you get a hand beneath you, and a hand above you, and you feel as if Christ had laid hold of you and was leading you joyfully captive!
Some of you remember when that happened to you–when the hand of Jesus was first held out, and then was put round about you–and you were taken prisoner and held in gracious bondage to the love and power of Christ!
Then we read that, "He pulled her in," and thus Jesus draws in sinners. There is something of a pull needed. Oh, what blessed pulls the Lord sometimes gives to bring sinners to decision and put an end to their hesitancy! They want to wait a little longer, but the Lord Jesus will not have it! Providence and Grace end their delays.
They are very fearful, fluttering like this dove, afraid of her best friend, but the Lord Jesus Christ gives a pull that ends their fears and kills their despair. They are His and His powerful love wins the day! Sometimes, it is ignorance that keeps sinners back from Christ, for God's doves are often very silly creatures. They do not know the way into the ark. They miss the window. But Jesus does with them as Noah did with the dove–"He pulled her in." I hope I am not talking beyond the experience of many of you, or, if I am, I pray my Master to make this to be your experience even now. May these poor simple words of mine induce some of you to come to Christ at once! Why will you perish? Why will you delay? Why not be pulled in tonight, even as the dove was pulled in by Noah? I cannot pull you in. I would if I could, but Jesus can! And He cannot be less willing to bless you than I am!
Notice where Christ draws sinners. Noah pulled the dove in unto himself and that is what Christ does with His poor fluttering doves!
He draws them to Himself. You say that you need a lot of things.
No you do not–you only need Jesus. If you have Him, you have everything! You need to be pulled into peace, to joy, to holiness, to rest. Yes, but what you really need is to be pulled into Jesus and you will get all the other blessings! Drawn to His wounds, poor doves, you shall find your hiding place! Drawn to His wounds, poor doves, you shall find the truest cleansing! This is what your Master must do for you, even as Noah pulled the dove in unto himself.
And when he had pulled her into himself, then she was in the ark and she soon found other doves. Thus, Jesus draws sinners in unto salvation. When He draws a man to Himself, then He draws Him to the Church and he comes where he shall meet with fit society that shall console him and help him during the rest of his days. I cannot preach as I would, but I know that I am telling you that which, if my Lord will but bless it, will save and comfort your souls! I pray
Him to put me on one side, altogether, and to come–and with His own pierced hands pull you in unto Himself!
III. So I finish with this third point. THAT WHICH JESUS DOES
TO HIS SERVANTS AND TO SINNERS, HE WOULD HAVE US
DO. Now, you people of God, listen to me, and do what I now entreat of you in my Master's name.
In the first place, look out for souls. Now, Noah, go to the window! There is that dove, you know, fluttering somewhere–go and look out for it, go to the window, Noah! He does not need to be told to go, for there he is. Noah loves his dove, so he is watching for her at the window. Dear people of God, often go to the window!
In your families look for the salvation of your children. In your workshops look for the salvation of your employees and those with whom you work! Perhaps that is a new thought to some of you. If you can get them to work for a little less money, you look out for that, but oh, that you would look out for their salvation! To see your employees saved is the best profit that you can, any of you, have! Watch for their souls and do so, not only at home, but when you come to your place of worship. We have friends in this Tabernacle who are looking all over the place while I am speaking.
I do not say that they are not attending to my message, but I do not think they are attending so much to my words as to those to whom I am speaking! I have frequently seen a Brother making his way very quietly down to a certain spot where he has noticed some of you sitting very attentively, some newcomers, perhaps, who have never been here before, and it is more than likely that he will speak to some of you before this service is over.
I hope somebody will ask you whether you are saved and, if so, you will begin to find that there are some who desire to bring you into close quarters! I think that it ought to be so. I cannot bear the thought of your coming here without getting a blessing. I have to fire the Gospel cannon from this platform–it is loaded with grape shot and it often does great execution–yet many of you may not be hit that way, but, happily, my friends can come to you with their little pocket pistols and so reach many whom I miss! Get to close quarters with them, Brothers and Sisters! Find out whether they are saved or not! We need a great deal of this kind of work. Now then, Noah, go to the window and look out–be you an old Christian or a young Christian–be on the look out for sinners!
Noah goes to the window and, sure enough, there is his dove.
Then Noah stretches out his hands, as I want you to do. Stretch out a hand to sinners. Do it very gently, for doves are not bears, you know–the souls of men are not like the skins of tigers. Stretch out your hands to sinners, but do it in a very loving and gentle way.
Try, if you can, to let them see that there is a friend near who will be happy to help them to Christ. Stretch out your hands and if you can, lay hold of them. I do not know how Noah caught his dove, whether by the wings, or the legs, or the neck, but he did catch her, and pulled her into the ark. Now try if you can to lay hold of a soul for Christ–get a firm grip on it! This is not child's play! He that can catch doves with his hands is a wise man and he that would win souls must be wise. Try to catch souls, if you can, but do it gently.
Remember that they are doves and, therefore, be very tender and very gentle with them. But, being doves, they are apt to fly away– therefore hold them fast–and do not let them go.
Perhaps they will not like you to touch them. Never mind that–go on as mildly and lovingly as you can, yet do seek to give them a pull and do not rest until they are with you in the ark, that is to say, till they are in Christ! Till they are trusting Him, till they are resting in Him, till His precious blood has washed them and they are saved, as you trust you are!
I do not think that we are half earnest enough in dealing with our fellow men. I remember a young man who, when dying, said to his brother, "I am afraid I am lost, my brother, and I cannot help saying to you, 'Why were you not more earnest about my salvation?'" His elder brother answered, "John, I have spoken to you once or twice about your soul." "Once or twice!" replied the other, "You ought to have been always at me." "Well, but I did frequently speak to you about Divine things." "But," said he, "if you knew that I was perishing, why did you not shake me? Why did you not do something unusual with me? Why did you not weep over me? Why did you not force me to think? My soul is lost and you have shown but very little care about it."
Perhaps that was a very hard thing to say, and an unkind thing, and a self-excusing thing, but do you not think that some people might say that of you and of me? We have never been earnest enough in seeking the salvation of their souls. Mr. Rowland Hill's story about this matter is a good one. He said, "I hear them say that poor old Mr. Hill makes a great noise and often shouts when he is preaching, the poor old gentleman gets quite excited." "Yes," added
Mr. Hill, "and I was one day walking out at Wotton-under-Edge, and I was going by a gravel pit, or a chalk pit, and it fell in and buried a man. And I went running down into the village as fast as ever my old legs would carry me, crying out that there was a man likely to be buried alive–and the people rushed out to try to save him! And they did not say, then, as they do, now, 'Poor old Mr. Hill is making a deal of noise.'"
Oh, that we were as earnest about the souls of men as we can sometimes be about their bodies! Do try, then, you who love the Lord, to pull them in, even as Noah pulled the dove in unto himself into the ark.
I leave the text with you. When I cannot preach, I always wish that all of you may be preaching. If the preacher seems to speak feebly, take up what he has said and work at it, and go and do better with it. And if you will do so, it will be better than if I, alone, had done better. The Lord bless you, for Jesus Christ's sake! Amen.
Ge 8:21 • Human Depravity and Divine Mercy
ERMON 0615
Human Depravity And Divine Mercy
"And the Lord smelled a sweet savor. And the Lord said in His heart, I will not again curse the ground anymore for man's sake; for the imagination of man's heart is evil from his youth; neither will I again destroy anymore every thing living as I have done."
Genesis 8:21
PETER tells us that Noah's ark and Baptism are figures of salvation. He puts the two together as pictures of the way by which we are saved. Noah was not saved by the world's being gradually reformed and restored to its primitive innocence, but a sentence of condemnation was pronounced and death, burial and resurrection ensued. Noah must go into the ark and become dead to the world.
The floods must descend from Heaven and rise upward from their secret fountains beneath the earth. The ark must be submerged with many waters–here was burial. And then after a time Noah and his family must come out into a totally new world of resurrection life.
It is the same in the figure of Baptism. The person baptized, if he is already dead with Christ, is buried–not purified and improved– but buried beneath the waves. And when he rises he professes that he enjoys newness of life. Baptism is setting forth just what Noah's ark set forth–that salvation is by death and burial. You must be dead to the world. The flesh must be dead with Christ, buried with Christ–not improved, not made better, but utterly put aside as unimprovable, as worthless, dead–a thing to be buried and to be forgotten.
And we must come forth in resurrection life, feeling that above us there is a new Heaven and beneath us a new earth where righteousness dwells, seeing that we are new creatures in Christ
Jesus. It would be very instructive to dwell upon each point of the resemblance between Noah's deliverance and the salvation of every elect soul. Noah enters into the ark–there is a time when we distinctly enter into Christ and become one with Him. Noah was shut in the ark so that he could never come out again till God should open the door. There is a time when every child of God is shut in–when faith and full assurance give him an evidence that he is indissolubly one with Christ Jesus. He is grasped in Christ's hand so that none can pluck him out. He is hidden in Christ's loins so that none can separate him from the love of God.
Then comes the flood–there is a season in the Christian's experience when he discovers his own depravity. He is saved. He is in the ark. He is, however, still a sinner, still the subject of inbred lusts. Suddenly all these corruptions break up! They beat upon his ark, they assail his faith, they endeavor, if possible, to drown his soul in sin. But he is not destroyed by them–for, by the grace of God, he is where other men are not–he is where he cannot be drowned by sin. He is in Christ Jesus! He mounts as the floods deepen. The more he feels the depth of his depravity, the more he admires the fullness of the atoning sacrifice! The more terrible the temptation, the more joyous is his consolation in Christ Jesus.
And so he rises in holy communion towards his God. Then comes the wind–typical of the breath of the sacred Spirit by which the floods of corruption are calmed and peace reigns within and the soul sings, "Therefore being justified by faith we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ." Then the tops of the mountains appear–sanctification takes place upon a part of the man. There are some bright graces which glisten out of the general flood of corruption. There are some points of his new-born nature which delight him with their beauty. His ark has grounded and settled–he no longer floats, so to speak, tossed about with a struggling faith and contending unbelief–he feels that as Christ
Jesus is forever seated firmly at the right hand of God, so he, in Christ Jesus, has entered into rest.
The ark grounded on the top of Ararat–so does the Believer's experience come to a settled condition. He is no more moved about with fears and questions, but rejoices in hope of the Glory of God.
He sends forth his thoughts in search after evidence of his complete salvation, and probably he sends out some of his own ignorant carnal expectations, just as Noah sent out the raven. These ignorant imaginations of what the work of the Spirit is go forth and they never return earnest prayers go to and fro. By and by they come back with a token for good, some choice mercy from the hand of God–an olive branch of assured peace–and the Believer surely knows not only that he is in Christ, not only that he is grounded in Christ, but that all the waters are calmed, all sin is gone, all danger removed, all death destroyed!
Then occurs a period where God opens the door. Christ had been as a sort of prison to the Christian up till then. The Cross had been a burden. He did not rejoice in liberty. But God the Father now comes with the blessed Spirit and opens the door and the Believer is fully at liberty in the new world. The saved soul's first act is, like
Noah, to build an altar unto God and, as a priest, to offer sacrifice, which, as it rises to Heaven, is accepted because it is a memorial of Christ. The Lord smells a sweat savor and though the believing man is still full of sin and from his youth up has an evil imagination, yet he hears the Covenant voice which says, "I will no more curse, I will no more destroy."
He hears the Covenant promise which confirms forever the faithfulness of God and he rejoices to inherit, like Noah, a new world where righteousness dwells. I do not lay any stress upon these interpretations, but I know the Apostle says concerning Hagar and Sarah, "which things are an allegory." I believe that the book of Genesis is a book of dispensational Truth and if it were rightly read, not by the eye of curiosity, but by the heart of the student who has been made wise to see the deep things of God, very much of Divine and holy teaching would be discoverable in it.
But now I come to the text itself. We have here, first, a very sad and painful fact, "the imagination of man's heart is evil from his youth." We have, secondly, God's most extraordinary reasoning, "I will not again curse the ground for man's sake, for the imagination of man's heart is evil." Then, thirdly, we have some inferences less extraordinary but practical to ourselves from the text.
To begin, then, with the text, we have here A MOST PAINFUL
FACT that man's nature is incurable–"the imagination of man's heart is evil from his youth." You will remember, before the flood, in the fifth verse of the sixth chapter it is written, "God saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only continually evil."
After the flood it is just the same. The description in the sixth chapter belonged to all the antediluvian race.
You might have hoped that after so terrible a judgment, when only a few–a picked and peculiar few–that is, eight, were saved by water, that then, as man began anew with a better stock, the old branches that were sere and rotten being cut away–that now the nature of man would be improved. It is not one whit so. The same
God who, looking at man, declared that his imagination was evil before the flood, pronounces the very same verdict upon them afterwards. Oh God! How hopeless is human nature! How impossible is it that the carnal mind should be reconciled to God!
How needful is it that You should give us new hearts and right spirits, seeing that the old nature is so evil that even the floods of Your judgments cannot cure it of its evil imaginations!
I would have you studiously notice the words used in both these passages–the antediluvian and the postdiluvian verdict of God.
Look at the fifth verse of the sixth chapter–God saw not only outward sin that was great and multiplied and cried to Him for vengeance–He saw sin in the sons of men, the descendants of Cain.
Worse still, He saw treachery and departure from God in the sons of the chosen ones, the sons of Seth had gone astray, also. The sons of God saw the daughters of men, that they were fair and the two races became mingled so as to produce monsters of iniquity. But, worse than that, He saw that the thoughts of men's hearts were evil–man could not think without being evil.
No, more! The substratum which underlies actual thought– unformed, unfashioned thought–the eggs, the embryos of thought, called here the imagination of the thought, the first conception, the infant motions of the soul–all these God found to be evil. But observe, He says they were, "only evil." Not one trace of good! No gold amidst the dross, no light amidst the darkness–they were "only evil." And then He adds that word "continually." What? Never any repentance? Never any yearning towards the right? No pure drops of holiness now and then? No, never!
"Every imagination"–notice that word. The whole verse is most clear, a broom that sweeps man clean of all boasted good. "Every imagination"–when he was at his best, when he stood at God's altar, when he tried to be right–even then his thoughts had evil in them! Dr. Dick says, "All man's thoughts, all his desires, all his purposes are evil, expressly or by implication because the subject of them is avowedly sinful, or because they do not proceed from a holy principle and are not directed to a proper end. It is not occasionally that the human soul is thus under the influence of depravity. This is its habit and state. It seems impossible to construct a sentence which should more distinctly express its total corruption than this."
Look at this other passage which is our text. You will see it gives a different phase of the same evil, but it does not abate one jot or tittle of it. It is still, "the imagination of man's heart." It is still the inward character, the core, the pith, the marrow of mankind which God is dealing with. It is not the stream which comes from man that is foul but the fountain of man–the innermost source of the fountain! The imagination of his heart is evil–and we are told here what we are not told in the other text–that his thoughts are evil from his youth, that is to say, from his earliest childhood.
And it would not be evil from his childhood in every case if there were not certain seeds of evil sown before that and therefore we can go further and in the words of Holy Scripture we can confess with sorrowful truthfulness–"Behold I was shapen in iniquity, and in sin did my mother conceive me." From the very earliest imaginable period in which human nature exists it is a defiled, tainted thing and only worthy of God's utter abhorrence! And were it not that He smells a sweet savor in the sacrifice of Christ, He would say, as He did say in the sixth chapter, "He repented that He had made man on the earth and it grieved Him at His heart. And the Lord said, I will destroy man whom I have created from the face of the earth."
I have thus brought out this painful fact distinctly, I hope, before you. It is true both before and after the flood. If you want any proof of its being true now turn to the scores of passages of Scripture which all prove it. I think, however, if our time were limited, as it is this morning, I should prefer to mention the third chapter of Paul's
Epistle to the Romans. It is the most sweeping description of the universality of human depravity that could possibly have been penned. I will read from the ninth to the nineteenth verse–"What then? Are we better than they? No, in no wise: for we have before proved both Jews and Gentiles, that they are all under sin as it is written, There is none righteous, no, not one: there is none that understands, there is none that seeks after God.
"They are all gone out of the way, they are together become unprofitable. There is none that does good, no, not one. Their throat is an open sepulcher. With their tongues have they used deceit. The poison of asps is under their lips: whose mouth is full of cursing and bitterness: their feet are swift to shed blood: destruction and misery are in their ways: and the way of peace they have not known: there is no fear of God before their eyes. Now we know that what things so ever the Law says, it says to them who are under the Law: that every mouth may be stopped and all the world may become guilty before God."
Jonathan Edwards says upon this passage, "If the words which the Apostle uses here (Rom. 3:10-19) do not most fully and determinately signify a universality, no words ever used in the Bible, or elsewhere, are sufficient to do it. I might challenge any man to produce any one paragraph in the Scripture, from the beginning to the end, where there is such a repetition and accumulation of terms so strongly and emphatically and carefully formulated to express the most perfect and absolutely universality, or any place to be compared to it. What instance is there in the Scripture, or indeed any other writing when the meaning is only the much greater part?
"Where this meaning is signified in such a manner by repeating such expressions, 'They are all,' 'they are all together,' 'every one,' 'all the world' joined to multiplied negative terms, to show the universality to be without exception? Saying, 'There is no flesh,' 'there is none, there is none, there is none, there is none,' four times over. Besides the addition of, 'no, not one,' 'no, not one,' once and again… So that if this matter [universal depravity] is not here set forth plainly, expressly and fully, it must be because no words can do it. And it is not in the power of language, or any manner of terms and phrases, however contrived and heaped one upon another, determinately to let us remember the confessions of God's people."
You never heard a saint on his knees yet tell the Lord that he had a good nature, that he did not need renewing. Saints, as they grow in Divine Grace, are made to feel more and more acutely the evil of their old nature. You will find that those who are most like Christ have the deepest knowledge of their own depravity and are most humble while they confess their sinfulness. Those men who know not their own hearts may be able to boast, but that is simple ignorance, for if you will take down the biographies of any persons esteemed among us for holiness and for knowledge in the things of God, you will find them frequently crying out under a sense of inward carnality and sin.
If I may return to Scripture I cannot help quoting David, "Behold
I was born in sin and shapen in iniquity." It is a most villainous thing that some persons try to slander David's mother and to suppose that there was something irregular about his birth which made him speak as he has done! Whereas there cannot be the slightest imputation upon that admirable woman. David himself speaks of her with intense respect and says, "Save the son of Your handmaid" as though he felt it no discredit to be the son of such a woman.
She was, doubtless, one of the excellent of the earth and yet, excellent as she was, it could not but be otherwise that in sin her son was conceived. Let us not at all attempt to escape from the