C. H. SPURGEON,

at the metropolitan tabernacle, newington.

“If a son shall ask bread of any of you that is a father, will he give him a stone? or if he ask a fish, will he for a fish give him a serpent? or if he shall ask an egg, will he offer him a scorpion? If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children: how much more shall your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him?”-Luke 11:11-13.

In this chapter there is an evident progress. It opens by the disciples asking the Lord to teach them to pray. To that he gave a full and sufficient reply; he prepared them an outline of what complete prayer should be. Brethren, we have need, some of us, to begin with asking to be taught to pray. It will be a blessed sign when it can be said of us, “Behold, he prayeth;” and just in proportion as we are instructed how to pray shall we give evidence of more advanced Christian life. He has most grown in grace who prays best. Depend upon it, the most acceptable prayer with God is the evidence of a most accepted state of heart within. Our growth in prayer may be to us the test of our growth in all other respects. “Lord, teach us to pray,” is a prayer for the young beginner, and for the more advanced disciple; it is a suitable petition for us all, for we have none of us yet learned to the full the sacred art of supplication.

Then the chapter proceeds a little further to answer a question: we are shown how to pray, but will God really answer us? Is prayer only meant to do good to the suppliant? Does it end with the benefit which it works in us, or does it really affect the heart of God? Do replies actually come from heaven in answer to the entreaties of God’s children? The answer is given by our Lord with great clearness. We have a parable to show that as importunity does evidently affect men, so importunity will also gain an answer from God, that he will be pleased to give us what we need if we do but know how, with incessant earnestness, to come again and again to him in prayer. We are assured that asking is attended with receiving, that seeking is attended with, finding, that knocking will lead to opening, that it is not a vain thing to pray, that our prayers are not lost on the wind, or expended merely on ourselves, but that there is a connection established by divine decree between the prayer that is raised on earth and the mercy that is given forth from heaven.

But since we are such sinful creatures, the chapter proceeds to deal with a grave doubt which may arise in the troubled mind. “It may be God will hear, and as a general rule will make replies in mercy; but I am an undeserving one; if the Lord should be incensed at my prayers and answer me in wrath instead of love, I should deserve it; if after having made my confession, he should deal with me judging me out of my own mouth, and there and then condemn me, what should I say?” The Saviour very explicitly answers the question as to whether God will give answers of peace, and will always grant us good things; and he puts it thus to us: when your children ask for good things you grant their requests; you do not mock them by giving them something that may look like what they asked for, but is only a deception; you never play upon their ignorance and mock their childish confidence by giving them the injurious semblance of what would have been a useful reality. When their prayers are right you answer them. If you then, being evil, fallen creatures, yet answer your children’s right and proper prayers, how much more will your heavenly Father answer your fitting prayers, and give to you good things? he will not put you off with evil things when you ask for good, but he will grant you in truth the good gifts which you are seeking after.

You will observe that the fear lest God should give us something evil when we are seeking something good, is very naturally raised in the heart by a sense of sinfulness, and is increased by the conviction that we should not always be able to judge whether the thing received be good or no good. We tremble lest we should receive from the divine hands what appears to be gracious, and yet may be sent in judgment. But he says, “No, your children trust in their father, and their father never deceives them: you may safely trust your heavenly Father that when you ask a good thing from him, he will most assuredly give you a good thing, and not an evil thing in lieu of it.” You are true and kind to your children, much more shall God be good towards you. In saying “How much more?” he asks an unanswerable question. As high as God is above us, so high is the certainty that he will give us good above the certainty that we will give good things to our children. Yet since we feel in our hearts quite certain that we could not mock our children, let us be quite convinced that it is still further beyond all question that God will never mock us and give to us an evil thing when we are seeking a good thing at his hands. By the way, it has been remarked that the expression of our Saviour here is, “ye being evil;” that expression evidently teaching the doctrine of our fallen condition, the doctrine of human depravity. Ye, my disciples, ye are evil. Ye who have children, whether ye be upright or otherwise in others’ estimation, ye are all evil, and yet, being evil, you still have such affection and judgment that you give your children good gifts; much more shall he who is infinitely good give good things to you when you seek them.

I have met with many expositions of this passage, in which there is an attempt made to show that the child asked a wrong thing, and wished for a stone which appeared to be bread. Nothing of the kind is here. The child is not represented as asking for a stone, but as seeking as he should a most proper gift, namely, bread. No mistake was made at all by the child, his prayer was what it should be, and the point of the parable touches the father’s answer. The truth here taught is not that God will refuse us evil things if in our mistake we ask for them; that is a truth, but it is not alluded to here; the one statement of this verse is, that prayers for good things will be answered, and that they will not be answered with gifts wearing the mere appearance of good, but with the actual good things desired. That simple thought I shall endeavour to enlarge upon in this morning’s discourse.

Our first head will be-right prayers, right answers; the second point will be the best prayer, the surest answer; and the last head will be this, the prayer of the text is the best, for it contains all blessings in it.

First, then, right prayers, right answers. The child asks bread, his father does not give him a stone; he asks a fish-there are certain kinds of fish that are very like snakes-but the father does not give him a serpent; the child asks an egg-we are told by some that certain scorpions when they fold themselves up look like eggs-the father never makes a fool of the child, or injures him by giving him a scorpion for an egg. If we may be allowed to put some interpretation upon this, I should say, if we begin our prayers by asking God for necessaries, that is bread, bread temporal, or the bread of life, he will not give us useless, tooth-breaking, unsatisfying stones. We shall have when we pray for needful things, the really needful things themselves, not the imitation of them, but the actual blessings. And if our faith grows a little stronger, and having obtained bread we ask for fish, not absolutely a necessary, but a comfort and a relish; if we make bold to ask for spiritual comforts, consoling gifts and ennobling graces, something over and above what is absolutely needful to save us, our heavenly Father will not mock us by giving us superficial comforts which might be injurious as a serpent; he will give us so much of comfort as we can bear; and it shall be pure, holy, healthy comfort. And if, gathering more confidence still, we ask for an egg, which I take it was in Christ’s day a rarer luxury, we shall not be deluded by its counterfeit. Only once, except in this place, and that in the book of Job, and Job was a rich man, do we ever read of eating eggs at all in Scripture; and all through the Bible we find not even the mention of poultry till our Saviour’s day; and then chickens were so valuable that eggs were considered a high luxury, for which a child at least might not be expected to make request. But if the child be bold enough at last to ask for this larger favour, his father will not punish his impertinence by putting into his hand a deadly scorpion; even thus if I can summon faith enough to ask for the highest enjoyments and enrichments of grace, the highest blessings of Christian manhood, the most rapt and intense fellowship with Christ, I shall not receive instead of that an intoxicating excitement, a delirious fanaticism, or some other deadly or injurious thing.

Now, this at first sight may not seem to be a very useful truth, but I think I can show you that it is. To begin with the common blessings of providence; you have been laying your case before the throne with much earnestness of late, and you have prayed God to guide and lead you in all the steps of life. At this moment you are overwhelmed with trouble, distress has followed distress. Now, do not judge of God harshly, above all do not judge of him so harshly as to think him less kind and tender than you would be yourself. Your child asking bread receives bread; you have asked guidance and shall have it; you have asked providential care and you have obtained it. These present circumstances, which God has appointed you, are what you have asked for; your present lot is from the Lord. He has not given you a stone. It seems hard perhaps; may it not be the crust of true bread for all that? believe it to be so, but never suspect that you are treated ungenerously by your Lord. Were you as able to judge as he is, you would perceive that he has given you that which is for your lasting good, and has appointed the best thing possible for you. Do not look upon your present distress as a stone, a serpent, or a scorpion; if so you will be afraid of your mercies and tremble at your consolations. Providential love you have sought and providential love is yours beyond all question, even though trials surround you; for by all these things men live, and in all these is the life of our spirit. God will bring good out of the apparent evil; indeed, if faith will but open her eye it is not apparent evil, but it is even now evidently good. Blind unbelief misrepresents the work of God, faith’s clearer eye discerns the truth. Do not suspect your God of giving you the scorpion instead of the egg. You have asked that here on earth providence may deal wisely with you, and that God may be glorified by you; infinite wisdom is even now fulfilling your hallowed wish; amid fiery trials your faith is honouring God, and every circumstance of your affliction is made subservient to your soul’s perfection.

In spiritual matters how often in our earnest anxiety to be right have we questioned whether the spiritual gifts which we have received are what we hope they are, or whether after having sought of God grace we may not after all have missed it. For instance, many of us, I hope most of us, are possessors this day of faith in the Lord Jesus Christ; we look to his cross and we are lightened; we see him as our suffering substitute, and our soul feels joy and peace as the result of faith; our faith doth lay her hand upon his head as the scape-goat, and we see sin carried away by him into the wilderness of forgetfulness; but the question will come and sometimes very bitterly, “Is this true faith? Is this the faith of God’s elect? Is it not after all presumption for me to say and believe that in Jesus Christ I am pardoned and saved? There is, evidently, a notional faith, may not mine be that? There is, it seems, a faith of devils, for they ‘believe and tremble,’ may not mine be of that sort? Is this which I have sought of God in prayer, and which I accepted as my answer, the real grace of faith, or am I after all deluding myself?” Look, my brother, where did you seek this faith? Did you not ask your heavenly Father to give it you? Have you not devoutly sought, and do you not still seek to-day, even with tears that he would work in you the faith which is of his own Spirit’s creation? Now do you think that he would have given you a stone instead of bread, that he would have put into your heart a carnal presumption, or have suffered it to come there while you were waiting for the humble simple faith of God’s own people? My Lord, I sought it at thy feet, and there I found it, and it cannot be otherwise than a good and real faith which I found when I looked up to thee. Be assured, O anxious heart, that in the vital matter of faith true seekers shall not be put off with false faith.

The same question may arise as to every spiritual grace. We will take repentance. I am not for a moment about to depreciate the value of a discriminating theology, which clearly shows the difference between legal bondage, and the evangelical repentance of a child of God, but I suppose few of us can sit under sermons of that order, especially if the preachers make a great many nice distinctions, without feeling, “I am afraid I come short on several points; I fear that my repentance does not come up to the mark, and I hardly know whether I can quite say that I have so renounced sin, so abhorred it, so detested it, so loathed it from the very bottom of my soul, as this good man describes.” Well, then, it will be a sweet thing to fall back upon this: I seek repentance of the Holy Ghost through Jesus Christ. I come to my Father and I say, “Create in me a new heart, O God. If my heart be not broken and contrite, break it, and heal it if it be.” I earnestly desire that the Lord would give me a tender spirit. My longing is towards the repentance which is of his own working. I lay myself down like a field, and ask him to plough me. I put myself before him as the patient places his limb under the surgeon’s knife, and I beseech him to deal with me in the most cutting and severe manner, so that he may but rid me of the disease of sin. Now, if you sincerely act thus, I am sure you will not be deceived in your repentance; you shall receive the repentance that needeth not to be repented of. You would not give your child the serpent instead of the fish, neither will God suffer you to be deluded with a suppositious repentance instead of the gospel repentance which is the peculiar water-mark of his own chosen.

Now, as I have said, all our graces may be subjected to the same questioning, and our confidence in them may be re-established by the same method. If you have sought them of the Lord, and have waited upon him in prayer anxiously desiring to have such as he gives, and only such as he gives, you shall not be deceived or disappointed. He of whom you seek these boons is truth itself, and gives no mockeries to his sons. If you went to pretended mediators and priests, you would be deceived, but never by the one Mediator, Jesus Christ. If you dream that the spiritual boon is to pass through mortal hands, there be priests nowadays like the priests of Egypt, Jannes and Jambres, who during the passage of the fish through their hands would have transformed it into a serpent, and craftily exchanged the egg for a scorpion by a little manipulation. If, then, I have got my religion at second hand I may have been deceived, but if I have gone to God himself, my Father, in earnest and importunate prayer, and have desired to receive these blessings direct from his Son and his Spirit, no mistake can have occurred, I must have received the good thing which I sought.

We will take one more instance, and that shall comprehend the whole. My dear brethren, in looking back upon all our experience, the doubt will occur to us whether after all it may not have been a fallacy and a delusion. I thought that I was brought out of darkness into God’s marvellous light; I thought that I rejoiced in the Lord; I have thought that my prayers had been answered; I have believed that I had been led from grace to grace by his Spirit; I have thought, and if not awfully deceived it is true, that I have had fellowship with the Father and with his Son; I have had but few ecstacies, but I have had much peace; I have had both the mournful and the cheerful experiences of God’s people-I think I have; but in dark times we say, “Is it so? Am I after all a true child of God? May I not after all have persuaded myself that I was converted during a revival or under a certain earnest minister? May I not since then have propped up that deceptive supposition by the respect and esteem of Christian people, and may I not up till now have been a deceiver, or self-deceived? May not the whole thing turn out to be one awful sham?” In such a case we come back to this: where did I seek this, and what did I seek? Did I go to God and desire to be a mere professor? Was it my wish to gain a worldly position or to win the respect of my friends by professing to be a Christian, or did I go sincerely to the Lord, and for love of salvation desire to be converted? Did I desire the Saviour that I might be reconciled to God, that I might be made holy? And since then have I still desired truly and earnestly to possess the grace which God gives, and not the mere imitations of man? Do I pant to have God’s own Spirit in my soul, and is that my sincere and earnest prayer now? Well, then, I have no right to suspect that I am deceived. Like a child, I believe that my heavenly Father has given me what I asked for; I have done right in so believing. My child would do me a gross injustice if he suspected that the fish I gave him was not a fish, but a serpent; and I do my God a great injustice if, sincerely knowing that I have sought the one thing needful at his hands through Jesus Christ, I suspected that he has permitted me to be deluded with something else. No, if I sought it from him, and sought it sincerely, I have now the good thing which I longed for.

Now, this simple truth, may yet be very, very helpful to you, for nowadays men assail our faith. Some of us have waited upon the Lord for teaching, and we have been established in the old faith which men now sneer and rail at as a worn-out creed. We have been taught as we believe, by the Spirit of God, and by God’s word; and now because this advanced age and this enlightened century have discovered that these old-fashioned truths are unphilosophical, are we to believe that when we went to God for teaching we did not receive bread, but a stone? I do not believe it, nor will I give up the bread I have long lived on because these men choose to call it a stone. I will hold it still, it is my food, and on it I shall live for ever. If a man has sought of God to be filled with zeal till he becomes like a burning seraph, some will tell him this is all wildfire, the man is excited beyond bounds, he ought to be more cool. My dear brother, if you have sought from God the zeal of his house that eats you up, do not believe that the spirit that God has given you is wildfire, that your ardour for the conversion of sinners is fanaticism. Hold on to it and get more of it, and do not let the devil delude you out of the treasure you have gained. The fish is a fish, not a serpent, and the egg is an egg, and not a scorpion. And so, too, when the believer has stood fast in the faith and would not leave it, then he has been told, “It is only your natural obstinacy. You are pig-headed; you have got hold of a thing and there is no making you give it up.” Many a man of God has been ridiculed for his determination:” it is not that he has any real martyr’s spirit in him, it is only his animal obstinacy.” Ah, my friend, but you know where you got this firmness, and if you wait upon the Lord, and say, “Establish me in thy fear, my God; help me to bear contradiction of sinners against myself, as my Redeemer did,” then God will not give you any evil thing. Having done all still stand, endure to the end, and you shall gain the crown of life that fadeth not away.

That is our first point-prayer for good things meets a good answer.

Then, dear friends, the question will arise in every heart: “It seems then that I have only to ascertain that my prayer is for a really good thing, and I shall have it?” Just so, and hence, secondly, the prayer for the best thing is surest of an answer, for, saith the text, “How much more shall your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him?” There is no doubt about the Holy Spirit being a good thing; when we therefore ask for him, for his divine presence and influence, we may rest assured that God will give it. Make that our first point under this head-God will give the Holy Spirit to them that ask for him. Beloved, the Holy Spirit sometimes is represented as the wind, the life-giving breath. He blows upon the valleys thickly strewn with slain, and they are quickened to life. You and I, though we are made to live, often feel that life to be flagging, and almost dying. The Spirit of God can quicken us, revive in us the spark of divine life, and strengthen in our hearts the life of God. Pray for this quickening breath, and, my brother, God will give it you. As surely as you sincerely pray you shall have and feel the revival of the life within. The Spirit of God is sometimes compared to water. It is he who applies the blood of Jesus and sanctifies us. He cleanses us, fertilises us. Well, he will come to us in that capacity. Do we feel that our sin has much power over us? O Spirit of God, destroy thou sin within us and work in us purity. Thou hast already given us the new birth by water and the Spirit, go on and complete thy work till our whole nature shall be fashioned in the image of the Great Firstborn. You shall have it if you seek it; God will give you this Spirit if this you seek for. The Holy Ghost is revealed to us under the image of light; he illuminates the mind, he makes our natural darkness flee. Wait upon him, O child of God, that you may be led into all truth. He can make that which now perplexes you to become plain; he can uplift you into truths which are now too high for your attainment. Wait upon him! As a child of God, long to be taught of God. I do not know how to express to you the sense I feel just now of the deep condescension of God in promising to give us the Holy Spirit. He has given us his Son, and now he promises his Spirit. Here are two gifts, unspeakable in preciousness. Will God, in very deed dwell with man upon the earth? Will God dwell in man? Can it be that the infinite Spirit, God over all, blessed for ever, will dwell in my poor heart, and make my body to be his temple? It is certainly so; for as sure as it is that God will give good things to those that ask good things, he will surest of all give the Holy Spirit to them that ask for the Holy Spirit. Sit not in the dark then when the light of God will break upon you if you seek it.

The Holy Ghost is set forth to us under the emblem of fire, and in this capacity he kindles enthusiasm of spirit, and burning zeal in the hearts of God’s people. The tongue of fire speaks with a matchless might; the heart of flame conquers the sons of men. O that we had this fire! It is to be had. The Spirit of God will come in answer to our cries, he will come and fire the church, and each individual member of it. Oftentimes the Spirit of God is set forth as oil; by him we have the divine anointing. The prayer that the pastor may be anointed with fresh oil is a very welcome one, but it is equally needed that you yourselves have your lamps supplied, that your light may not go out. This desire will be fulfilled. He will give the Holy Spirit in this way to them that ask him for it. And so too as the gentle dropping dew that cheers and refreshes the grass, so will the Spirit come to console our spirits, care-worn, tried with the heat of this world’s busy day. The Holy Ghost will come and bedew us if we seek him. As the blessed dove, bearing peace upon his wings, he will come to us. In fact, there is no operation of the Spirit which will not be wrought in us if we seek it. There is no attribute of the Spirit of God which shall not be put forth for us if we ask it. He will give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him.

From the connection in which the text stands, I gather the following remark, namely, that it will truly be the Holy Spirit. Go back again to that first thought. The child asks bread, and does not get a stone; you ask the Holy Spirit, and you shall receive the Holy Spirit. Some persons have been misled by an evil spirit. I belivee that very much of the rant that came out years ago about the date of the second coming of Christ, the unknown tongues, and I do not know what beside of blatant nonsense, was of an evil spirit, and I query whether there was a humble laying down of minds before God’s throne to seek the Holy Spirit, whether there was not much self-sufficiency, and much desire for something that would make important its possessor, which led certain eminent preachers into vain imaginings and fanatical rant. You shall not receive an evil spirit instead of the good Spirit, if you humbly and patiently wait upon the Most High. Neither shall you be misled by fancy. Men will tell you that you are deluded when you experience high joys and deep experiences, but if you have sought the Spirit sincerely and intensely, it shall be the Spirit that God will give you. You need not be afraid when you bow before Jehovah’s throne in Jesus’ name, and ask for the Holy Spirit, that you will be sent away with anything short of that Holy Spirit that proceedeth from the Father and the Son.

But it appears plainly enough from the text that this Holy Spirit is to be given in answer to prayer. Did not we hear some time ago from certain wise brethren that we were never to pray for the Spirit? I think I heard it said often, “We have the Holy Spirit, and therefore we are not to pray for it.” Like that other declaration of certain of the same brotherhood, that we have pardon of sin, and are not to pray for it, just as if we were never to pray for what we have! If we have life we are to pray that we have it more abundantly. If we have pardon in one respect we are to ask for a fuller sense of it; and if we have the Holy Spirit so that we are quickened, and saved, we do not ask for him in that capacity, but we ask for his power in other directions, and for his grace in other forms. I do not go before God now and say, “Lord, I am a dead sinner, quicken me by thy Spirit,” for I trust I am quickened of his Spirit; but being quickened I now cry, “Lord, let not the life thou hast given me ebb down till it becomes very feeble, but give me of thy Spirit that the life within me may become strong and mighty, and may subdue all the power of death within my members, that I may put forth the vigour and energy which come from thyself through the Spirit.” O you that have the Spirit, you are the very men to pray that you may experience more of his matchless operations and gracious influences, and in all the benign sanctity of his indwelling may seek that yet more and more you may know him. You have this as your encouragement, that God will give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him. Ever since certain brethren gave up asking for the Holy Spirit they have not had it, and they have gone aside into many inventions; if they will not ask they shall not have, but be it yours and mine to wait humbly and patiently upon the Lord that he may daily give us of his Spirit.

I desire earnestly to call your attention to one thing which our Saviour says: “If ye being evil know how to give good gifts unto your children,” how ought it to run to make it parallel? “how much more shall your heavenly Father know how to give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him?” Would not that be the parallel? Of course it would, but he does not say so. He very kindly puts it in the first place, that we “know how to give good gifts,” for sometimes we know how to give them, but we cannot do it. It is a bitter thing, and yet it has sometimes happened that the child has said. “Father, give me bread,” and with a breaking heart the father has had to reply, “My child, there is none.” It must be one of the hardest trials of human life, and yet it is the trial of tens of thousands in this city at this time, to have to say, “No, there is not even a crust of bread for my child.” You see the father knows how, but he cannot do it. But the text does not say that God knows how to give the Holy Spirit, it says a great deal more than that, it declares that he does give, because with him to know how is the same thing as to do it. He gives the Holy Spirit to them that ask him. He does not only know how, but he does it. Never does he have to say to his child, “My child, I cannot.” The poor sinner says, “Lord, help me to repent,” and the Lord never says, “I have not enough of the Holy Spirit to make you repent.” When one of his children cries, “Lord, give me the anointing of the Holy One that I may understand thy gospel more fully,” the heavenly Father never answers, “I cannot give you so much of the Holy Spirit as that.” Boundlessly will he give if faith dare but open her mouth wide. You are not straitened in him; you are straitened in yourselves. Men and brethren, I am telling you nothing new, but a very simple truth; and yet for all that a truth which we do not put in practice. We may have the Spirit of God resting upon us. As Stephen was a man filled with the Holy Ghost, even so may we. No miracles do we seek, but all the spiritual uplifting which the Holy Spirit gave to men of old we need, and he can give it to us still. Though he will not reveal new truths-we do not want he should, for we have already the complete gospel revealed-he will bring home the old truths to our souls and make them potent upon our consciences, and upon our lives, and this is what we want. Oh, if any of you are but just Christians, and are not glorifying God, nor living near him, nor mighty in prayer, nor well taught in Scripture, nor useful in your lives; I beseech you remember, if you have not the Spirit it is because you do not seek him importunately, do not seek him with a deep sense of your need of him. If you, being evil, give your children bread, how much more will God give you the Spirit; and as you, being evil, do not mock your child by putting him off without the bread, and giving him something else, neither will your heavenly Father. He will give you the real Spirit; no enthusiasm that might mislead you, no fanaticism that might injure you, no self-conceit that might become like a deadly scorpion to you, but his own gentle, truthful, infallible, Holy Spirit he will give to them that ask him.

Now for our last point. The best of prayers, which is sure to be heard, is also a most comprehensive one.

Turn to the parallel passage in the gospel of Matthew (ch. 7:11). Note that Matthew says nothing about the egg, and then read the eleventh verse, “If ye being evil know how to give good gifts unto your children, how much more shall your Father which is in heaven give good things to them that ask him?” Now what does our text say, “How much more shall your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him?” Is it not clear then that the Holy Spirit is the equivalent for “good things,” and that in fact when the Lord gives us the Holy Spirit he gives us all “good things”? What a comprehensive prayer then is the prayer for the Spirit of God! Dear brother, sit down with pencil in hand and a sheet of blank paper before you, and write down all your spiritual wants. I will judge of your wisdom by the length of the catalogue, for if you know yourself you will find you have not done yet, you are a great mass of wants. To pray for all these things separately might seem a very long exercise. My dear brother, just take the pencil, and do as the school boys do when they add up the total of their sums; you will find it comes to this-the Holy Spirit. “My God, give me thy Holy Spirit, and I have all.” “But do we not need the Saviour?” saith one. Truly, but the Holy Ghost where he comes, “takes of the things of Christ, and shows them unto us.” That is the great value of the Holy Spirit. “He shall glorify me.” Wherever the Spirit of God comes there comes the blood of the atonement, we are brought nigh by it, and every spiritual blessing bought with blood is brought by the Holy Ghost home to the soul. If you have the Spirit he does not come empty-handed. He comes loaded with all the treasures of the covenant, the blessings ordained for you fram before the foundation of the world, and the blessings secured to you in the covenant of grace, and the blessings bought for you by Jesus’ precious blood. Do, then, let this be your prayer: “Give me, O God, thy Holy Spirit.”

Then, my dear friends, your prayer is interecssory as well as for yourselves. You pray for your children, for your wife, for your neighbours, for your friends. I hope your intercessory roll is a long one. If God gives you power to bless men by your prayers, do not stay the blessing. What is it that you want for others? In one word, it is the Holy Spirit. Let the Holy Spirit be given to that dear boy of yours, and he will have a tender conscience-you have often wished he had; he will have a desire after Christ, and he will find Christ; he will be a Christian. Let the Holy Spirit be given to that girl of yours. She will have a desire to the word of God, a love to the means of grace; she will find the Saviour, she will become a useful Christian woman. Your neighbours, you prayed that they might go with you to hear the gospel, and a very excellent prayer it was. Still it would be a fuller prayer still that the Spirit would visit them. Some have been visited by the Holy Spirit who have not been in the house of God. Even at their work divine impulses they could not account for, have followed them. The fact is, the hearing of the word is but the vehicle, the power lies in the Spirit of God. I put it to you, therefore, whether it is not a most fitting prayer for you to offer for your neighbours and kinsfolk?

And, now, the last point is one I wish to impress upon your hearts, my dear friends. To-morrow is the day of prayer. As I have said, I hope you may be all with one accord in one place in prayer; but I humbly suggest to you, that we should all pray throughout that day and onward, that God will give to his churches more and more of the Holy Spirit. Just now, I do not know how you feel, but I am ill at ease. The Church of England is eaten through and through with Sacramentarianism, but Nonconformity appears to me to be almost as badly riddled with philosophical infidelity. Those of whom we thought better things are turning aside one by one from the fundamentals of the faith. At first they gave up the doctrine of the eternity of future punishment, now it must be the doctrine of the fall: first one thing then another. If some men have their way, all the doctrines of the word must go. They treat the doctrines of Scripture as though they were all disproved, and only held by a few ignorant bigots. Through and through, I believe, the heart of England is honeycombed with a detestable infidelity, which dares still to go into the pulpit, and call itself Christian. I pray that God may preserve our denomination from it; but my prayer shall go up that he will give us the Holy Spirit, for men never go wrong with the Holy Spirit; he will keep them right, and lead them into all truth. Soundness of doctrine is only worth having when it is the result of the living indwelling of God in the church; and because too much the Holy Spirit has departed, we see the signs that the orthodox faith is given up, and the inventions of man preached instead thereof.

Sometimes I breathe as I walk along, this prayer, that God would raise up more ministers to preach the gospel with power; there is so much feeble preaching, mere twaddling, and so little declaration of the gospel with power. But I do not know that I will pray that prayer again; I will put up this, “Lord, send thy Spirit upon the churches!” then will come the ministers, then will come the earnest workers. The Spirit of God will touch their tongues with fire, and they will say, “Here am I, send me,” and once again we shall have back the Puritanic age of preaching and ministries like those of Whitfield, Edwards, and McCheyne. The Spirit of God is the power of the church, and speaks with might in her.

My longing is that the churches may be more holy. I grieve to see so much of worldly conformity; how often wealth leads men astray; how many Christians follow the fashions of this wicked world. But shall I pray that the churches may be holy? I will, but I will put my prayer in this form, I will ask that God will give the Holy Spirit. He is the Spirit of holiness, he leads to obedience, purges from sin and creates the image of God in his people.

I desire to see, and I think you all do, more unity among the churches. It is a pity when churches fall out, and chide, and fight; Ecclesiastical quarrels are generally more bitter than any other. Do not so much pray for unity as put it all into this, “Lord, give the Holy Spirit; for if the Holy Spirit be in us and abound we shall not be divided-the church of God will feel the unity of life.” Life it is that creates true unity amongst the people of God.

If there be anything else that we long to see in the churches, and I confess there are a thousand things-for I would desire to see them increased with men as with a flock-I would desire to see them built up in an intelligent understanding of the doctrines of grace, I desire to see them looking for the coming of Christ and ready for his advent; if we desire all these, let us ask that the Holy Spirit may be more plenteously given-and when this prayer is answered, as answered it must be, then shall we see all that our soul desires.

I do, therefore, very earnestly, over and over again, ask you to make to-morrow a day of real prayer, and if you cannot be here in body, yet all day long cry mightily unto the God of Sabaoth, our Father, who hath spared not his own Son, but freely deliverd him up for us all, who will also with him freely give us all things, if we know how to ask aright.

ICONOCLAST

A Sermon

Delivered on Lord’s-day Morning, November 13th, 1870, by

C. H. SPURGEON,

at the metropolitan tabernacle, newington.

“He removed the high places, and brake the images, and cut down the groves, and brake in pieces the brasen serpent that Moses had made: for unto those days the children of Israel did burn incense to it; and he called it Nehushtan. He trusted in the Lord God of Israel; so that after him was none like him among all the kings of Judah, nor any that were before him.”-2 Kings 18:4, 5.

The first commandment instructs us that there is but one God, who alone is to be worshipped; and the second commandment teaches that no attempt is to be made to represent the Lord, neither are we to bow down before any form of sacred similitude. “Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth: thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them.” The two commandments thus make a full sweep of idolatry. We are not to worship any other god; we are not to worship the true God by the use of representative symbols. He is a Spirit, and is to be worshipped in spirit and in truth, and not by the use of visible imagery. It seems clear that the human mind since the fall finds it hard to keep to this. All over the world men set up images and idols, not at first with the view of worshipping the wood or stone, but with the intention of being helped to worship the Deity by having some outward symbol of his presence. After awhile the evil heart falls into something even more debasing, and the image itself is adored. Even the people of God, the children of Israel, who so peculiarly enjoyed the Lord’s presence in their midst, and who were taught to worship him by law-givers and prophets inspired of the Most High, could not keep to pure and spiritual worship. Though their weakness was somewhat helped to the understanding of truth by a system of types, they were not content with these because they contained no similitude of God. The religion of pious Jews was mainly spiritual, for only at the one appointed spot at Jerusalem was sacrifice allowed, and there the sacred vessels of ceremonial worship were in secret places, and seldom if ever seen by the people. A worship so little outward was too spiritual for unregenerate Israel; the people wanted an outward ritual for other places beside Jerusalem; and wherever there was a rock or lofty hill there they put up an altar to God, and it was called one of the “high places” of the land; wherever a grove of ancient trees could be discovered, they set that apart also; to the true God, mark you-but still without divine sanction, and contrary to his law, seeing that he had not appointed that there should be any groves or places sacred to himself, except the one chosen spot at Mount Zion. Then they came to the use of teraphim, symbolical forms, statues, “images,” as our English translation puts it; not that they actually worshipped these as God, but used them, as they said, to help them to worship God. This was all contrary to the divine law, and led to a forgetfulness of God himself, robbing him of his worship and giving it to dumb idols. As soon as good Hezekiah had come to the throne and taken possession of its power, he set to work to cut down all the groves, to break the images, and as far as he could, as governor of the land, to bring back Israel to her allegiance to the great invisible Jehovah, and to the spiritual worship in which he delights, restraining the outward worship with sacrifice and offering to the one temple at Jerusalem. Among the various objects of Israel’s degenerate worship was one which it would have seemed natural even for a reformer to spare, it was the famous serpent of brass which had been made by Moses in the wilderness, and had been lifted up upon a pole, by looking to which thousands had been cured of the poisonous bites of fiery serpents. This had been carefully preserved, but seeing that it had become an object of superstitious reverence, Hezekiah destroyed it; according to some, he ground it to powder, and he called it by an opprobrious epithet, Nehushtan. The margin has the translation, “a piece of brass.” It might be read, “filth,” or “verdigris,” or “a piece of copper.” The king gave it a name which would show that he protested against the idolatrous reverence shown to it. Although it was an interesting memorial, it must be utterly destroyed, because it presented a temptation to idolatry. Here if ever in this world was a relic of high antiquity, of undoubted authenticity, a relic which had seen its hundreds of years, about which there was no question as to its being indisputably the very serpent which Moses made; and it was moreover a relic which had formerly possessed miraculous power-for in the wilderness the looking at it had saved the dying. Yet it must be broken in pieces, because Israel burned incense to it. Away with it, it is a defiled thing; call it by an ill name; dash it to atoms; make Israel to despise it and to forget it. If the brazen serpent be put to a wrong use and made into an idol, it must not be spared. Put the piece of verdigris away; let the coppery reptile be ground to powder, if it be once set up as a rival to Jehovah, or as a sharer in the veneration which is due to him only.

This leads me to the following remark. After all, our reformers acted well, and after a scriptural model, when they poured contempt upon the idols of Rome, and made a mockery of her saints, relics, images, masses, and priests. They were more than justified in exposing the idolatries of Popery, and subjecting the objects formerly reverenced to the utmost contempt. There was a deep meaning in their breaking of crosses and the burning of holy roods. The white linen of priestly amices served well for under garments for the poor, and altar stones made admirable backs for stoves, but they meant more than utility, they were a protest against superstition. Holy water vats were in those practical times frequently given to the country people to be turned into troughs for swine, the little sacring bells which had formerly been rung at the elevation of the host were hung around horses’ necks, and the box which contained the detestable mockery of our incarnate God, which the Papists most adored, was broken in pieces. No contempt could be greater than these idols deserved. The iconoclasts of that age did not go one bit too far. I could wish they had been even less lenient than they were, and that not a single thing ever worshipped by man had been spared for a moment. Call it god! then break it up, though art itself perish with it. Adore it as a holy thing! then away with it, though it be made of gold and inlaid with gems. What God abhors, what his anger smokes against, it is not for us to spare from motives of tenderness to other people’s feelings, or because the canons of taste would say, “Let the idol be preserved.”

Our sires, the Nonconformists, when they left the state-created religion to maintain a spiritual worship, and gathered themselves together as the servants of God, did well in bearing their protest against the less glaring idolatries of their age. In their day, as now, there existed the very common idolatry of superstitious reverence of buildings. Certain piles of stone, brick and timber, are regarded as holy places. It is thought that inside certain walls God is more peculiarly present than outside, where the trees are growing and the birds singing. Our forefathers protested against this by never calling their buildings churches. They knew they could not be; they knew that churches mean companies of faithful men and women. They called the places of their usual worship “meeting-houses;” that is what they were, and nothing more. The veneration of building materials, pulpits, altars, pews, cushions, tables, candlesticks, organs, cups, plates, etc., is sheer, clear idolatry. “Worship God” is a command which needs to be spoken in these days in tones of thunder. There is none holy save the Lord. “God that made the world and all things therein, seeing that he is Lord of heaven and earth, dwelleth not in temples made with hands; neither is worshipped with men’s hands, as though he needed anything, seeing he giveth to all life, and breath, and all things.” Hear ye the Lord’s own words: “Heaven is my throne, and earth is my footstool: what house will ye build me? saith the Lord: or what is the place of my rest? Hath not my hand made all these things?”

Our sires also stood out against another idolatry which still survives in England; namely, the observing of days and months. Certain days are set apart as holy, and observed with great reverence by those calling themselves Christians. Not content with the Sabbath as the day appointed of God for his worship, they have like Israel of old, when under legal bondage, new moons, and appointed feasts, for which they claim great respect, but to which none whatever is due. Our sires said, “This is not of Scripture, therefore it is of man, therefore it is will-worship, and idolatrous;” and they showed their contempt of the commandments of men by an open disregard of holy days, and we shall do well in this respect and in all others to maintain their pure testimony. Whenever we see superstition in any shape, we must not flatter the folly, but according to our ability act the inconoclast’s part and denounce it. In this matter too many do the work of the Lord deceitfully, and bow in the house of Rimmon, instead of maintaining inviolate the spiritual worship of the great I AM.

But let this suffice on such themes, we have other thoughts in our minds. I intend, this morning, first to apportion a share of image-breaking work to believers; and, secondly, we shall prescribe another form of this same work for seeking souls.

We have much idol breaking for Christians to do. There is much to be done in the church of God, there is much more to be done in our own hearts.

First of all, there is much idol breaking to be done in the church of God. Let me mention some of the things against which you and I must always bear our personal and earnest protest. We are all too apt as Christians to place some degree of reliance upon men whom God in his infinite mercy raises up to be leaders in the Christian church. We ought to be thankful for the Paul who plants so well, and the Apollos who waters so ably; we are never to look with contempt or with slighting upon those precious gifts which Christ received when he ascended up on high, and which he continues to give to his church, namely, apostles, teachers, preachers, evangelists, and the like. A man is more precious than a wedge of the gold of Ophir. When God gives a man to the church fitted for her enlargement, for her establishment, and her confirmation, he gives to her one of the richest blessings of the covenant of grace; but the danger is lest we place the man in the wrong position, and look to him not only with the respect which is due to him as God’s ambassador, but with some degree of-I must call it so-superstitious reliance upon his authority and ability. Brethren, we have discarded saints, we abhor the idea of worshipping them, and yet by slow degrees we may gradually fall into canonisation, and virtually set up among ourselves another set of saints. Is it not true that some almost worship St. Calvin, and St. Luther? Beyond their teachings they cannot go. Over others St. John Wesley, or St. Charles Simeon sway an awe-commanding sceptre; and to far more, the minister under whom they sit, and whose teachings they constantly receive, is the reason and basis of their faith. I am afraid that some of the conversions wrought in the Christian church are rather the work of the preacher than of the Spirit of God, and therefore when the minister who was the instrument of them happens to be removed, the faith which was built upon the wisdom or the earnestness of man is removed too. The point I want to bring you to is this, receive truth from us if we give it to you purely, and are truly God’s mouth to you, but accept it not because we say it is so. Go to the fountain head of truth, search the Scriptures for yourselves, and see whether these things be so. Let nothing be to you a spiritual truth unless it be taught of the Spirit of God in the Scriptures. Do not be content to hear with the outer ear and say, “That is true, for such-and-such a man of God has said it;” ask to hear with the heart so as to feel, “That is true, for God has said it in his word, and his holy Spirit has also written it over again in my consciousness and experience.” We must get beyond men, or else we shall be very babes in grace. If we overvalue the blessings which God gives us in our teachers and preachers, he may remove them from us. We are to exalt not the pipes but the fountain head; not the windows but the sun must we thank for light; not the basket which holds the food or the lad who brings the loaves and fishes must we reverence, but the divine Master who blesses and multiplies the bread and feeds the multitude. To Jesus must all adoring eyes be turned, and to the Holy Spirit the revealer of the truth, and to our Father who is in heaven; and we must receive the gospel not as the word of man, but as it is in truth, the word of God. Love the ministers of Christ, but fall not into that form of brazen serpent worship which will degrade you into the servants of men.

In the Christian church there is, I am afraid, at this moment too much exaltation of talent and dependence upon education, I mean especially in reference to ministers. I do not believe that a man of God who is called constantly to preach to the same people can be too thoroughly educated, neither do I believe that the highest degree of mental culture should be any injury to the Christian minister, but rather should be very helpful to him. By all means let the religious teacher intermeddle with all knowledge, let him give himself unto reading and be able mentally as well as spiritually to take the lead, but, O church of God, never set thou up human learning in the place of the Eternal Spirit, for “it is not by might nor by power, but by my Spirit, saith the Lord.” The great wonders of apostolic times were mainly wrought by men who were illiterate in the world’s judgment; they had been taught of Christ and so had received the noblest education, but in classical studies and in philosophical speculations they were but little versed, with the exception of the apostle Paul, and he came not with excellency of speech or of wisdom. Yet the apostles and their followers preached with such power, that the world soon felt their presence. On the slabs of stone which mark the burial places of the early Christians in the catacombs of Rome, the inscriptions are nearly all ill spelt, many of them have here a letter in Greek and there a letter in Latin, grammar is forgotten, and orthography is violated, a proof that the early Christians who thus commemorated the martyred dead were many of them uneducated persons: but for all that they crushed the wisdom of the sages and smote the gods of classic lands. They smote Jupiter and Saturn, until they were broken in pieces, and Venus and Diana fell from their seats of power. Their conquests were not by the learning of the schools; that hindered them-the Gnostic heresy, the heresy of pretended knowledge hindered but never helped the church of God. Even thus at this hour the culture so much vaunted in certain places is opposed to the simplicity of the gospel. Therefore I say we do not despise true learning, but we dare not depend upon it. We believe that God can bless and does bless thousands by very simple and humble testimonies; we are none of us to hold our tongues for Christ, because we cannot speak as the learned; we are none of us to refuse the Lord’s message to ourselves because it is spoken by an unlettered messenger. We are not to select our pastors simply because of their talents and acquirements; we must regard their unction, we must look at their call, and see whether the Spirit of God is with them; if not, we shall make learning to be our brazen serpent, and it will need to be broken in pieces.

Just the same also may be said of human eloquence. It is a good thing when a man can speak well, and his words flow from his soul like a torrent, sweeping everything before them, when his heart burns and flashes with a divine enthusiasm when he speaks what he believes and feels to be of the weightiest importance; but after all, conversions wrought by carnal rhetoric, what are they? Conversions wrought by human logic, what are they? “That which is born of the flesh is flesh.” Let the men speak well-the truth ought to be delivered in the best of sentences, but the noblest language ever uttered by man never convinced a soul of sin, or bound up a wounded conscience, or raised a sinner from his death in sin. We must in prayer cry for the Spirit of God, and all our confidence must be placed in him; for oratory is but a sounding brass and a tinkling cymbal if the Holy Ghost be not there.

Continuing still our remarks with regard to the Christian church, I will further remark that much superstition may require to be broken down amongst us in reference to a rigid adhesion to certain modes of Christian service. We have tried to propagate the truth in a certain way, and the Lord has blessed us in it, and therefore we venerate the mode and the plan, and forget that the Holy Spirit is a free Spirit. There are persons in our churches who object very seriously to any attempt to do good in a way which they have not seen tried before. For them custom has all the force of authority: the traditions of the fathers are their law. Bold measures of evangelisation shock them as innovations, as if anything could be an innovation where all is free! I know Dissenting congregations which are as conservative of their do-nothing plans as if they had received them direct from heaven. Their life is fossilized, their order is funereal, their orthodoxy is sepulchral. “As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end, Amen,” seems to be the chant of many good, but mistaken Christians amongst us who cannot think a thing ought to be done if it never has been done. If there be anything clear in the teaching of our Lord and his apostles, it is this, that we are not under law, rubric, and tradition, but are brought into the liberty of the children of God, so that we are led by the Spirit, and in the service of God are not to hunt for precedents or wait for regulations, but follow the great principles of the word, and the guidance of the Spirit, and “by any means save some.” I have known brethren frightened at open-air preaching, and yet what sort of preaching used there to be in Christ’s days but open-air preaching? I have known others quite alarmed at the idea of Christ’s name being mentioned in a place that had been put to commoner uses, as if in the olden times Christ could have been preached anywhere if it had been necessary to have a place consecrated to Christian worship! There is a class of persons who object to every holy project for evangelisation, however right and judicious, if it happens to be novel, and they will continue to object till the work has been long in action, and has placed itself beyond fear of their opposition or need of their assistance. We shall degenerate into a race of Scribes and Pharisees if we give way to this spirit. We shall again be slaves to traditions, legends, and old wives’ fables, as bad as those which polluted Judaism. In the name of everything that is Christlike, away with all that checks the vital action of the body of Christ. Fetters are none the less burdensome for being antique. Let the brazen serpent be broken if it become a barrier to the onward progress of the cross. If any endeavour to force upon us the yoke of habit, let us resist them in the spirit of Paul, who, speaking of those who came in privily to spy out his liberty in Christ Jesus that they might bring him into bondage, declares “to whom we gave place for subjection, no, not for an hour.”

So it is with the forms of divine worship. I have frequently, especially in our country churches, met with the most determined protests against the most trivial alteration of the routine of their worship. You must sing at such a time, for they always have sung at such a point in the service; you must pray at such a moment, they always have prayed at that part of the worship; and if you can keep to the same quantity of minutes usually occupied so much the better. The whole service, though not in a book-for our sturdy brethren would rise in revolt against the use of a book-yet is quite as stereotyped as if it were taken from the Common Prayer. Now, I believe that in public worship we should do well to be bound by no human rules, and constrained by no stereotyped order. I like, and we have often done it, to have an interval of silence sometimes. Why not? Why should it be all vocal worship? And why not begin with the sermon occasionally? You who come in late would probably mend your manners in such a case. And then why should we not sing when we have been accustomed to pray, and pray when we have been accustomed to sing? We are under the dispensation of the Spirit, and as far as I know, the Spirit of God has not inspired those cards which I see sometimes nailed up in pulpits-“begin with short prayer, sing, read, pray, preach,” and so on. A legality of form is growing up among us, and I enter my heart’s protest against it. Not that you and I may have been affected by this Dissenting ritualism, but practices good in themselves are to be protested against if they gender to bondage, for the Spirit of God bloweth where he listeth, and if we worship God according to his guidance, the worship cannot invariably take the same form.

2. Thus we have done a little image breaking in the church. Now let us turn to the temple of our own hearts, and we shall find much work to be done there.

Beloved brethren and sisters, exercise self-examination now for the next five minutes or so. How about your present position as a Christian? You feel, probably, after ten, twelve, twenty, or thirty years of profession, very considerably in advance of what you were when you first came to Christ. Do you feel that you are? You can now see the imprudences of your early zeal, and you can look down with unmeasured pity upon those young people who know so little about the road to heaven, of which you know so much, and who have so little strength, of which you now have a very considerable share, who are so little aware of the devices of Satan, against which you guard yourself so ably. Dear brother, are you thus really congratulating yourself upon your advanced position? Are you? Then permit a little image breaking there, for rest assured if we, any of us, come to put much value upon our attainments we shall be very near to sliding into self-confidence, carnal security, and I know not what of mischievous pride. Beloved, are you stronger than you were? But does your strength lie anywhere else than where it used to lie, even in Christ? Are you wiser than you were? But have you any wisdom except that Christ is made unto you wisdom? Do you really think that twenty years’ experience has changed your corruptions, that your passions have become extinct, that your tendencies to sin are not so strong as they were, that in fact you have less need to watch, less need to depend simply upon the merit of Christ and the work of his Spirit? Do you think so? Do you think so? “Let him that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall.” I have heard that more horses fall at the bottom of a hill than almost anywhere else, and I know that more professors make shipwreck towards the close of life than at any other time. As I have often told you, the falls recorded in the Old and New Testament are the falls, not of young men in the heat of passion, but of old or middle-aged men. Lot was no boy when he disgraced himself. David was no young man when he transgressed with Bathsheba. Peter was no child when he denied his Lord. These were men of experience and knowledge and attainments. Your attainments, my brother! Oh, brave word for a poor thing! Your attainments! Your attainments, poor sinner! Apart from what you have in Christ, how absurd the language! Better still to say, “Having nothing and yet possessing all things, God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ.” Do I then despise Christian attainments? By no manner of means, only when they are idolised and hide the Saviour, then I call them Nehushtan, and would fain break them in pieces.

Again, dear brother, it may be that you are enjoying very near fellowship with Christ. How delightful it is when you know by assurance that you are the Beloved’s and that the Beloved is yours; when all doubts and fears have fled away and you are walking in the light of his countenance! When we are in such a condition we are like Peter, and would fain build three tabernacles, for we say, “Master, it is good to be here.” But we must mind lest we elevate our enjoyments into the place of our Master. We may even make our communion with Christ an idol, by putting it before Christ himself. I am not saved and safe because I am greatly rejoicing. Not my enjoyment, but Jesus saves me-he alone saves me. If my communion were interrupted, I should still be secure in him, and now I enjoy it sweetly it does not add to my actual security or acceptance before God. An old Puritan quaintly says, suppose a loving husband were to give to his wife many rings and jewels out of love to her, and she should come to think so highly of the love-tokens that she sat and looked at them, and admired them, and forgot her husband, would he not be rather inclined to take these things away to turn her love once again to himself? So with our graces and our enjoyments; if we think too much of them the iconoclastic hammer will come in, and these things will vanish because they have provoked the Lord to jealousy.

Further, we have a little more work to do. You have, and you thank God for it, some good friends in this world, dear friends, Christian friends, reliable friends. Hold them fast; but it is not always easy to keep these friends where they should be. There is a text that might save us a thousand sorrows if we thought more of it: “Cursed be the man that trusteth in man, and maketh flesh his arm: but blessed is the man that trusteth in the Lord, and whose hope the Lord is.” And there is another text of the same tone: “Cease ye from man whose breath is in his nostrils: for wherein is he to be accounted of?” Friendship by all means, and confidence in those who deserve it by all means, but pass not the bound which God hath set, think not that to be immutable which is but clay, and fancy not that to be faithful which is but flesh. Changing circumstances have changed many hearts, and altered positions and conditions have made sad havoc among friendships which seemed to be eternal. Lean on thy friends, but not with all thy weight; trust and be confident as thou mayest, but let thine inmost reliance, thy deepest faith, lean on that arm which thou canst not see, but which arm nevertheless upholds the universe.

Now a word that may cut more keenly still, and it concerns our dear relationships in the family circle. The last should I be to speak against the love that is due to husband, and wife, and child, and brethren. Christianity fosters all the domestic loves. We love none the less our dear ones below because our heart still loves our Saviour above all. But, beloved, there is such a thing as putting child or wife or husband into Jesus’ place. The beloved one was meant to be loved, but not to be worshipped. That little gem was given to be prized, but not to be valued beyond the pearl of great price. Beware of desecrating your earthly love into idolatry; rather consecrate it by seeking God’s glory in it, and it shall be well with you; for if you are a child of God, whatever idol you worship, God’s great hammer will be lifted up against it. You will lose the child, or it may live to prove your curse; you will lose the love you think so precious, or you may have it, but it will lead you astray. Beloved, I know there is work to be done in many of our hearts in this respect.

And so there is yet further in the pursuits of our minds. I do not see why a Christian man should not have for a pursuit the attainment of eminence in learning, proficiency in science, or success in business; if he does not do so he is not likely to distinguish himself, and there can be no reason why a Christian should be always in the rear; but these lawful worldly aims must be kept in their place and be subservient to higher ends, or else what is right in itself will get to be wrong through being put in the wrong place. You may pursue that branch of knowledge, young man, but seek first the kingdom of God. Do you desire to be an artist and rank with Landseer and Millais? I would not discourage you for a moment; in the skilful use of that pencil may you rise to the highest position in your art; but for all that do not worship the palette, do not bow down before the outspread canvas: there is something better to live for than to paint. Student, I do not wonder at your desire to excel. Why should not Christian men be first in all departments of learning? But after all, there are higher objects than zoology, geology, mechanics, or astronomy. Do then, I pray you, guard against putting anything where Christ should be. Seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness. Ever God first, and then the rest that you may glorify God by what of ability or influence you have obtained such means. I charge you look to this on pain of seeing idols broken, and aspirations destroyed.

Thus have we gone into the temple of your hearts, and used the hammer a little there.

Now I desire for awhile to speak with those who are seekers of Jesus. There is some idol breaking to be done for them. I pray God the Holy Spirit to do it.

The way of salvation lies in coming to Christ, in trusting in Jesus Christ alone. Why is it that so many refuse to do this, and remain in the border land of desire unsaved? Many think that they ought to be much better than they are: they have faults to be corrected, their minds are in a wrong condition, they must be put right, and they are trying to do this with the intention when they feel better to put their trust in Jesus. O that my hammer might smash all that to pieces! My friend, you ought to be better, your mind ought to be in a better state; I grant all that; but if you put this improvement of yours in the place of the work of Christ, you are going the sure way to destruction. Your righteousness is not what is needed, but Christ’s righteousness, and if you conceive that you must fit yourself for him, you know not the gospel. Come to Jesus as you are. Your conscious sinfulness and imperfections will but enable you to prize his perfection and his power to save. Do not look to yourself for a part of your salvation; if you do I must call your goodness “Nehushtan,” and compare it to dross and dung! Look to Jesus, and Jesus only, all else will deceive you. Do see how he carried sin, and was punished for it, and how his righteousness avails with the Father, and look not to any preparations or fitnesses which you may conceive to be in yourself.

With some the Nehushtan which they set up is their sense of sin, either they do not feel their need of Christ as they ought, or else they do feel their need, and therefore think they are in a fair condition. Now, believe me, you often misunderstand the promises of Christ. That matchless promise, “Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden,” is thought to be a promise made to those who labour and are heavy laden. My brethren, the promise is not made to labouring nor to being heavy laden. “What is it made to?” say you. The promise is made to coming to Christ, “Come unto me, and I will give you rest.” You may be weary and heavy laden as long as you will, but you will not get rest by labouring, it is coming to Christ that gives rest. Do not think that feeling your need of Christ is salvation; it is coming to Christ, depending, relying upon him alone, that brings you to the blessing. Do not delay, then. The most proper sense of sin, though it may be commendable as the brazen serpent, if you rest in it must be broken in pieces, for it is an antichrist.

Many persons are resting in their fear of self-deception. “I would fain trust in Christ,” says one, “but I am so afraid of being self-deceived.” And do you think that your being afraid of presumption is a better thing than believing God’s testimony concerning his Son? You must think so or else you would not keep it in preference to believing. To believe in Jesus Christ-that is, to rest upon God’s own Son, who was put to death because our sin was laid upon him-to believe in him simply with a childish confidence is the way of salvation; but you prefer not to do it on the ground that you are afraid of being self-deceived; you prefer tarrying in a state of caution to advancing to faith. Away with your idolised brazen serpent-away with it. Give up the fear or keep it, which you will, but come to Jesus.

Many of you, I am afraid, are resting in sermon hearing. “I shall get good one of these days,” says one, “I am always at the Tabernacle, or always at my church,” or, “I go to hear a good gospel preacher, and I shall pet a blessing.” What, do you think salvation comes through merely hearing sermons? Ah! sirs, responsibility comes when the gospel is honestly preached, but nothing more, unless you believe the message which you hear. Faith is the vital point, the coming to Jesus, or else I pour ridicule on sermon hearing, and sermon preaching too, if you look to this as the groundwork of salvation. It is not the poor trumpet that makes the jubilee, it does but proclaim it. O that you would obtain the liberty which the trumpet proclaims.

But some of you may say, “I not only hear sermons, but I read the Bible regularly!” Yes, and I commend you for it, but if you imagine you are in a good and proper state because you are a Bible-reader, I must tell you that as an unbeliever you are condemned already, and, while reading the Bible, that very Bible itself condemns you. Go on with the reading of it-I am in hopes that you may get beyond that, to be a believer in Jesus; but as long as you are not a believer in Jesus, you may read your Bible as much as ever you will, it will not, cannot save you. What does our Saviour say? He says (so I read the original), “Ye search the Scriptures, for in them ye think ye have eternal life, and they are they that testify of me; but ye will not come unto me that ye may have life.” A great many in his days studied the Scriptures, but would not believe in him. You may be lost with a knowledge of Scripture as well as without it, if you tarry in the letter and go not to the spirit of the word.

There are others who are making an idol of brass out of their prayers. “I am not saved,” says one, “I have not trusted Christ, but I do pray.” Neither do I find fault with your prayers any more than I have a right to find fault with the brazen serpent in its place, but if you suppose you will be saved by praying, you are greatly mistaken. He that will not be saved by the cross shall never be saved by his closet. He that will not be saved by Christ’s wounds, shall not find salvation by his own groans and tears. There on the cross is all your hope, sinner, and if you will not have it there is no other; nay, though you hardened your knees with kneeling and blinded your eyes with weeping, you would find no gate of heaven and no hope of mercy but in the crucified Saviour. Fly to Jesus and you are saved, keep from Jesus and your prayers do but insult the Saviour, for you place them in his stead. I must break up these things-they are idols if they hide the cross of Jesus.

And so, to close, is it with all the unbelieving reasonings and rebellious considerings which some people so abound with. Seekers of Christ will some of them continually start new difficulties. If you solve one doubt they get another; if you solve that they invent a third. Their doubts, and reasonings, and questions, are like an endless chain; pull up one link and it brings up another. Their suspicions are like a chain of dredging buckets that come up all full of mire, and over they go and empty themselves but to come up full again. There is no comforting them; their soul refuseth to be comforted. If one tenth part of the ingenuity they use in rebelling against the command of God, which bids them believe, were used in simply investigating what they are told to believe, they would come to faith, and be saved from their doubts. Do you think you are wise in trying to discover reasons why you should be damned? I can hardly conceive of a man in the condemned cell-and that is where every unbeliever is-trying to find out reasons why he should not be pardoned. There lies the pardon before him, and he is perversely searching the whole treasury of logic to find out arguments against his pardon, and reasons for his execution. Thou fool, wilt thou perish through thy reasonings? Sinner, let me say to thee, let thine artful doubts and reasonings be nailed to yonder tree where Jesus died. Crucify them. You suspect too much, you consider too much, you question too much. Here it is-receive it as a little child receives his father’s word-“God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them.” “The Son of Man is come to seek and to save that which was lost.” “Whosoever believeth in him is not condemned.” “He that hath the Son of God hath life.” “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved;” for “He that believeth and is baptised shall be saved; but he that believeth not shall be damned.” Here all is simplicity; do not mystify it. Here all is clear as noonday; do not shut out the light. God grant you grace to break up these idols of yours, and take your Saviour now, for Jesus’ sake. Amen.

Portions of Scripture read before Sermon-Psalms 62 and 63.