Part 43
Christians–such a man has never kept up long–that balloon has come down–that bubble has, before long, gone to pieces. The profession of very extreme holiness has generally ended in the most dolorous iniquity and the professed exaltation of the heart on account of talent and success has generally led to degradation and shame! Hence the Lord, who would not have us exalted above measure, speaks roughly to us to keep us humble, as well as to keep us sober.
Why does He deal roughly with us? Is it not to give us another reason for coming to Him? Jacob's sons might nothave come down to Egypt again. They might have said, "We would rather starve than go to be bull-baited by the lord of the land." But when Simeon is in prison they must go down. They have a reason for going and a reason which overcomes them, let them strive against it as they may! And, child of God, when the Lord favors you with His smile and with the light of His Countenance, He takes care at the same time to give you a trouble that shall compel you to come to the Mercy Seat. Oh, but I think it is a blessed thing to go to the Throne of Grace on an errand! Many pray out of custom, perhaps that is well, but I believe there is no praying like the praying of a man who has got an errand–he who goes to God because he needs, must go because he has something to ask for–and these rough dealings of God keep us well stocked withmotives for being much on our knees, for much pleading with the Father of Mercies that He would deliver us out of affliction and out of temptation–and is not this kindness on our Father's part thus to deal roughly with us that He may compel us to the sweet duty of prayer?
Moreover, Brothers and Sisters, does it not strike you that the Lord's rough dealings with His children, when He intends to bless them, have the effect of making them see how utterly dependent they are for that blessing from Him? Why,Jacob's sons could now see that Joseph could lock them up for life, or take away their lives, or could send them back, if he pleased, with empty sacks to starve!
They were entirely in his hands. They had no more power to escape than the dove has from the talons of the hawk. So God would have us know that we are entirely and absolutely in His hands, as the clay in the hand of the potter. If He pleases to withhold His hand, all the world and all Heaven cannot help us! If the Lord did not help you, how shall I help you out of the barn floor, or out of the winepress? That well stopped, all the world is walled up–there are no other bottles that can water you. Child of God, you are as dependant today upon the bounty of Heaven as at your conversion!
A babe in Grace is not more dependent upon God than the mature and venerable Christian! Our life is in the hands of Christ. Our breath is in His nostrils. Let the foundations of our lives, either natural or spiritual, be taken away by a cessation of Divine Power and we crumble into spiritual and into physical death! We shall hold on our way, glory be to God, but not from any power that is in us, nor through our own innate strength! These shall melt away and droop and die under the exigencies of our spiritual pilgrimage. It is from the overflowing fountains of inexhaustible strength we must derive our supplies and so hold on to the end. Thus, treating us roughly makes us like bottles in the smoke–we become dry, shriveled up and empty–but still, it leads us to see how much the Lord can do for us. Being brought into need, it shows that all that is done, is done of His mercy and His sovereignty–not of our merit, nor through any concurrent help from us–but altogether, utterly and alone of Him!
Now, child of God, let me put this point to you very plainly.
Without saying anything further, are you in very deep trouble tonight? Do all God's waves and billows go over you? Does deep call unto deep at the noise of His waterspouts? Then expect that now some great blessing will come of it! That stone on the lapidary's wheel has been cut, and cut, and cut again. That other stone in the corner of the shop is but a common pebble and he never vexes it upon the wheel, for it is worthless. But the more precious the stone is in His esteem, the more diligently does He cut its facets. You are dear to God. Therefore is it that He tries you again and again, but good shall come of it and you shall blaze and sparkle, and glitter with Divine Grace which would have been otherwise unknown to you! Your tribulation shall work patience in you, and patience shall work experience, and experience hope, and hope shall make you not to be ashamed because the love of God is shed abroad in you. You are trading in a profitable market! There is no usury so heavy as the interest of affliction. The black ships of trouble come home laden with pearls of Grace. Therefore, be of good cheer. Take the rough usage from your Brother Joseph–you must and will prevai1! But I must change the tune. Our next observation upon the text is that while the Lord deals roughly with His servants–
II. HE USUALLY GIVES THEM AT THE SAME TIME
PROVISION BY THE WAY so that they may be enabled to bear
His roughness and to endure all the difficulties through which they are called to pass.
You observe Joseph had put Simeon in prison and had treated his other brothers very roughly, yet he gave them their sacks full of corn and put money into the mouths of their sacks. And then, as a third blessing, he gave them provisions for the way. Never does a child of God pass through trial without some special provision being made for him during his time of need.
But what provision is this? Why , dear Brothers and Sisters, there are different provisions according to differentneeds! Sometimes the child of God under trial has a wonderful sense of Divine Love.
"Oh, how He loves me," he says.There comes stroke after stroke– husband dies, child is buried, the property is wasted–yet the dear child says, "I cannot weep or repine, for I feel God loves me. I know not how it is, but I feel it so fresh and strong upon my soul and I have such a wonderful impression of that dear love of His, that it quite overcomes my sorrows and takes the edge off my grief." And, let me say, there is nothing that under trial can support a soul so well as the love of God shed abroad in the heart by the Holy Spirit, which is given unto us! To know that my Father sees it all and orders all in love–in special love to me–oh, this makes the back strong enough to bear a very world of trouble and yet not to be wearied!
At other times God's servants have been fed on a joyous view of the Covenant of Grace. I have known some who intheir trouble have come to understand the deep doctrines of the Word of God as they never understood them before and could then say with David, "Although my house is not so with God, yet has He made with me an Everlasting Covenant, ordered in all things and sure." And as they look to the provisions of that Covenant, to the sureness of the Covenant, to the blessings of the Covenant, to the everlasting nature of the Covenant, their souls have been so ravished and transported with joy that they could beat poverty, or pain, or whatever form of roughness their heavenly Joseph might choose to put upon them!
Others of the Lord's people have been sustained in their trouble by a delightful outlook to the end of their sorrowsand the better land on the other side of Jordan. Oh, there have been saints upon sick beds who have scarcely felt the torture of their pain or their disease, through the excess of bliss they have enjoyed in foretastes of the better land! Martyrs have been heard to call the fiery branches a bed of roses! And sometimes it has been almost questionable whether they suffered or not! The bodily pain must have been there, but the wonderful excitement of sacred joy in the thought that they were so soon to be with Christ and that their burning pile was but a chariot of fire to bear them to their Beloved has lifted them up above the tormenting sensation! They have been treated roughly, but they have had such provision by the way that they forgot the roughness as they rejoiced with unspeakable joy and full of glory! Well may the traveler trip over a rough road when his home is so near before him–the glittering spires of the new
Jerusalem, the everlasting rest, the sweet fields arrayed in living green, the rivers of delight–
Ohcould we stand where Moses stood,
And view the landscape o'er–
Not Jordan's stream nor death's cold flood
Should fright us from the shore."
Roughly treat us as You will, good Lord, if we have this money in our sack's mouth and this provision by the way, we will be well content!
The Lord sometimes sustains His people under His own roughness by the recollection of their past experiences. "MyGod, my soul is cast down within me; therefore will I remember You from Hermon and from the hill Mizar." The faithfulness of God in the past has been so vividly remembered that the child of God could not dare to doubt! The evidence of God's love was so strong, vehement and fresh in his soul that he cried, "Though He slays me, yet will I trust in Him; let Him do what He will to me, yet do I know that in very faithfulness He has afflicted me." He could hear these silver bells, thousands of them, all around, above, below, beneath–ringing out this tune–
"For His mercy shall endure,
Ever faithful, ever sure."
Oh, let the Hell drum be beaten as loudly as the devil can beat it and let affliction come from Heaven, earth and Hell all at once–as long as we know that God's mercy endures forever, our mouth shall be filled with laughter and we shall boast in the name of the Lord!
The saints of God have also had this provision by the way. In their sufferings they have enjoyed a sight of the greatersufferings of
Christ– should I complain of want or distress, Temptation or pain? He told me no less.
The heirs of salvation, I know from His Word, Through much tribulation must follow their Lord.
How bitter that cup, no heart can conceive, Which He drank quite up that sinners might live!
His way was much rougher and darker than mine– Did Christ my Lord suffer, and shall I repine?"
A sight of the steps of the Crucified One has often checked the tears which have been flowing, while the enraptured child of God would stand and sing in holy wonder–
"Christ leads me through no darker rooms
Than He went through before–
He that into this Kingdom comes
Must enter by this door."
Thus I might continue to show what kind of provision it is that the Lord gives by the way, but the time fails me. Inmay the Holy
Spirit comfort you with it! You shall never be sent on a journey without provender and you shall never have to go to battle at your own charges. If the Lord tries you, it shall never be above what you are able to bear, for He will, with the temptation, make a way of escape, that you may be able to bear it. He may treat you roughly, but He will fill your sack. He may speak sharp words, but He will put your money into your sack's mouth. He may take your Simeon and bind him before your eyes, but He will give you provision by the way till you get to the goodly land where you shall need no more provision and the Lamb shall be forever with you–and you with Him! The third lesson which we draw from this is that though sometimes the Lord treats His people roughly, more roughly than He does any other people, yet– III. HE GIVES THEM THE BEST OF THE BARGAIN IN THE LONG RUN.
These, his brothers, were the only ones Joseph spoke roughly to, but they were the only ones upon whose necks he afterwards fell and wept. They were the only ones that made the tears come into his eyes. They were the only ones of whom he said, "I will preserve you alive." They were the only ones for whom he sent the wagons to bring them down, saying, "Regard not your stuff, for the whole land of Egypt is yours." They were the only ones whom he brought in before Pharaoh and said, "Behold my father and my brothers."
They were highly favored and they dwelt in the land of Goshen and they had rest. Child of God, you will have the best of it soon! Even now you are the only ones that Christ deigns to call His Brothers and Sisters. You are the only people of whom it is written that you are a people dear to Him. You are the only people for whom Christ prayed, for He said, "I pray not for the world, but for those whom You have given Me out of the world, that they may be one." You are the people for whom all things work together for good. As many of you as have believed in the Lord Jesus and are resting upon Him for salvation, though your path may be rough and thorny, you are the only people who have God, Himself, to be your Captain, who have His fiery cloudy pillar to be your direction and who shall have the everlasting rest, the eternal portion! Be of good courage. Your riches in reversion are such that you can smile at poverty. Your rest which is yet to come is such that you may well despise the labor which makes you eat your bread in the sweat of your face. Your glory which is to come so excels that you may forget your poverty and your reproach. Your being with Christ will be so superlatively, Divinely blessed, that you may well, for awhile, bear to have a rough word or two from Him– "Forever with the Lord!
Amen, so let it be!"
When it shall be so, when you are forever with the Lord, if you could be ashamed, you would be ashamed and confounded to think that you ever murmured, or ever entertained a thought of complaint against the kind and gracious God who ordered all things for the best for you to promote your profit and His Glory! May that thought cheer you, you who are depressed and cast down–and may you go on your way rejoicing!
As for such as have never trusted Christ, it often makes my heart bleed when I talk of these things, to think that I cannot speak to them, that I cannot tell them that these comfortable things are theirs. Oh, unbeliever, you are an alien and a stranger to the privileges of heavenly citizenship! For you there is no blessedness, either now or hereafter! Why will you remain an unbeliever? Why will you continue to be careless and godless, Christless? I trust the Lord has designs of love to you. Leave your sins, for you must either leave them or be lost! Trust the Savior. Rely wholly upon His blood and righteousness, for there is no other righteousness that can ever help you. But if you cast your soul upon Him, it shall be well with you forever! God grant that we may all be found in the day of the appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ, as Brothers and Sisters who are in allegiance to Him. So may it be with you all. Amen.
Ge 42:21 • A New Leaf for the New Year
ERMON 2497
A New Leaf For The New Year
"And they said one to another, We are truly guilty concerning our brother."
Genesis 42:21
YOU know the story from which our text is taken, how Joseph's brothers, being envious of him, sold him for a slave, deceived his aged father concerning him and then endeavored to forget the deed.
They appear to have gone on with sad consciences for a number of years, but, by-and-by, there was a sore famine in all lands and from all countries people went into Egypt to buy corn. So old Jacob told his sons that they must go down into Egypt to buy from the stores there laid up for the time of famine. And they went, not knowing that Joseph was there in great power. He knew them and, at first treated them very roughly, charged them with being spies, and put them in prison for three days. Afterwards he said to them, "If you are true men, let one of your brothers be bound in the house of your prison: go you, carry corn for the famine of your houses: but bring your youngest brother to me; so shall your words be verified, and you shall not die." Then it was, but not till then, that they said, one to another, "We are truly guilty concerning our brother."
See, from this narrative, how, sometimes, trouble and sorrow bring men to repentance. Personal affliction or bereavement, or trial of one kind or another may be most useful to us by making us think about our own condition in the sight of God, and our actions toward Him as well as with regard to our fellow men. There may be someone in this congregation who has had sore troubles, wave upon wave, affliction upon affliction. It will be a source of eternal gratitude to you, my dear Friend, if your afflictions should make you think of your conduct towards Christ, so that you should be moved to say, "I have been truly guilty concerning my Savior, concerning Him who took upon Himself the form of a Man, that He might be my Brother and might redeem me from going down into the pit."
I shall limit my discourse to this one topic–in our treatment of Christ, we have all been guilty. And I shall try to press this Truth of God home with a demand, in God's name, for repentance on account of the way in which we have dealt with His Son, Jesus
Christ, our greater Joseph. I shall be happy if any have come here in trouble, if that trouble should work with my rebuke to stir up their hearts and move them to repentance before God. When a certain man lost his eyesight, that sight being gone deprived him of the power to join in many a merry party and to go on in his former sin. He then began to attend the House of God and there he found the Savior. And he was in the habit, afterwards, of saying that he was always blind while he could see, but after he had lost his sight, then it was that he truly began to see! Theremay be some here who are afflicted, perhaps not exactly as that man was, but in some other way. If so, I hope that they, too, will soon be able to say with the Psalmist, "Before I was afflicted I went astray: but now have I kept
Your Word." It will be a good beginning towards such a blessed consummation if they should now confess that they have been guilty concerning Christ.
I will try to handle my subject in this way. First, let us consider our treatment of Christ. Secondly, let us think of Christ's treatment of us. What then?
First, let us consider OUR TREATMENT OF CHRIST.
Let us begin by taking ourselves in the mass, without any division of character. How have we and the whole human race treated the Lord Jesus Christ? He came to this earth with love in His heart, with love in His eyes, with love in His hands, with love on His lips, He was altogether Love Incarnate and when He made His appearance, what was the reception He met with? You kings, have you not a palace for Him who is the King of Kings? Let the purples of Thyatira, let all the dainty damasks of the East be brought forth to wrap the Holy Child Jesus! No, alas, it is not so! There is no palace, nor even a private house that will receive Him as a guest, and even of the place where others might lodge it is written, "there was no room for Him because there is no room for Him in any betterplace! He grows up, but who are His associates? Is He surrounded by the wise? No, they cavil at Him! Do the righteous, or those who pretend to be so, become His disciples? No, these hypocrites are His worst enemies. He finds no associates who love
Him except a few poor and humble fishermen–and these have had to have new hearts before they could see any beauty in Him. "He is despised and rejected of men; a Man of Sorrows and acquainted with grief."
The world has plenty of music for its greatest murderers– Look, the conquering hero comes, Sound the trumpets, beat the drums," sings the world when it sees the warrior come home with his garments red with the gore of his fellow men! Let him ride through the street in pomp and splendor! Run to your windows, climb to your chimney tops and look down upon the gigantic murderer as he goes along the streets in triumph. But the world has no songs for the Savior, no pomp, no praise, no acclamations for Him! A few peasants and children once cry, "Hosanna! Blessed is He that comes in the name of the Lord!" But in a day or two that note is changed and, "Crucify Him! Crucify Him!" is the world's cry concerning the only Redeemer the world will ever see!
If He had been only treated thus–with derision and shame–it were enough, one would think, to provoke God to dash the world in pieces. But this, alas, was not all. We took the Prince of Glory–yes, we did it, for had we been therewe would have done the same as they did, and we really have done the same in spirit if not in act–we took the Prince of Glory, we scourged Him at the whipping post, we hounded Him through the streets, having no compassion upon Him. We took our sins and drove them like nails through His hands and feet. We lifted Him high up on the Cross of our transgressions and then we pierced His heart through with the spear of our unbelief! This is the treatment that we, Brothers and Sisters, have given to Jesus! Surely, we did well to sing, just now, if the words really came from our hearts as well as from our lips–
"Was it for crimes that I had done
He groaned upon the tree?
Amazing pity! Grace unknown!
And love beyond degree."
You cannot stand, even in imagination, by the Cross of Calvary, and see the writhing body of your Redeemer nailed to the accursed tree, without saying, as you wring your hands in a very agony of sorrow, "Yes, we are truly guilty concerning the Lover of our soul, Christ Jesus, the Friend that sticks closer than a brother."
But now we will divide the house and pick out the Christians, those who know and love the Savior. May I speak for you, dear
Friends? I am sure I can say for myself and, I suppose I can also say for you, that we Christians are truly guilty concerning Christ, our Brother. We do love Him. If He should ask each one of us, as He asked Simon Peter, "Do you love Me?" We could, every one of us say, even though it brought tears into our eyes, "Lord, You know all things; You know that I love You."–
"Do not I love You, O my Lord?
Behold my heart and see!
And turn each odious idol out
That dares to rival Thee."
Yet we are truly guilty concerning our Lord, first, because we have exhibited such little faith in Him. Beloved, wemust never put our unbelief of Christ among our little sins, for it is one of the greatest that we can possibly commit! When Mr. Marshall, who wrote a famous treatise on Sanctification, had been, for some years, in great distress of mind, he went to converse with that eminent
Divine, Dr. Thomas Goodwin. After he had mentioned a great many of his sins, Goodwin very pertinently observed, "But, friend
Marshall, you have left out the greatest sin of all." "And what is that, Doctor?" he enquired. "Why," said the Doctor, "you have left out the great sin of doubting the power of Christ to forgive you all your sins!" Surely, this is a sin of no mean sort, yet these doubts concerning our Savior are very common to us and I am sure He does not deserve them! Is there anything that vexes you more in a friend than for that friend to mistrust you? I must confess that although I can bear many things, this is one of the points upon which I feel very tender. And for me to live with a person who habitually mistrusted me would, I think, be like living in the midst of a Hell upon earth! Yet we treat our Lord Jesus thus! Some of us habitually mistrust Him and the best of us too frequently fall into doubts and fears.
I think I may also speak for you, my Brothers and Sisters, when I say that even concerning temporal affairs we aretruly guilty with regard to our Lord. We often get to fretting and worrying when, if we were but just to our Divine Friend, we would be in peace of mind, leaving all our cares with Him. When Cromwell sent Mr.
Bulstrode Whitelocke across to Sweden as his ambassador, he took ship and, the night coming on to be stormy, he sat up in great uneasiness of mind, fretting about the unsettled state of the nation, and thinking that he was living in the worst and most perilous times that men had ever known. But he had a godly valet, and his servant said to him, "Mr. Whitelocke, how did God govern the world before you were born? Did He manage it all right?" "Oh, yes," promptly answered Whitelocke, "He managed the world with wisdom." "And when you are dead, Sir," asked the valet, "will God be able to manage the world without you?" "Oh, certainly!" replied
Whitelocke, "He does not need me." "Well, then," said the sensible servant, "don't you think, Sir, that He is able to manage the affairs of the world with you just as well as He could without you, and would it not be better for you to go to bed and get some sleep? And then, if God spares your life, you may wake up in the morning and do your best, rather than sit here in this state of anxiety and fretfulness." There was great wisdom in what that man said and many of us need just the lesson that Mr. Whitelocke had to learn.
When I think of the way in which we have been running here and there, and forgetting the exceedingly great and precious promises of our everglorious Lord, I must again say that we are truly guilty concerning our Brother.
And, dear Friends, how guilty we have been in the matter of our love to Jesus! Another year is almost gone, let us review it. Have we loved Christ this year as we should have done? Our love, perhaps, can be measured as well by our conversation as by anything. Have we talked much about Jesus Christ? Have we said a good word concerning Him in all company into which we have been drawn? When Mr. John Locke was brought into the company of two noted philosophers–I believe Buccleuch and Halifax–they began talking a great deal of nonsense and Mr. Locke took out his pencil and pocketbook and commenced to write. One of them asked him what he was doing. "Well," he replied, "I have been for years desiring to be introduced into the company of such distinguished philosophers as you are, and now that I have that honor I should like to take down all that you say." This was a welldeserved rebuke and, of course, they then began to speak upon some other topic which might minister to their companion's edification.
Now, Beloved, have we, when we have been in company, always talked as Christians should talk? The philosopher should speak like a philosopher. Have we, as Christians, spoken like Christians?
When Hugh Latimer was being examined as to his faith, he said that he began to speak without any very great care, but presently he heard a pen scratching on some paper and then he knew that, behind the arras, the hangings of the room, there was sitting a man who was taking down all that he said. "Then," said Latimer, "I endeavored to speak with discretion." So, dear Friends, we know that there is a God who is preserving every word we have uttered.
If the record of the past year could be read out to us just now, would it show that we have talked much of Jesus? I fear that, in many cases, it would rather compel us to say that we have been truly guilty concerning our Brother.
We may measure our love to Him, too, by our service for Him and our sympathy with Him. What have we done for Jesus this year? What have some of you given to Him? Take stock of your gifts to the cause of Christ. I know that some of you have given even beyond your means and my Master will amply reward your liberality. But I know, also, that there are some who can talk loudly concerning the things of God, but who never seem to have had enough religion for it to have much effect upon their pockets! I will give but little for your love to Christ if you bring Him no offering as a token of your affection.
Then, have you faithfully served Christ in the matter of soulwinning? The greatest wish of Christ's heart is to win the souls of men. Has that been your highest wish? Has your soul ever longed and panted to be useful to your Lord? Haveyou ever really felt the weight of men's souls upon your heart and conscience? Did you ever fully comprehend these two words–perishing souls? Have you ever understood the meaningof that word, soul, and have you ever been awakened by it to a holy ardor which has expended itself, first, in agonizingprayer, and next in earnest, self-sacrificing effort that you might win the souls of your fellow creatures? In reviewing my own ministry in this place, with the vast opportunities which God has given me, I stand here to confess that I am truly guilty concerning my Brother. Oh, that I had wept more over you dying men! Oh, that I had pleaded with you more passionately! Oh, that I had more fervently persuaded you, as though God did beseech you by me, to be reconciled to God in Christ Jesus and to lay hold of eternal life! The past is gone beyond recall, but we must confess the sin of it and you, too, dear Friends, must surely make the same confession that I have done. Have you served Christ as you could have desired?Will you not join with me in the humiliating admission, "O Lord, we are truly guilty concerning our Brother"?
Now think, for a minute or two, of anything else in which you have had to do with Christ. Consider, fellow Christians, with regard to communion with your Lord. Have you been as much in fellowship with Christ as you could havewished to be? Have you been often enough under the apple tree in the midst of the woods?
Have you eaten all you could of His pleasant fruits? Have you been sitting as much as you might in His banqueting house, under the banner of His love? How stands the record as to your private prayer? Have you wrestled with the Angel of God as you could have wished to do? Have you brought back with you an abundance of treasure from God's great storehouse, of which He has given you the key? If not, confess that you are truly guilty concerning your Brother! And how about your outward life? Has that been according to the example of Christ? Have your common, everyday actions all been sanctified with the Word of God and prayer? Has your business been done as in the sight of God? Has there been, about the whole of your life, a clear ring, an unmistakable sound, so that you can say, "To me to live is Christ. I have set the Lord always before me. I honestly endeavor to magnify Him in all my acts"? I am afraid, Brothers and Sisters, that in this matter, also, we shall again have to confess that we are truly guilty concerning our Brother.
Now let us deal for a little while with another class of persons.
There are some here, I trust, who have lately been brought to know the Savior. Perhaps it was this morning, or some day last week, when you first saw the Lord. Beloved Friends, you who are beginners in the Divine Life, shall I go back with you in thought and help you to confess your guiltiness towards Christ? I will confess it on my own account. I remember well when I first found
Him and I remember, too, the grief I felt that I should ever have treated Him so ill. He loved me and yet I had despised Him. He was always looking upon me, yet I would not look to Him. He was the true Lover of my soul and yet His name had no music in it for me–and His Person had no beauty to my eyes. He was preached to me, yet I did not trust Him. Dear friends pleaded with me to give my heart to Him, yet I chose the world's pleasures and vanities, and would not seek after Him. He came to me, He knocked at the door of my heart, but I said to Him, "Get You gone." He knocked again, and yet again, and sometimes I thought of opening my heart to Him, but instead of doing so I barred the door against Him and said, "I will not have this Man to reign over me."
It was never my sin to curse Him to His face, but that may, perhaps, have been the sin of some of you. You may, possibly, have persecuted His people, despised His Sabbaths, spoken ill of His ministers, left His Word unread, and His Throne of Grace unvisited.
Yet all this while He had loved you with an everlasting love, He had bought you with His precious blood, He had determined to make you His Brothers and Sisters and to bring you to His own right hand in Glory, though you had no respect or regard for Him.
O dear Friends, as you review the past, I am sure you will need no pressing on my part to make each one of you say, "Ah, indeed, I am truly guilty concerning my Brother." Our unkindness to Christ is one of the things we ought to confess as soon as ever He brings us to His dear feet. He has forgiven it all! He never harbors even half of a hard thought concerning us–and this makes it all the more bitter for us to reflect that we should ever have treated such a Friend so badly. The fact that He has been so kind and generous to us, although so long neglected and despised by us, ought only to deepen the sense of our guilt concerning our Lord.
There are some belonging to another class, here, and they are truly guilty concerning Christ, yet it is of little use for me to talk to them, for Christ, Himself, is nothing to them. There are those even here, I am afraid, to whom the story of a dying Savior is only like an idle tale. Ah, Sinner, if you do not change your note in this life, you will sing another tune, by-and-by! I know you say that you do not owe Christ anything and that you will not give Him your heart.
Ah, Soul, unless Divine Grace shall renew you and give you another mind, your portion will be where the wicked lie–forever banished from all hope. "Well," said an anxious wife to the physician after he had seen her husband, "what do you think of him?" "Well, Madam," he answered, "he certainly is a little better today, but I must not deceive you. He will die, it is only a question of time." That will be true of us all, unless Christ comes again soon.
Sinner, you may never be as strong and healthy as you are today.
You may have said to yourself, "I shall not need to think of dying yet." But it is only a question of time and oh, how short that time may be! And then it will be said concerning you, "Yes, he is gone," and we shall ask, "But where is he gone?" And the answer will be, "He is gone where those must go who are guilty concerning Christ, but who will not confess their guilt, who will not believe in Him, who will not trust Him, but who choose to keep their sins and to rely on their own righteousness and prefer the pleasures of this world to all Christ's love and Grace. He despised the Savior's power to save and so, because he would not come to Christ that he might have eternal life, he is gone, not to his rest, but to share the portion of the ungodly in Hell forever and ever." The Lord have mercy upon you, dear Friends, if you are in danger of such a doom, and renew your hearts by His Holy Spirit, for His name's sake!
Thus have I, as it were, brought before you the Truth of the text as it may be applied to the Lord Jesus Christ–and left it to every man and woman's conscience to decide whether they ought not to join us in saying, "We are truly guilty concerning our Brother."
II. Now, in the second place, we will, with great brevity, consider
CHRIST'S TREATMENT OF US.
Oh, for an angel's tongue with which to tell this wondrous tale!
There is Christ looking down from Heaven and marking all our sin and ill behavior towards Him. He is not weak, for He is very God of very God! He is able to avenge the insults to His name, to cast us off for all our shameful treatment of Him and to make us smart forever under the Divine lash of infinite and inflexible Justice. But how has He treated us?
Ah, Sirs, He has not given us one ill word! Some of us have been for many years living in sin, yet has the Lord JesusChrist said one ill word to us, or against us? No, instead of that, Jesus has put in many a good word for us. The barrentree would have been cut down long ago as a cumberer of the ground, but Jesus pleaded, "Spare it yet another year." That gray-headed sinner would not have been here, now, but that Jesus, that very Jesus whom he despised, has stood between him and the destroying angel, and so he is still allowed to live. Oh, that the goodness of God might lead him to repentance! Our Lord has not pronounced one curse upon us! He has not said one harsh word to us, but, on the contrary, He has pleaded for us again and again.
Brothers and Sisters in Christ, you and I have vexed our Master much and grieved Him sorely, yet He has never broken any of His promises to us. Has He ever once failed us in our times of need?
Has He ever said, "Get you gone; you are an unprofitable servant and an unfaithful friend"? Oh, no! We have not had a frown from Him, nor a hard word–nothing but love! If He has sometimes chastened us, it has been in love to our souls, that He might unite us more closely to Himself. I am sure that you have no fault to find with your Lord. I marvel at His patience with me. I do not know anything that astonishes me more, next to His redemption of my soul by blood, than this–that He should bear with such a poor unworthy sinner as I am! It astonishes me that He should still go on sanding down such a knotty piece of timber as I am and that He should persevere in making such common clay as I am into a vessel meet for His own royal use! You see, Brothers and Sisters, He has begun with us, and He will not leave off until He has perfected us!
He has loved us from eternity and He will not cease to love us through the eternal ages of the future! There have been ten thousand times ten thousand reasons why He might have given us up and cast us away, like broken vessels, yet we know, Beloved, that He will never give us up, but that He will bring us safely Home to be forever with Him in His Glory!
You and I have had nothing but kindness at Christ's hands all these years. O you venerable sires, with your hoaryheads, who have known the Lord for forty, fifty, or even 60 years, speak if you know anything against Him! And you young men in your prime–and you who are serving your Savior in the burden and heat of the day– speak if you know anything against Him! And you matrons and maidens who love Him and seek His company in secret, if He has ever done you an ill turn, or turned His back on you, speak if you know anything against Him! You cannot, for His treatment has been all love and nothing but love! Jesus died and oh, where are the words that can fitly tell this story? Behold, what manner of love is this! "Greater love has no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends." Jesus rises again, but He rises with the same love in His heart! He ascends to Heaven, but He still pursues the same mighty work that He began while He was here! Up there He is pleading for us, and preparing a heavenly mansion for us, and never ceasing from doing us good with both His hands! Now, surely, when we think of this generous conduct of His towards such undeserving worms as we are, we may well put a deeper emphasis into our confession, "Yes, Lord, yes! We are truly guilty concerning our Brother!"
III. Time flies, or I would have dwelt at greater length upon our Lord's treatment of us. I have merely mentioned it to you in a hurried manner, and now we are to conclude with this question– WHAT THEN? Thinking first of our treatment of Christ and next of His treatment of us, what then?
As we are so near to another new year, one of the first things for us to do is this–let us who are Christians turn overa new leaf. If we have been guilty concerning our Brother, let us not go on adding sin to sin, but let us endeavor to amend our ways in the sight of God and not be so guilty concerning Christ as we have been. We ought to be humbled in the recollection of our past sin. There was a little boy whose father, to teach him a lesson, told him that every time he did a certain thing that was wrong, a nail should be driven into a post, but that, on every occasion when he did anything that was right and kind, one of those nails should be pulled out. Master
Benjamin became exceedingly careful when the post had got well studded with nails and, after a while, they were drawn out, one after another, and soon his father had the pleasure of extracting the last one. He expected to see the lad begin jumping for joy, but, instead of that, the boy stood weeping and his father said to him, "Well, Benny, my boy, you see that all the nails are pulled out now." "Yes, father," he sadly answered, " but the holes are left."
So now, suppose that next year we should, by the effectual working of the Spirit of God, be so sanctified in our walk and conversation that our besetting sins should be destroyed and that we should be delivered from these sins that we have been confessing, yet, still, the holes of the past evils would be left–and it is only our Lord Jesus Christ who can fill those holes. It is only His perfect righteousness that can take away every trace of sin and put it out of sight forever. Let those holes, while we look at them and repent over them, spur us forward for the future, but let us not drive the nails in again, let us not crucify the Lord afresh and put Him to an open shame. Beloved, let next year's record, through the Grace of the Holy Spirit, be of a higher and nobler kind than that of any year we have ever lived! Rise, you who have but skimmed the surface of the sea of life, and with eagle wings mount upwards towards the sun! Up there is the true atmosphere for a child of God to breathe! Rise, you who, like the owl and the bat, have dwelt in darkness, and ask of your Lord the eagle eye that can face the sun, for the Christian's dwelling place is in the light! You who have crouched down, like a strong mule between two burdens, rise and speed onward like a war-horse prepared to carry his master into the thick of the fight! "Awake, awake; put on your strength, O Zion; put on your beautiful garments, O Jerusalem! Shake yourself from the dust; arise, and sit down, O Jerusalem: loose yourself from the bands of your neck, O captive daughter of Zion!"
So Beloved, let next year see how God can glorify Himself in the hearts of feeble men and women. This, then, is the message for us
Christians–let us turn over a new leaf.
But what about those who are not believers in Jesus? We may say to them that they, also, have been guilty concerning Christ, so, even before the New Year comes, they, also, should turn over a new leaf, only, in their case, there is neededa new book altogether, for if they merely turn over a new leaf in the old book, it will be quite as blotted as the past leaves have been! O Lord, give them a new book and take away the old one! And then they will be able to turn over a new leaf, indeed! It is no use trying to get your old stony heart patched up and repaired–you must have a new one altogether! May the Lord give you a new heart and a right spirit with which to begin the New Year so soon to dawn!
Further, to those who have been guilty concerning Christ, but who have not repented and trusted Him, and who have not been led to tremble with regard to their condition before Him, let us tell them how terrible is their danger, and how great will be their ruin before long. This next year some of you will die. I am not speaking at haphazard of such avast congregation as this, for out of the six or seven thousand persons present it is absolutely certain that within 12months many will die! I suppose, not less than a hundred. By the natural laws which limit the duration of a generation, in this next year many of us must die. Well, then, if you are not converted. If you have no Savior, it follows as a matter of certainty that within the next year some of you will be in Hell. This is not a matter of question or of chance, but if you do not, by faith, look to the Lord
Jesus Christ and lay hold on Him, it is absolutely certain that, before another 12 months shall have gone, and another last
Sabbath-night in the year shall have come, you will be in Hell–with no possibility of escape, shut out forever from the mercy of God, shut in forever with the devil and his angels–and weeping bitter tears which cannot quench the eternal flames of God's just vengeance against sin.
May the Lord sanctify to you these solemn meditations and give you Grace to believe in His Son, Jesus Christ, that you may be saved! Amen.
Ge 42:22 • Do Not Sin Against the Child
ERMON 0840
Do Not Sin Against The Child
"Spoke I not unto you, saying, Do not sin against the child?"
Genesis 42:22
THUS Reuben reminded his brothers of his admonition concerning Joseph–thus would I address you with regard to your own children. I thought it meet, beloved Friends, as our friend, Mr.
Hammond, is coming among us to labor for the conversion of the young, that I should, as it were, this morning deliver the preface to his series of services. Perhaps by enlisting the consideration and the affectionate prayers of God's people for the young, I may be doing more to help my friend in his work than it would be possible for me to do by any other means.
Note the words of the text. "Spoke I not unto you, saying, Do not sin against the child?" The essence of sin lies in its being committed against God. When men are fully convinced that they have disobeyed the Lord, and that this is "the head and front of their offending," then they are brought to a true perception of the character of sin. Hence David's penitential Psalm has for its acutest cry, "Against You, You only, have I sinned, and done this evil in Your sight." Yet the sword of sin cuts both ways–it not only contends against God but against His creatures, too. It is a double evil. Like a bursting shell, it scatters evil on every side. Every relationship which we sustain involves duty, and consequently may be perverted into an occasion for sin.
We are no sooner in this world than, as children, we sin against our parents. As members of a family we sin against brothers and sisters, and against playmates and acquaintances. We launch into the outside world, and around our ship sins dash like raging billows. As our various relations are multiplied, our sins also increase. We sin against a husband or against a wife, against a servant or against a master, against a buyer or a seller. On all sides the roots of our soul suck up sin from the earth in which they spread. We sin in public and sin in private. We sin against our poverty and against our wealth. Our evil nature, like the deadly upas tree, distils its venom–the poison of sin drops on all who come under our shadow. As the sea surrounds all shores, so sin beats with deadly waves upon all connected with our life. Our sin assails both Heaven and earth, time and eternity, great and small, old men and children.
The text calls us to consider one particular form of sin, namely, sinning against a child, and it is of that I intend to speak this morning, looking up to the great Father of spirits that He would teach me to speak aright. First, what is this which has been spoken to us? "Do not sin against the child." Secondly, who said it? And, thirdly, what then?
First–and this will occupy most of our time this morning–WHAT
IS THIS WHICH HAS BEEN SAID TO US? "Do not sin against the child." This warning may be suitable for every one of us without exception. Those who are not parents and who are not teachers of the young, are, nevertheless, bound to remember that they are in a commonwealth of which young people make up a very considerable part. Little eyes are so quick to observe the actions of those who are grown up–adults should be careful what they do.
Every man, by his own conduct, is, more or less, educating the rising generation of the nation. If a man acts amiss. If his speech is foul. If his conversation is polluted, he helps to educate children in the school of Belial. If, on the other hand, his ways are right, and, by the Grace of God he is made to act morally and to speak truthfully, he is doing something, unconsciously it may be, but still he is doing something to train up one for virtue and holiness. The exhalations of our moral conduct sweetens or defiles the general atmosphere of society, and in this, children, as well as others, are partakers.
I would say to every man who is giving full swing to his passions, if nothing else will check you, at any rate pause awhile when yonder fair-haired girls and lisping children are gazing upon you. If you care not for angels, stop for the sake of yon blue-eyed boy. Let not the leprosy of your sin pollute your offspring more than must be. Were you about to utter a lascivious sentence? Withhold it, I pray you, for it is not right that little ears should so soon be desecrated by that which has become common enough to you, but will as yet be shocking to them.
Were you about to blaspheme? Is it not enough to curse your Maker? Why need you bring a second curse upon that harmless little one? Why teach those lips that will be all too ready to learn to speak the hideous word? Man, if any feeling is left in you, respect the purity of childhood and let the presence of youth, if it is not a motive for sanctity, at any rate be a reason for restraint in open sin.
Do not sin cruelly and wantonly against the child.
But I would not merely put it in a light which may suit the vilest.
You, dear Friend, whoever you may be, owe a service to your neighbor. You are to love him as yourself–and that word, "neighbor," includes all mankind! The bond of the command is not limited to those who are over 21 and have assumed the responsibilities of manhood. When God wrote this Law He meant it to take in the whole sweep of our race. The religion of Christ is a religion of love to mankind as such–it bids us regard the babe upon its mother's knee as well as the gray-beard leaning upon his staff– to all it speaks of love.
You are bound, therefore, by the universal Law, to have a love towards children. And, as in the first place you are to refrain from doing or saying anything which would injure their morals for this life, so are you bound, as much as lies in you, to do all you can to train them by your own example for excellence and happiness in the path of right. I put forth God's claim and man's claim, this morning, to all of you–a claim from which you cannot escape by any pretense whatever. A claim which cannot be forgotten without sin.
We are all under obligations, both to old and young, to rich and poor, and especially I urge the claims of those who as yet cannot speak for themselves. To each and every child you are under an obligation as a member of the great human family–as a citizen in one great kingdom–to do nothing which may injure, and everything which may promote his future welfare. I summon before you all the host who gather at their mothers' knees, and beseech you by the heart of humanity not to drag these little ones down to Hell!
To the parent the text speaks with a still small voice, to which I trust none of us will be deaf. "Do not sin against the child"–against your own dear child! Yet how many parents do so! If as I now speak, unconverted parents will be compelled to acknowledge the truthfulness of the accusations I shall lay against them, I hope they will be led to deep and true repentance. There are many parents who neglect, altogether, the religious education of their children.
Were their children born without souls, they could not be more indifferent to their welfare than they now are! If it were revealed to them that their little ones, when they slept in their coffins, would be as the offspring of dogs and horses which have no hereafter, they could not treat them in a more thoughtless fashion than they now do!
Why, are there not many of you who, when you have sent your children to Sunday school, think you have done all that is to be done for them? And even if this little is neglected, you are content.
You never prayed for your babes–how can you? You do not know, yet, what it is to pray for yourselves in sincerity and truth! You never pointed your Samuels and Hannahs to the "Lamb of God that takes away the sin of the world." How could you? Your own sin lies upon you unforgiven!
You have never instructed the dear little ones in the danger of rebellion against God and in the necessity of being reconciled to Him through faith in the precious blood of Christ–how can we expect you to do this while you, yourselves, remain aliens and strangers to the blessed God and have not submitted yourselves to the Gospel of Jesus Christ? I remember a woman who was converted at an advanced age, who had been left years before, a widow with many children. She was a most exemplary, moral, and industrious woman and earned her living by most laborious work.
Yet she managed to bring up all her family, and settle them in a suitable manner.
But after her conversion I think I never saw more bitter tears than those which she shed when she said, "I took care to feed them and clothe their bodies, but I never thought of their souls! Alas for me, I knew no better! But alas for them I left the chief thing undone! The other day I spoke to my eldest son about the things of God and he told me religion was all a farce. He did not listen to a word I said.
And well," she said, "might he be an infidel when his mother never said a word by which he could have been led to the Savior."
Words were spoken by way of comfort to her, but like Rachel, she refused to be comforted because, she said, and said truly, her great opportunity had been thrown away. The best time of effort for a mother had been allowed to pass away unused. Her harvest was passed and her summer was ended–and her children were not saved! Some of you who are now godless, I trust may be brought to the same repentance. But I would have you saved so bitter regret by being led now to give your hearts to Christ while yet your children are about you.
In speaking to parents I put the charge in the mildest terms and have said that some have done nothing to train their families for the Savior, but graver accusations may be brought. Are there not some here who have done much the other way, much to quench the motions of the Spirit in the juvenile mind? Much to harden the children's hearts and to lull their consciences to sleep? It is a disgraceful fact that many fathers educate their children for the service of Satan. They are the devil's lackeys, introducing their sons into the courts of the Evil One.
When parents take their children to the theater, what can they expect to be the result? When they send them to the beer shop, or let them see their drunkenness, what surer school of vice can they send them to? Parents who teach their children to sing the silly, frivolous and perhaps licentious songs, are sacrificing them to Moloch! Shame is it when from a father's lips the boy hears the first oath and learns the alphabet of blasphemy! There are crowds of parents upon whose head the blood of their children will certainly descend because they have launched them on the sea of life with the rudder set towards the rocks–with a false chart, a deceitful compass–and every other appliance for securing eternal shipwreck.
Doubtless there are some here, unconverted men and women, whose example has already come home to them in the ungrateful conduct of their sons. They have seen their children grow up to be estranged from them. And if they are, therefore, blaming the Providence of God, let them pause awhile and ask themselves whether they ought not rather to blame themselves–are they not reaping according to their sowing? What are our children, for the most part, but what we make them by our training? And if they have grown up like ourselves–and our faults are mirrored in their characters–let us repent in dust and ashes before God!
Never think it a hard law that our sins against our children should recoil upon ourselves. Fathers and mothers who sin against your children, I fear you will be lost, yourselves. But before that doom overtakes you, I pray you remember that you will not perish alone in your iniquity–your household will suffer with you! If you have no care about your own souls, yet think, I pray you, of the little ones entrusted to you. You have some in Heaven whom Sovereign
Mercy has caught away from the cradle and the breast that they may sing the praises of God forever. I cannot bear to think that you should drag the others down to the pit of Hell! For your own sake.
For their sake, pause awhile–murder not yourown flesh and blood!
Repent of your own personal sins and seek mercy at the hands of Jesus that you may from now on never more sin against the child!
If these things come home forcibly to you who are unsaved, much more to Christian parents! Do Christian parents ever sin against their children? We answer, Christian parents are not perfect! They are yet in the body, and have yet to mourn over sins and shortcomings. And so, not condemning you who fear God–for who shall condemn whom Christ has justified?–yet let me, for the awakening of your consciences and to drive you again to the blood of Jesus for pardon, remind you that we, alas, too often do sin against our children! We are under a double responsibility, not only because they are our children, but because God has given us salvation. We are bound, having the light, to give that light to all around us, and bound by other ties to give the light, first, to those who have sprung from our loins.
If we deny our most loving efforts to our own households, we must surely be inhuman! Not only may we not talk of Divine
Grace, we can scarcely boast of fulfilling the promptings of Nature itself, if we have no compassion for our children's souls. Yet what do you think–may not our inconsistencies be the reason why our children are not converted? Is the boy compelled to say, "My father hardly believes what he says, or else he would not act as he does"?
Do you not think that in many families where the parents are worldly and conformed to the world, it would be a great wonder if the sons and daughters were not ungodly?
Are there not many Christians so busy about making money that they have no time to speak about soul concerns to their children?
And if those children were to die, do you think those parents could excuse themselves? If their children died without hope, how would their parents quiet their consciences? Do we, as a rule, pray for our own children as we ought? Do we wrestle with God for them night and day? Do we ever spend an hour, say, in pleading with the Most
High that they might live in His sight? And if we have prayed, do we use such efforts for our children as dying beds will make us wish that we had used? Have we spoken personally to them about their salvation? Having done it once, have we repeated it? If we fear that we have not touched the right chord of the heart, have we made up our minds to persevere in affectionate admonitions and earnest entreaties until every one of them shall be saved?
I know that some of you have done so. I rejoice in some fathers and mothers in this congregation, that they do lay themselves out for the conversion of their children. And of these I may also add that, for the most part, they have seen the desire of their hearts. But where there has been no desire, and no prayer, and no effort–if the children die unsaved, what balm can heal the mother's wounds? O you have been baptized into Christ and profess to have put on Christ! O you who claim to love your Lord and Master, what shall we say to you if your sons shall be unchastened like those of Eli, and shall die in their sins? If your sons turn out to be Nadabs and Abihas and not Samuels, how can we console you if you have not wept over them?
If they rebel like Absalom, who can wonder if their father never poured out his heart before the Lord on their account? Do you expect to reap without sowing, or to gather where you have not planted? Parental care can, alone, preserve household piety, and if that is gone, the pillars of the nation are removed. It is an ill day for any Church when family piety is on the decline. Household religion has been the great defense of England against Popery. Do not tell me of your State-paid clergy and their lofty prelates–give me family prayer and the Pope may curse away as long as he likes!
Give us the open Catechism, and the children made to understand it! Give us the Bible read from day to day, and godly parents inculcating Gospel Truths upon their little ones' minds–and we may laugh to scorn all the powers of Pope or Satan!
But once let the family altar be forsaken and let parents forget the natural duty of ordering their households before the Lord, and you may guard the Church as you will, your labor will be in vain! You have cast down her hedges–the bear out of the woods shall waste her! You have taken away the tower of the flock, and when the wolf comes he will find the sheep an easy prey! Christian parents, though I cannot address you this morning as I would, yet with all my heart would I say to you–do not sin against the child by your ill example or by your negligence as to his salvation–but seek of the Holy Spirit that to your own offspring you may fully discharge the solemn duties which Providence and Grace have thrown upon you.
The text has a word next to teachers, teachers especially of our Sunday schools, though I hold that teachers of weekday schools ought not to consider themselves exempted from seeking the good of the souls entrusted to them. Teachers of Sunday schools, you have voluntarily assumed a position, the responsibility of which is not to be laid aside so long as you continue in the office. I beseech you, do not sin against the child! He comes to you, this afternoon, to learn something weighty and of eternal consequence–do not be dull and uninteresting. Do not talk to him of unimportant matters.
Do not be cold and sleepy over your work, but tell him of Jesus lovingly, simply, earnestly. Do not lead him to feel that you have, yourself, no faith in what you teach. Be so earnest that he may see conviction gleaming from your eyes and may soon, in return, feel it flashing into his heart!
Remember, other teachers have been prayerful over their children. They have brought their boys and girls to Jesus, and have won a blessing from the Master–will not you be prayerful, too? If not, it were better for those children that you had never been born, and that some better teacher had been set over them! Do not sin against the child, therefore, by cumbering the ground and occupying a place which might have been far more profitably filled by a more earnest spirit. In the weekday do not sin against the child by conduct inconsistent with your profession. Do not sin against the child by neglecting him during the six days if you have opportunities for visitation. Seek his good at all times, follow him with your prayers and tears if you cannot with your personal visits and loving words.
As God gives you opportunity, let importunate entreaties and fervent prayers go together–entreaties to him and prayers to God– and who knows, God may give you his soul as a seal to your faithful ministry! Teacher, do not sin against the child by failure in anything to which conscience calls you. I am afraid, in looking back upon our own Sunday school experience, some of us will have to acknowledge that we did sin against the children a great deal–that we made our class rather a school for teaching, reading, and repeating texts and singing hymns than an occasion for aiming at heart-renewal and immediate salvation.
By the way, let me say while I am speaking to teachers, the word is equally applicable to some of you who are not teachers, but ought to be. In many of our Churches the work of teaching the young is left to the very youngest–and advanced Christians usually decline the service. Is this as it should be? I take it that for this