Charity and Its Fruits
be offered or given to God, can make up for the absence of love in the heart to him. For without this, nothing is truly given, and the seeming gift is but mockery of the Most High. This further appears,
3. From the fact, that this love or charity is the sum of all that God requires of us. And it is absurd to suppose that anything can make up for the want of that which is the sum of all that God requires. Charity or love is something that has its seat in the heart, and in which, as we have seen, consists all that is saving and distinguishing in Christian character. This love it is of which our Savior speaks as the sum of all required in the two tables of the law, and which the apostle declares is the fulfilling of the law. How can we make up for the defect, when, by withholding it, we do in effect withhold the sum-total of all that God requires of us? It would be absurd to suppose that we can make up for one thing that is required by offering another that is required — that we can make up for one debt by paying another. But it is still more absurd to suppose that we can make up for the whole debt without paying anything, but by continuing still to withhold all that is required. As to external things without the heart, God speaks of them as not being the things that he has required (Isa. 1:12), and demands that the heart be given to him, if we would have the external offering accepted.
4. If we make a great show of respect and love to God, in the outward actions, while there is no sincerity in the heart, it is but hypocrisy and practical lying unto the Holy One. — To pretend to such respect and love, when it is not felt in the heart, is to act as if we thought we could deceive God. It is to do as Israel did in the desert, after they had been delivered from Egypt, when they are said to have "lied unto God with their mouth, and to have flattered him with their tongues" (Psa. 78:36). But surely it is as absurd to suppose that we can make up for the want of sincere respect by flattery and guile, as to suppose we can make up for the want of truth by falsehood and lying.
5. Whatever may be done or suffered, if there be no sincerity in the heart, it is all but an offering to some idol. — As observed before,