It is the great joy of our heart that we do not labour in vain, nor spend our strength for naught. God is calling out from the congregations which gather here a people unto himself, who shall show forth his praise. Our heart is filled with adoring joy while we find company after company coming forward and saying, “We have found the Lord, because the Lord in mercy has found us.” Unto the name of the Ever Merciful be praise for ever and ever, because his hand is stretched out still, and the Spirit of the living God is not restrained among us. Still there is a bass to this music: there are some, and these not a few, who remain unblest where others are saved: this plot of ground is rained upon and another is not rained upon: the sun shines, and hearts, like wax, are melted, but other hearts, like clay, are hardened. This last and saddest of results has happened to some for whom we hoped better things; the almost persuaded have, in fact, been our peculiar trial. Some of you, my hearers, have remained under the sound of the gospel now for years, not without impression, but without conversion. The arrows of conviction have wounded your feelings, but they have not slain your sins. Ah, how many have disappointed their best friends in this respect! They have manifested the most hopeful appearance at times: their tears have glittered like the dewdrops of the summer’s morning, but, alas, their goodness has been like the morning cloud and the early dew in another respect, for it has vanished away, and they are as dry and graceless as ever they were. Nor is this all: they are even worse than they were before, for they have added to their sin, they have increased their responsibility, they have diminished the sensitiveness of their conscience, and the probabilities are daily increasing that they will perish in their sin. How terrible that they should go from the invitation of the gospel to the condemnation of the judgment seat; and that after having looked God’s minister of mercy in the face, they should have to confront the Greater Minister of justice, from whose face they will entreat the rocks and hills to hide them. Oh that these would come to their senses, and reason with themselves, then would they listen to the call of the text, which invites them to hold converse with their Lord, and receive his grace.

Amongst these persons there are some who in their hearts venture to lay the blame of their present condition upon God. They do not exactly say so, but they mean it. They would tremble to make the accusation in set terms, they would even think it blasphemy to do so, but this is the real intent of their thought. They complain that they cannot find peace with God, though they claim that they have used all means within their power, and have been really earnest, and prayerful. They go to hear the gospel, and love to hear it, they would be very sorry if they were not able to enter the place where their favourite minister preaches, for he affords them much delight, and even when he rebukes them they admire his boldness: but though they have heard the gospel, have heard it continuously, and claim to have heard it with good intent, yet no happy result has come to them; they have heard and their souls do not live, but they remain as they were, dead in trespasses and sin. It is not their fault, so they say, and we know, therefore, whose fault it must be. They have even prayed for salvation, and yet have not found it; their chambers can bear witness that sometimes they have bowed the knee in earnest supplication, and have cried to God, and this not once nor twice but many times: and yet they remain still in their sins as undecided, unregenerate, and unforgiven as ever. Surely, say they, “This is a strange thing, that hearing the gospel has not blessed us, and that crying unto God has not brought us an answer of peace. What can be the cause?”

It is obvious that something hinders. What can it be? The promises of God cannot fail. Why, then, are these seekers left in the dark? Some of these people are not anxious to know too much, and they will not be pleased when I state the true reason for their continuing without hope. They impute it to the sovereignty of God, or to some withholding of infinite love; they put the reason into some doctrinal shape or other, and quote a text or two, so as to look orthodox, but their meaning comes to this,-it is God’s fault that they are unsaved, it is certainly none of theirs. I wish that this bold way of stating their secret thought may convince them of the falsehood of it. At any rate to such I speak. Hearken to me, O ye who declare that ye would fain be saved but cannot be, O ye who say that you have been in earnest about salvation but God has not been moved by your entreaties. He bids you come near and reason with him, and end this cavilling. Come now and settle this matter, and end the dispute. It is not God who shuts you out of mercy; he declares on the contrary that as far as he is concerned he is a God ready to be gracious, and though your sins be as scarlet they shall be white as snow, though they be red like crimson they shall be as wool. He will not admit your insinuations against his grace, in the plainest possible terms he denies your imputations. He declares that the hindrance lies on your side and not on his, and he invites you to reason with him about it, that the truth may be clear to you. Come now, and argue with him, for I would speak on God’s behalf, and press his word upon you. Oh, that this morning, while the argument goes on, your reason might be taught right reason, and your conscience might be quickened to give assent to the truth which in God’s name I will declare to you, that so by the Spirit’s power, being subdued by the persuasions and reasonings which we would fain use this morning, you may yield yourselves unto God, for thus he says to you, “If ye be willing and obedient ye shall eat the good of the land; but if ye refuse and rebel ye shall be devoured by the sword, for the mouth of the Lord hath spoken it.”

It is most certain that the real reason why men who have an earnest desire to be saved, and have sincere religiousness of a certain sort, do not find peace is this, because they are in love with sin. Either some one sin is secretly indulged, or many sins are unrepented of and unforsaken. They provoke the Lord with their trespasses, and then hope to pacify him with their prayers. Hence it is altogether vain for them to tread God’s courts: in vain they pray, and in vain they attend upon religious ceremonies with the view of finding peace, for they have hidden the accursed thing in the midst of the camp, they are harbouring a traitor, and until this accursed thing is destroyed, and this traitor is driven out, they cannot be acceptable to God. To all such the Word of God says, “What hast thou to do with peace while thy offences are so many?” O, ungodly man, thy heart can never rest in God while it goes forth after its idols. As long as thou and thy sins are at peace, God and thy soul must be at war. Until thou art ready to be divorced from sin thou canst never be married to Christ. God will give salvation and the pardon of sin, and give them freely to the very chief of sinners, but the sinner must confess and forsake his sin. The Lord graciously says, “Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts, and let him turn unto the Lord and he will have mercy upon him, and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon”: but “There is no peace, saith my God, unto the wicked,” and his word solemnly declares that “God shall wound the head of his enemies, and the hairy scalp of such an one as goeth on in his trespasses.” About this matter we will talk this morning as the Lord shall help us, and may his Holy Spirit bless us therein.

“Come now, and let us reason together, saith the Lord.” Let us have this matter out, and hear what is to be urged in favour of God’s demands. It is a reasonable thing that sin should be renounced. As soon as I make that statement, every conscience here agrees with it. It is most reasonable, that if the rebel be pardoned, he should ground his arms and cease to be a rebel. Look at the demand for a minute, and it will strike you as being founded in right. It is most reasonable that we should renounce sin; that our heart should henceforth loathe it-first, because it is most inconsistent to suppose that pardon can be given while we continue in sin. Dear brethren, suppose God were to say to the ungodly man, “You may continue in your sin, and I will forgive you; you may go on in your rebellion, but I will never punish you for it;” what would this be but granting license to sin, and offering a premium to iniquity? How could the Judge of all the earth thus wink at iniquity? Would not the angels cease to sing, “Holy, holy, Lord God of Sabaoth,” if the Lord could act in this manner? Where would his justice be? where his righteousness? This were to make him-I speak with reverence-an accomplice in man’s sin, a justifier of transgression in the present, and a promoter of iniquity in the future. Where would moral government be, if the Lord bestowed his pardons upon those who persevere in transgression? Shall men fondle their sins, and yet be in a state of grace? Then might every adulterer and every thief say, “What mattereth it? I am forgiven. I will defile myself, and rob my neighbour yet more and more.” Only fancy what the effect would be upon our country if a proclamation were issued, that henceforth all manner of offences against the law would be immediately forgiven, and men might continue still to perpetrate them. We should hasten to emigrate from such a pandemonium. The wicked might approve of such a relaxation of the bonds of law, but it would be an awful curse to the righteous. If the judge of all the earth could possibly forgive sin while men continue to indulge in it, I do not see how the world could be inhabited; it would become a den of beasts, wild and without restraint, raging against all goodness, and even against themselves. The very pillars of society would be moved if sin could be at the same time indulged by the sinner and pardoned by the Lord. And what would be the effect upon the sinner himself if such could be the case? Say to a man-you arc not to be punished for your sin, and yet you may live in it still, and what worse turn could you do him? Why, sir, this would in some respects be a new curse to him. Here is a bleeding wound in my arm; the surgeon says he will allow it still to bleed, but he will remove my sense of faintness and pain. He will leave the mortal injury, but take away its attendant inconveniences, so that I may bleed to death and not know it? I would decline to have it so. Nay, let me bear the pain, if that will the more persuade me to seek the binding up of my wound. We do not want to be delivered from the punishment of sin, so much as from the sin itself, for sin bears its punishment in its bowels. Suppose there were no hell, no lake of fire into which the ungodly shall be cast, yet let the wicked live together, and indulge envy, revenge, and malice, and you will soon see that these passions would create hell. Turn men down together, and let them be selfish, ambitious, angry, lustful, jealous, and envious; take away all the restraints of moral government, and let their passions be indulged without a single hindrance. Oh, what a scene it would be! Imagine a den of wild beasts let loose upon one another! It would be a scene of peace and beauty compared with what this world would be if sin were patronised by a promise of pardon to the impenitent. Each man also would be hateful to himself; as long as he had sin within him it would be impossible for him to rest, his seething passions would boil against each other. Man is so constituted that sin means an unhealthy and unhappy condition. The machinery will not work easily unless it acts accurately; it is at once its glory and its burden that it is so. O mighty God, thy wisdom makes thee append suffering to sin. It is well that we should feel if we put our finger into the fire; it were a pity to take away the pain from the burning, lest a man should sit by the fire and lose limb after limb, and not be aware of it: in the same manner, also, it is most meet that the unhappiness caused by sin should give us warning of the mischief it is doing to us. We do not ask God to separate the suffering from the sin (let them stand as they are), but we want to be severed from the sin, and then the suffering will go as a matter of course. It is unreasonable, man, it is unreasonable that you should expect that God will allow you to remain impenitent, and yet give you the kiss of forgiving love. It would be neither honourable to God, nor good to your fellow-men, nor really beneficial to yourself.

Is it not reasonable, too, that we should part with sin, because sin is so grievous to God? I never know how to express my feelings when I read this first chapter of the prophet Isaiah. I have felt a heartbreaking sympathy with God when I have read those words, “I have nourished and brought up children, and they have rebelled against me.” It is so very sweet to us to have our children love us in return of our kindness to them; they are to us a very great joy and comfort, and we are very glad and thankful to God for their dutiful affection. But many a man has been ready to tear his hair when the boy that he dandled on his knee has treated him with wanton insult. With what sorrow and anguish has many a mother had to remember an ungrateful daughter! Such iron enters into the soul. Such draughts of gall embitter the inmost heart of life. And here is the good Lord, like David of old, crying, “O Israel, my son, my son.” To let us see how he regards sin he describes himself as calling the universe to witness to the ingratitude which has assailed him “Hear, O heavens, and give ear, O earth: I have nourished and brought up children, and they have rebelled against me. The ox knoweth his owner, and the ass his master’s crib: but Israel doth not know, my people doth not consider!” There is another plaintive expression in one of the prophets, “Oh, do not this abominable thing that I hate:” as though the Creator turned pleader to his own creatures, and said, “Do not follow after that which so provokes me, and is so detestable to me.” It is for our sakes that he is so grieved. We vex the Holy Spirit every time we go into sin, for he loves us much and cannot bear to see us so dreadfully hurting ourselves. Now, sinner, is it not most reasonable that if you would find peace with God you should cease from that which provokes him? Are you to go on thus vexing him and yet expect him to bless you? How would it be in your own case if you were a father? Would it not seem right and reasonable that the evil habit which vexed and broke your heart from day to day should be given up by your child? Would you not expect him to say, “My father, I did not know I was grieving thee so much as this, but now I do know it I turn from my folly: teach me how I may please thee and do that which is right in thy sight.”

A third reason why sin should be given up may also be found in the chapter before us, for I am strictly following the connection of the text. Should it not be given up because of the mischief it has already done to man? Look at yourself, unconverted man or woman, what happiness have your transgressions brought you? What peace has the love of sin produced in your spirit? What are you now? Why, according to your own confession, you are dissatisfied and ill at ease; sometimes thoughts of death haunt you and make you so wretched that you hardly know how to live: the dread of hell comes over you, and you have often wished you had never been born. You know it is so. You are well described in the chapter before us,-“The whole head is sick and the whole heart faint.” What has made you so sick and sorry? What but your wrong-doing? If you could prove that some good had come to yourself through sin, even then you ought to give it up for God’s sake, since it grieves him; but no good has ever come of it; ills of every sort are its only offspring. Look, prodigal, look at your rags, and see what your harlots and your boon companions have done for you! Look at what the citizens of the far-off country have done for you,-sent you into the fields to feed swine! In your degradation and your filthiness ask yourself is there not a cause? What has deprived you of the comforts of a father’s house? What has made you ready to eat the husks to stay your craving hunger? If you were wise you would hate the sin which has served you so badly; you would long to shake it off as Paul shook the viper into the fire, and cry to God. “Deliver me from it, O Lord, by thy Son Jesus Christ: for it is evil, only evil, and that continually; therefore cleanse thou me, O Lord.”

Remember also, my friend, that unless sin is repented of and forsaken no act of yours, nor ceremony of religion, nor hearing, nor praying can possibly save you. Do you see what these Jews did? They brought expensive offerings; they said, “We will be very generous to the cause of God,” and therefore they brought bullocks and rams and goats by hundreds. And what does God say of it? “To what purpose is the multitude of your sacrifices unto me? saith the Lord: I am full of the burnt offerings of rams, and the fat of fed beasts; and I delight not in the blood of bullocks, or of lambs, or of he goats. When ye come to appear before me, who hath required this at your hand, to tread my courts? Bring no more vain oblations; incense is an abomination unto me; the new moons and sabbaths, the calling of assemblies I cannot away with; it is iniquity, even the solemn meeting.” If their hearts had been right he would have accepted the smallest offering; a pair of turtle doves or two young pigeons would have been acceptable to him, but as long as they lived in uncleanness their sacrifices were vain oblations, and their sweet smelling incense was an abomination unto him. “Ah,” you have said, “I have given to the cause of God, and yet I have had no peace.” Does God accept what is given by one who practises dishonesty, or lives in pride, or revels in vice? “Ah,” say you, “but I have always attended the means of grace.” Yes, but suppose you go from the Tabernacle to the gin palace, will your coming here be acceptable with God? Suppose you go home to practice unholy living or continue in malice against your brother, can the Lord regard you? Suppose you go away from the assembly of the saints to find equally congenial company in the society of sinners: then I say to you in God’s name, who hath required this at your hands, that you should tread his courts? Does he want courtiers to surround his throne whose garments stink of the dens of Belial? Does he want your hymns, O ye who have been singing lascivious songs? Think ye he will endure it that men should rise from the bed of uncleanness and draw nigh to his altars? It is scandalous to decency: it is insulting to the infinite majesty of heaven; and yet how many there are who are secretly doing this. Let the consciences of those who hear the gospel, and yet live in known sin, attest the truth of my words; does not reason itself teach them that God must be rather angered than pleased by the worship of those who live in sin? I heard to my deep sorrow the other day of one who will walk several miles to hear me preach, and yet in the place where he lives he is known to be a drunkard. He glories in his admiration of the preacher, and yet lives scandalously. O sir, do you think the preacher gains by the admiration of such as you are? How much less can God be pleased with the adoration of men who live in open sin? Their worship is a dishonour to his blessed name. He calls your attendance at public worship the treading of his courts; it is nothing more than a mere trampling upon holy things, and if you dream that there is anything acceptable in such conduct you are grievously mistaken. If you come here that you may repent of your sins and forsake them, come and welcome; but if you imagine that coming up to the worship of God will procure the condoning of your offences you dote on a falsehood. Be not so deluded by Satan, but cast away this lie from your right hand.

“Well,” saith one, “but there must be something in prayer.” Hear, then, from the Lord’s own mouth what there is in prayer while you continue in sin. “When ye spread forth your hands, I will hide mine eyes from you: yea, when ye make many prayers, I will not hear: your hands are full of blood.” Though I cannot say of you that your hands are full of blood, yet if they are full of any sin which you love in your heart, your sacrifice will be an abomination unto God. Do you dare to bow the knee, and say, “O God, forgive me my sin, though I mean to continue in it”? How dare you offer such an impudent petition to the majesty of heaven? Is God to give you a dispensation,-a permit to sin with impunity? Is he such an One as you are, that he should answer such a wicked prayer? “O God,” you practically say, “give me a sense of peace with thee, and let me still be unholy.” God cannot hear such a request: I speak with reverence to his blessed name; God’s holy nature forbids that he should ever listen to such a blasphemous prayer. Alter it, and say “Lord, help me to give up my sin; Lord, help me to deal righteously with my neighbours; help me to love my fellow-men, and at the same time grant me forgiveness for the past for Jesus’ sake.” If this be your heart-felt language, the heavenly Father meets you freely, and says, “Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow.” But if you reply to that gracious word, “I am willing to accept the pardon, but am resolved to keep the sin,” his reply to you will be, “Ah, I will ease me of mine adversaries, and avenge me of mine enemies.” If you refuse and rebel there is no mercy for you, but the sword shall devour you, for the mouth of the Lord hath spoken it.

Thus have I reasoned upon one point: let me now go further, and declare that it is most reasonable that man should seek purity of heart. You ask for pardon and forgiveness, and in return God says to you, “Wash you, make you clean; put away the evil of your doings from before mine eyes, cease to do evil; learn to do well; seek judgment; relieve the oppressed; judge the fatherless; plead for the widow.” Is there not reason in this command? You practically say, “Lord, enter into amity and peace with me.” The Lord replies, “There is no peace to the wicked: only as you become renewed in nature can there be any peace between us.” Do you dare to ask God to commune with you while you are a lover of sin? Can two walk together except they be agreed? What communion hath Christ with Belial, what fellowship hath light with darkness? You cannot have amity with God till the evil of your doings is put away from before his eyes, and this he will enable you to do. Do you refuse the work of his grace? Do you decline to be purged from every false way? Then you also decline friendship with God. You ask the Lord to make you his child; when you pray you call him “Our Father, which art in heaven,” but do you not see that it is unreasonable to expect to be enrolled in his family and yet to remain the servant of Satan? What would the world say? “If this is one of God’s children, what a Father he must be who has such a family!” As it is, the faults and imperfections of the Lord’s children often cause men to blaspheme his name, but at any rate his children desire to be clean from sin, and he has not a child in the world that is in love with evil; this is one of the marks of his children, that they hate iniquity, and that sin is a plague and burden to them. John says, “In this the children of God are manifest, and the children of the devil: whosoever doeth not righteousness is not of God, neither he that loveth not his brother.” Shall the drunkard, the liar, the oppressor, the revengeful, the pitiless, the greedy, the dishonest be called the sons of God? Shall fornicators and persons of unclean lives be called his children? True, he takes such into his household, by his mighty grace, but he washes, cleanses, and sanctifies them, making them new creatures in Christ Jesus. He receives them while they are sick with sin, but it is in order to their healing, and if that healing be refused they cannot become his sons at all.

You have asked to be a disciple of Christ in your prayer. I ask you again, how is it reasonable that you should be recognised as a disciple of Christ if you will not imitate his character, and if you do not desire to obey his commands? This man a disciple of Christ! And yet he remains an habitual drunkard, or carries on a dishonest trade, or lives in unchastity! Can he really be a Christian? Every hallowed name forbids. Such a man is a servant of the devil, not of Jesus. His servants ye are whom ye obey; there is no mistake about that matter. He that doeth sin is the servant of sin. If you yield yourselves unto evil then ye are the servants of evil, and the wrath of God abides upon you.

Often, too, you pray the Lord to take you to heaven when you die, and yet you intend to remain in your sins. Whence is this folly? Are you devoid of thought? What, carry your sins into heaven! Carry hell into heaven! Man, hast thou any reason left in thee to expect God to have it so? Shall even his own courts, where his glory blazes forth with ineffable splendour, be defiled with that which his soul abhors? Shall his enemies be admitted to insult him to his face in his own palace? It cannot be. Holiness will never brook such an intrusion; heaven’s portals are guarded by omnipotence, and cannot be invaded by his enemies.

“Those holy gates for ever bar

Pollution, sin, and shame;

None can obtain admission there

But followers of the Lamb.”

Now, my hearer, let us reason together still in God’s name, while the word of the Lord shows you what it is you must be willing to become as the result of salvation. Look at the portrait drawn by Isaiah; it pictures the truly pardoned man’s life towards his fellow-man. It sets him forth in those lovely colours in which the Spirit of God has adorned him. Read the 16th and 17th verses. The pardoned man has by grace been washed and made clean, his life is pure, upright, and commendable. He has put away the evil of his doings from before God’s eyes, that is to say, he not only shuns open sin before the eyes of man, but he hates that also which is only seen by the eyes of God; he desires to be cleansed from secret faults, and to be pure within. He has also, by grace, been led to cease to do evil; he breaks off his sins by righteousness, and flees from unholy habits; at the same time he learns to do well; he is not perfect yet, he is a scholar and he is learning, but with all his heart he studies to be practically holy, and by divine teaching he is instructed in righteousness. He seeks judgment, and desires to deal faithfully with all, to be honest and upright, and to walk in all integrity, true to the word he speaks, even when it is to his own loss; he counts his simple word to be as binding as another man’s oath, and scorns to profit by a falsehood. Nor is this all, the grace of God teaches him to love his neighbour as himself, and, therefore, he relieves the poor and oppressed, and is the generous friend of the fatherless and the widow. In almsgiving and deeds of Christian love he abounds. Here is the portrait. Do you admire it? Do you wish to be made like it? God’s grace is willing to make you this, are you willing that it should operate upon you? If on the other hand your hard heart cries out, “No, I want pardon and peace, but I do not wish to be renewed in heart,” then the reply is-there is no peace for you. You are not to be saved by or for your good works, but God’s salvation brings these to those in whom it works. God will not separate santification from justification, nor free remission from regeneration. Pardon must be followed by purity, and grace by the graces. If any man will be forgiven his sin, he must also be renewed in nature, and submit to be moulded into the blessed likeness of the Lord Jesus Christ. Have you been made willing that such should be your case?

If the sinner remain impenitent it is most unreasonable for him to lay the blame of his not being forgiven upon the character of God, for God is ready to forgive. Those who impute an unforgiving spirit to the Lord do lie, and know not the truth. God gives the master argument to confute that slander by saying-“Though your sins be as scarlet they shall be as white as snow; though they be red like crimson they shall be as wool.” He is both willing and able to forgive. He is prepared to remove the ingrained sins of our nature. Scarlet dye was fixed in the very wool of the fabric before it was made up, and so is sin inwrought into our being. We were sinners by nature before we were sinners by practice: but this deep-seated stain of our nature he is able to remove, so as to make us white as snow. Though your sins should be double-dyed as crimson was, though you should have sinned again and again and again, multiplying your transgressions, yet he is able to cleanse you; and though you should have continued long in sin as the scarlet cloth lies long in the dye, and though your sins should be glaring and startling as scarlet and crimson colours are, yea, though they should be imperial sins, as though you had put on a royal robe to defy the sovereignty of God, yet even these shall be forgiven perfectly by his grace. Not only shall some of the more glaring colour be taken out of our character, but the scarlet shall be white as snow, and the crimson, red as it was, shall be as wool; and all this by the free, unmerited grace of God. There is perfect pardon to be had by the vilest transgressor; immediate and irreversible pardon is freely given according to God’s infinite mercy and abounding grace to the very chief of sinners. He waits to bestow mercy on the sons of men, and, therefore, if you have it not it is not because God is hard to propitiate. He delighteth in mercy; to the ends of the earth he makes proclamation “Let us reason together, though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow.”

Here is the last point upon which we will argue. It is a reasonable thing that God should demand with this pardon obedience to his command. And what is that command? It is, “If ye be willing and obedient ye shall eat the good of the land; but if ye refuse and rebel the sword shall devour you.” Great Lord, it seems most strange that men should be unwilling to be saved from their sins, and unwilling to follow the direction of perfect love! Yet, so perverse is human nature, that till thy grace makes men willing they never will lay hold upon thy abounding mercy and transcendent forgiveness, but prefer to abide in their sins. Sinner, here is the great question-are you willing? “Willing for what? I am willing to be saved from hell.” Ah, who is not? What criminal is not willing to be saved from prison or the gallows? Are you willing to be saved from yourself, to be saved from loving the sin which now enthralls you, to be saved from finding pleasure in the unholiness which now enchants you, to be saved from the indulgence of evil passions which tyrannize over you; to be saved, in a word, from sin? Are you willing? Some say that they are, but when it comes to the test, and a sweet sin comes before them, like a painted Jezebel, then they are bewitched by it, they fall into its arms, and let Jesus go. Are you willing to give up any sin for Christ and every sin for Christ? The Lord demands this of you. Oh, may he also grant it to you, turning your heart of stone into a heart of flesh. May you be made truly willing to be saved from sin in God’s way, that is, by simply believing in Jesus, believing in Jesus not that you may get rid of the past merely, but be delivered from the present dominion of evil. If ye be willing, there is the point. His people shall be willing in the day of his power, and if you are not willing, and live and die unwilling, you are none of his. Then it is added, “If ye be obedient.” Whenever the Lord saves a soul he will make that soul obedient, for Jesus Christ will not take into his army soldiers who mutiny against his commands. “If ye be willing and obedient.” Obedient to what? Obedient to all gospel precepts. “Repent;” let sin be hateful to you; “Repent and be converted,” that is, turn round to seek after other things and better things than you sought before. Are you willing to obey his command to love one another as Christ also hath loved you? Are you willing to be obedient to the command, “Cease to do evil, learn to do well”? “Oh,” saith one, “I am willing enough to be obedient, but where is the strength to come from?” Ah, my blessed Lord does not ask you to find the strength; for that you may look to him. If you are willing he will grant you the power; nay, in making you willing he has already begun the work. If this morning he has made you truly willing to give up sin, his blessed Spirit will never leave you till sin is overcome. Jesus is able to cleanse you from the power of sin as well as from the guilt of it. The point is this-has he made you willing to be made holy? Are you at this present moment willing to be washed and cleansed? Do not answer this question till you have looked at it and marked the self-denial it will cost you. After doing so I fear that honesty will compel some of you to say, “I am not prepared to undergo the change which is here proposed.” You know, my hearer, that sin in some attractive form is very sweet to you, and while it is so there can be no hope of pardon for you.

You think, perhaps, that I spoke sharply just now. The Lord knows I desire to speak in all gentleness of spirit, but I must be faithful to your souls, and by God’s help I will be. As I look round I am not so utterly ignorant of you all as not to know that there are some here who love to hear me preach, and yet they love their sins. They know their characters are disgraceful, and yet they pretend to believe that they are going to heaven because they have a notional faith in Jesus. Now, sirs, when you wake up in the day of judgment and find yourselves deceived, you will be forced to own that I have not deceived you. I have never preached to you that you may live in sin if you only believe in Jesus: I have never preached that you shall be saved without being purified in heart. No, the salvation which this pulpit has proclaimed is not salvation in sin but salvation from sin, not a licence to evil but a deliverance from evil. The two-edged sword of our gospel divides between men and sin, and slays all the hopes of the impenitent and disobedient. “Be not deceived, God is not mocked; whatsoever a man soweth that shall he also reap.” “Without holiness no man shall see the Lord”: this holiness is his gift to you. Deliverance from sin is not a work of the flesh, but a work of grace: it does not spring from legal bondage, but from the gracious work of the blessed Spirit: but you must have it, you must have it, and if you will not have holiness neither shall you have heaven. There shall be no blotting out of sin unless there is a ransom from the dominion of sin. May God help you to be honest with yourself and honest with your God, who again invites you to reason with him, and entreats you not to be so unreasonable as to continue in sin and yet expect forgiveness. He invites you to cast out that evil, which is as much your enemy as it is his. He points to this stumbling-block which lies at your door, and bids you will to have it removed. He begs you to come to your senses, and awake from your dreams. Your past sin he is fully prepared to obliterate for ever, but it is your love of sin which lies in the way. O that you would from your heart give it up, and follow after better things. May he help you now to say, “O Lord, I desire to be made pure and holy; give me strength, I pray thee, to overcome temptation, and walk in the way of thy commandments. I would be holy, even as thou art holy. To will is present with me, give me also power to do that which I would. O Lord, I would renounce my old sins, my constitutional sins, my once beloved sins. I do not ask to be tolerated in any one of them, but would be delivered from every false way, for Jesus’ sake. Help me, O Lord.” Your heavenly Father stands ready to help you, prepared to help you. Though you are as yet a great way off, he comes to meet you and opens his arms to embrace you. For the sake of the atoning sacrifice of Jesus he has passed an act of amnesty and oblivion for all the past, and he will rule over you for the future with the gentle sceptre of his holy love. “If ye be willing and obedient”-are you indeed so? May God grant you a subdued will and a submissive mind, for Jesus’ sake. Amen.

Portion of Scripture read before Sermon-Isaiah 1.

Hymns from “Our Own Hymn Book”-176, 459, 489.

AMAZING GRACE

A Sermon

delivered by

C. H. SPURGEON,

at the metropolitan tabernacle, newington.

“I have seen his ways, and will heal him: I will lead him also, and restore comforts unto him and to his mourners.”-Isaiah 57:18.

There are a few objects in nature which never cease to astonish the beholder. I think Humboldt said he could never look upon the rolling prairies without astonishment: and I suppose some of us will never be able to look upon the ocean, or to see the sun rise or set without feeling that we have before us something always fresh and always new. Now, I have been, not only for the love of it, but because of my calling of preaching it, a constant reader of Holy Scripture, and yet after these five-and-twenty years and more I frequently alight upon well known passages which astonish me as much as ever. As if I had never heard them before, they come upon me, not merely with freshness, but even so as to cause amazement in my soul. This is one of those portions of Scripture. When I read the chapter describing the wickedness, the horrible wickedness, of Israel-when I notice the strong terms which inspiration uses, and none of them too strong, to set forth the horrible wickedness of the nation-it staggers me. And then to see mercy following instead of judgment! It overwhelms me! “I have seen his ways, and”-it is not added “I will destroy him; I will sweep him away”-but “I will heal him.” Verily God’s grace, like the great mountains, cannot be scaled; like the deeps of the sea, it can never be fathomed, and, like space, it can never be measured. It is, like God himself, wondrous, matchless, boundless. “Oh, the depths! Oh, the depths.”

I shall try to set forth the astounding grace of God, as his Spirit shall enable me, by showing, first, that the sinner is beheld by God.-“I have seen his ways.” And yet the sinner is nevertheless the object of divine mercy-“I will heal him: I will lead him also, and restore comforts unto him and to his mourners.”

The text declares that the sinner has been observed of the Lord. Many a man relieves an unknown person in distress whom he would not think of helping if he knew his character. Some generous hearts are perpetually victimised in this way: they deal out their money to those who are altogether unworthy, but if they knew of this unworthiness they would not be so free with their gifts. Now, the Lord is aware of the unworthiness of those to whom he deals out his grace, and it is the glory of that grace that he pours it upon the utterly undeserving. He knows exactly what men are, and yet he is kind to the evil and to the unthankful. He gives his grace to those who, like Manasseh, and Saul of Tarsus, and the dying thief, have nothing but sin about them, and deserve his hot displeasure rather than his gracious love.

Notice, first, that God’s omniscience has observed the sinner. Man while living in rebellion against God is as much under his Maker’s eye as the bees in a glass hive are under your eye when you stand and watch all their movements. The eye of Jehovah never sleeps; it is never taken off from a single creature he has made. He sees man-sees him everywhere-sees him through and through, so that he not only hears his words but knows his thoughts,-does not merely behold his actions but weighs his motives, and knows what is in the man as well as that which comes out of the man. One is often led to cry, “Such knowledge is too wonderful for me; it is high; I cannot attain unto it.” That God should know all, even all the little things about man’s sin is a dreadful thing for unpardoned souls to think of. I was reading the other day a very pretty observation upon one of our Saviour’s sayings, and I cannot help telling it to you. You remember he says two sparrows are sold for a farthing, and yet one of them does not light on the ground without your Father. But in another passage he says, “Are not five sparrows sold for two farthings? And not one of them is forgotten of God.” Do you notice that? Two for a farthing-five for two farthings; so there is an odd one thrown in for taking a double quantity. Only a sparrow! Nobody cares about that odd sparrow, but not one of them is forgotten of your heavenly Father-not the odd sparrow even. And so no stray thought of yours, no imagination, no trifle which you have quite forgotten, which indeed you never took any heed of, has escaped your heavenly Father’s notice. The text is true to the fullest possible extent “I have seen his ways.” God has seen your ways at home, your ways abroad, your ways in the shop, your ways in the bedchamber, your ways within as well as your ways without,-the ways of your judgment, the ways of your hope, the ways of your desire, the ways of your evil lustings, the ways of your murmurings, the ways of your pride. He has seen them all, and seen them perfectly and completely; and the wonder is that, after seeing all, he has not cut us down, but instead of it has proclaimed this amazing word of mercy, “I have seen his ways, and will heal him. I have seen all that he has done, and yet for all that I will not cast him from my presence, but I will put my mercy and my wisdom to work with divine skill to heal this sinner of the wickedness of his soul.”

While we were reading the chapter I could not help feeling that it was a chapter almost too strong to read in public, I looked it through and through, and I said, “Shall I read it?” Some of its allusions are so painful that one can think of them, but one would not like to explain them. Divine wisdom could not find anything but vices which are scarcely to be mentioned to describe the wickedness of the human heart. It is so foul a thing that he must compare it to the lewdness and filthiness of those who are given over to the utter rottenness of licentiousness. And yet, after so describing the character, the Lord says, “I have seen his ways, and will heal him. I have seen everything bad in his ways, and I have perceived nothing good in them, but nevertheless, though I know all his conduct, and see the filthiness of it all, yet will I come to him, and I will heal him.”

You noticed while I was reading that the persons described were a people who had scoffed at religion. “Against whom do ye sport yourselves? against whom make ye a wide mouth, and draw out the tongue?” They had made the name and honour of God the subjects of profane sport. They had ridiculed God’s people-calling them hypocrites, fanatics, enthusiasts, or whatever else happened to be the cant names with which they bespattered saints in those days. They had jested at virtue, and jeered at piety; and yet the Lord says, “I have seen his ways. I have heard his ungodly jests and taunting ridicule. I know his sarcasms. I know what falsehoods, what slanders, he pours forth upon my own beloved people, and my wrath rises against those that touch my anointed; but for all that I will heal him. I have seen him put out his tongue at the name of Jesus: I have seen him behave exceeding proudly when my gospel has been the subject of conversation; but for all that, though I have seen his haughty ways, I will heal him.” Oh, the splendour of this grace! Is this the manner of men, O Lord God? Surely, high as the heavens are above the earth, so high are thy ways above our ways.

These people seem to have been quite infatuated by sin. According to the Scriptures, you will see that they could not have enough of it. What mountain was there upon which Israel had not set up her altars? What stone was there, polished by the flow of the stream, which they had not consecrated to an idol? What giant oak was there throughout all Bashan under which they had not performed mystic and diabolical rites to the false god? The land was stained with the blood of their children offered to Moloch; yea, it reeked with their infamous sins; for in the worship of their false gods their orgies were full of lewdness, and all manner of indescribable iniquities. Yet the Ever-merciful says, “I have seen it. I have seen behind the door what they have done. I have seen in the high mountains what they have done. I have seen their abominations in the groves and thickets. I have seen how eager they are after sin-how they drink it down like behemoth, who thinks to drink down Jordan at a draught. They add lust to lust in their pursuit of sin till they are maddened with it. I have seen that they are desperate sinners, but I will heal them, I will heal them.” Oh beloved, this text sounds so strangely good, so singularly gracious, so exquisitely merciful, that it holds me spellbound. It is such a surprise. Just when the harsh drum begins to sound, and war is about to let slip her dogs, there comes an unexpected pause, and meek-eyed pity, with a thousand tears, steps forward and cries, “I love them still. Only let them renounce their ways, and to my bosom they shall be pressed, and their horrible sins shall be forgiven.”

There is one expression I must dwell upon, because it is so remarkable. I should never have dared to use it if inspiration had not employed it. It is that expression in verse 9, where the Lord says, “Thou didst debase thyself even unto hell”-even unto hell. When a man debases himself down as low as the swine trough, that is low enough, and there are many who do that. The drunkard goes lower than the sow, for no sow would habitually intoxicate itself: few animals would even touch the defiling concoction. We talk of a man’s being like a beast, but the beasts are hardly done by when we compare drunkards with them. Men sink below the mere animal, because being capable of so much higher things they make a more terrible descent when they yield themselves up to their baser appetites. Alas, there are vices of human nature from which the cattle of the field are exempt: man has debased himself below the creature over which he has received dominion. The prophet says, “they debase themselves even unto hell.” I say, a man does that when he defies his Maker and blasphemes his Saviour, when after every other word he uses an oath, and lards his conversation with profane expressions, as some do. What good can there be in such wanton wickedness? What is to be gained by it? I suppose the devil himself is not such a blasphemer as some people are whom we have the misery to hear, even in our streets, as we walk along, for I suppose he has some method in his profanity, but they use it in mere lack of other words. Men sink to the level of the devil when they are unkind to their aged parents, or on the other hand unnatural to their own offspring. What shall I say of the abominable cruelty of some men to their wives? I believe that if the devil had a wife he would not treat her as many working men treat their wives. Creatures called men are frequently brought up before our police-courts, and the charges proved against them make us disgusted altogether with human nature. Would the fierce lion, the savage tiger, or the wild boar treat his mate so ill? O how many are thus debased unto hell! Yet, yet should this reach the ear of any one who has thus debased himself let him listen to this-“I have seen his ways. I have seen him debase himself even unto hell; yet will I heal him, and lead him, and restore comforts unto him.”

“Why,” says one, “that seems too good to be true.” It does; and were you dealing with men it would be too good to be true, but you are dealing with one of whom it is written, “Who is a God like unto thee, passing by transgression, iniquity, and sin?” “for all manner of sin and of blasphemy shall be forgiven unto men.” “The blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sin.” I say, once more, I do not know how to put this declaration of grace into words forcible enough. I stand astonished. I am not here to explain, I cannot explain it. I am here to set it forth, but I cannot even do that. It does so amaze me that God’s electing love should cast its eye upon the very vilest of the vile, and then that he should say, “I have seen him. I know what he has done. I understand it all: and yet, nevertheless, I mean to save him, and save him I will.” Heaven itself shall be amazed that ever such a wretch was saved, and hell itself shall tremble in its lowest deeps while it sees against what a gracious God it has dared to offend.

But I must proceed to notice, next, that God had not only seen their ways in the sense of omniscience but he had inspected their ways in the sense of judgment. He says, “I was wroth and I hid myself.” O, sinners, do not think because we come to-night to preach free grace and dying love to you, and proclaim full pardon through the blood of Jesus, that therefore God winks at sin. No, he is a terrible God, and will by no means spare the guilty. As surely as fire consumes the stubble so does his wrath burn against wickedness, and he will utterly destroy it from off the face of the earth, for “God is angry with the wicked every day.” Do not think that when these sinners of old worshipped idols, the Lord was careless as to what they did. Do not imagine that when they thrust out the tongue and mocked him he was indifferent and sat still as if he had been made of stone. Far from it. It provoked his holy mind: for he cannot look upon iniquity, neither shall evil dwell with him. He is as a consuming fire against evil, and will by no means tolerate it. And yet-and yet-he whom the angels call “Holy, holy, holy, Lord God of Sabaoth”-the jealous God, the God who revengeth and is furious against sin, even he has said, “I have seen his ways and will heal him.” Ah, if it were a matter of indifference to him-if God were hardened so that he did not care about sin as some men are, or if he were only half-sensitive to sin as we are, I could understand his forgiving sin; but when I remember that sin does as it were touch the apple of his eye, and move his heart, and vex his spirit, then I am amazed that in the same moment in which he denounces sin he looks on the sinner, and says, with tears of pity, “I have seen his ways, and will heal him. He is my child though he has played the prodigal. I hate his harlotry and the riotous living with which he has wasted his estate and mine. I hate the swine-trough and the citizens of the far-off country, but my child, my child, I love him still; and when he comes back to me I will receive him with a kiss, and I will say, ‘Bring forth the best robe and put it on him: put a ring on his hand and shoes on his feet; and let us eat and be merry: for this my son which was dead is alive again; he that was lost is found.’ ” I cannot trust myself to expatiate on this Godlike miracle of love: it is very wonderful to me and deeply touches my heart.

Yet once more on this point. It was not only that God had seen and observed the rebel, and had judged the evil of his sin, but the Lord had tested him. If you read the chapter through you will see that God says that he had attempted to reclaim him by chastisements. He says, “For the iniquity of his covetousness was I wroth, and smote him: I hid me, and was wroth, and he went on frowardly in the way of his heart.” You see, then, that the Lord tested the man. He said to himself, “Perhaps he does not feel the evil of sin. I will make him smart. These people have worshipped false gods. I will send a famine: I will send a pestilence: I will give them over into the hand of their enemies, and then perhaps they will repent.” And so God did this to Israel, and the nation was brought very low. But what was the result? Did they turn under the chastening rod and confess their sin? Did they humble themselves before God? No. He says of the nation, “He went on frowardly in the way of his heart.”

How often it happens that when the Lord commences a work of grace on men he begins with some terrible judgment, laying them low that he may lift them up in due time. But how often these visitations end in disappointment! The man is sick: he lies suffering on the brink of eternity. He makes promises of reformation, but what happens when he recovers? Why, he forgets it all, and is, if anything, worse than before. Or the man is brought low by his sin, even to beggary. How often have I seen this; a man of respectable parents shivering in his rags. But when he is in his poverty does he turn from his vices? No, he whines about his follies when he sues for a little help, but when he gets it he spends the charity in drink, and continues as degraded as ever he was. Worse and worse is the way of the wicked, even though their sorrows are multiplied. Ah, my friends, all the afflictions in the world, apart from the grace of God, will only harden men. When the Lord in his mercy sends sharp providences to stir men up in their nests, and make them feel that sin is an evil thing, the general result of it-nay, the constant result of it, apart from divine grace-is that the man continues in his sin just the same as before, or only flies from one form of it to another. He is wounded by the goad, but he does not yield: he kicks against the pricks. He thinks that God has treated him very hardly. He drives himself farther off from God, and runs into despair, and says there is no hope, and therefore he may as well live as he list: he may as well be hung for a sheep as for a lamb, and so he plunges deeper and deeper into rebellion.

Yet notice the grace of our text and be again astonished! This person had been chastened in vain and even hardened by affliction, and yet God says, “I have seen his ways. I have seen how he grows worse and worse. I have seen how he hardens his neck. I have seen what a brazen forehead he has, and what a neck of iron he dares to lift up against me. I have seen it all, but thus my eternal purpose runs-“I will heal him, I will do it. I will let all the world see that grace is stronger than sin, and everlasting mercy is not to be cut short even by infamous transgressions.” Oh, the depths of divine love! Truly it is past finding out.

Now, before I go to the second part of the subject I must say this. I am not speaking now of cases which happen now and then; neither am I talking about men that lived years ago, like John Newton, the African blasphemer, or John Bunyan, the village rebel. No, I am talking about a great many here before me. To a great extent I am talking about myself. I know that in me there was nothing that could have caught the eye of God to merit his regard: I know that, if I was not permitted to indulge in grosser vices, yet I went as far as I could, and should have gone infinitely farther if it had not been for his restraining grace; and in my case I feel that it is as much the free sovereign undeserved mercy of God that I am this night saved, as that the poor thief when dying on the cross received the promise, “To-day shalt thou be with me in paradise.” In every case, whether we have been moral or immoral, salvation is altogether a matter of pure favour, and in every case God has virtually said of us, “I have seen his ways. I cannot see anything good in them. I see only what I abhor: but nevertheless I will heal him.” The tears may well stand in our eyes as we think of this, I am sure they do in mine. A poor half-witted man was asked by his minister how he came to be saved, and he said, “It was between me and God. God did his part and I did the other.” “Well,” said the minister, “what part did you do?” The answer was, “God saved me, and I stood in his way.” That is the part, I must confess, in which I was most conspicuous. I was very stubborn and wilful, and put from me the invitations of the Lord’s love. I willed to remain a rebel, but he would not have it so. Did I not resist his Spirit? Did I not put from me his gospel? Did I not resolve to abide in my self-righteousness, and continue as I was? But he would not suffer it to be so, and at last I was compelled to cry, “I yield to the all-conquering grace of God, and bless the hand that sweetly bows me to its mighty sway.”

Now we will turn to the second part of our discourse, and pause awhile while you relieve yourselves with a cough.

Notwithstanding all that we have said, the chosen sinner is the object of divine mercy to an extraordinary degree. Thus saith the Lord, “I have seen his ways, and will heal him: I will lead him also, and restore comforts unto him and to his mourners.” Notice how God speaks. Observe the tone and spirit of his declaration. “I will,” says he: “I will, I will, I will.” Now “I will” and “I shall” are for the king, nay in the highest sense they are only becoming when used by God himself. It is not for you and for me to say “I will:” we shall speak more wisely if we declare that we will if we can. We will if--God needs no “ifs.” “I have seen his ways,” he says: “I know what a rebel he is, but I will heal him. I know how sick he is, for from the crown of his head to the sole of his foot, nothing but bruises and putrefying sores are to be seen, but I will heal him.” He speaks like a God-“I will.” There is no condition expressed, and there is no “peradventure” or “but,” because there is no condition. He does not say, “If he will.” No, when God says “I will,” man will be made willing: be sure of that. He does not say, “I will, if man will do a part of it.” No, but “I will.” But suppose that he would not. Ay, that is not to be supposed. The Lord knows how, without violating the human will (which he never does), so to influence the heart that the man with full consent, against his former will, yields to the will of God, and is made willing in the day of God’s power. I always like to think as I am preaching here, “Now, whether or not there will be anybody saved by the gospel I preach does not depend upon whether they have come up here willing or unwilling, for the Lord hath said, ‘My people shall be willing in the day of my power.’ ” There is a higher power than the human will, whatever power there may be in that, and there certainly is a very great power, neither do I wish to deny the fact; but there is a higher power than the will of man, else man were God, and the will of man would be omnipotence. The Lord knows how, by sacred arts of wondrous grace, to make the stout free will of man yield itself to the perfect free will of God and thus he takes the sinner captive and leads him in triumph to the feet of Christ. Glory be to God for this. If the salvation of men depended upon their being willing, and no prevenient grace ever came to unwilling sinners, there is not one soul in all our race that ever would be saved, for we err and stray from God’s ways like lost sheep, and if God waited till we came to him of ourselves, he would wait for ever in vain. No. The Good Shepherd goes after the sheep-follows it, tracks it, seizes it, throws it on his shoulders, and carries it home rejoicing. We to-night bless that mighty grace which did not stop for us to seek it, but sought us. It was like the dew which waiteth not for men, neither tarrieth for the sons of men, but comes in all its blessed cheering influences and makes the earth glad. Oh, mighty grace of God, come in that way to-night to this crowd of poor sinners without “ifs,” “buts,” or conditions.

Now, notice that this was the only good thing that could be done with Israel. There were two courses possible. Here is Israel bent on sin, here is God angry with that sin, and hating it with all his soul:-Israel can be destroyed: that is one thing, and it is an easy matter. The Lord has only to call flood, fire, famine, fever, or war, to sweep the nation away; but then he is full of love, and judgment is his strange work. What is to be done then? He must either mend them or end them-one of the two. He cannot let them go on as they are: which shall it be, destruction or salvation? He looks at them and says, “I will heal them: that is what I will do with them. I cannot endure that they should act as they do. I will therefore set to work upon them as a physician does upon a sick patient. Though the case would be quite hopeless unless I were omnipotent, I will bring my omnipotent love to bear on this foul, leprous, rotting, loathsome sinner, and I will make him clean, pure, and lovely. I will heal him. I cannot leave him in my universe as he is, for he spreads infection all around. He defiles my sanctuary, he profanes my Sabbaths, he pollutes the very air he breathes; he must not be suffered to go on in this way. What must I do with him? I will not destroy him, but I will heal him.” Oh, the wonder of divine mercy that ever the Lord should say that.

But do you not know that this is just the spirit which the Lord Jesus creates in the heart of his really consecrated servants towards the wicked and the fallen? Here they are in this world, brethren, we cannot put them out of it, and we would not if we could. We are very sorry whenever the majesty of law does require the destruction of a single guilty life. What are we to do, then, with the criminal classes-with depraved men and fallen women? What are we to do with cannibals and heathens? In God’s name we must cure them with the blessed medicine which has cured us. Think of John Williams. He hears of Erromanga. What is there in Erromanga to induce John Williams to go there? Are they a hopeful sort of people? No, they are hideous cannibals; they devour men. Will they receive Mr. Williams if he lands? Will they listen to him with respect? Not they. The probabilities are that they will lift the war club, and he will not escape with his life. What did that devoted missionary feel? “Those are the people that need me, and to those I will go beyond all others.” And so he went, and Williams in landing at Erromanga, and in dying there, is a feeble type of Jesus coming to an ungodly and graceless world, not because there was anything good in it, but because there was no good whatever-not because they would welcome him, but because they were so fallen that they would crucify him. The sinfulness of man was his need of a Saviour’s coming, and for that very reason Jesus came. Did he not say, “I am not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance. I am come as a physician, and the physician has nothing to do with the healthy, his business lies with the sick; and I am come therefore to deal with sin-sick souls.” What a wondrous thing this is that God should look upon sin and say, “I see it all, and I hate it all; but, nevertheless, I mean to heal the sinner, and to lift him up from his degradation.” May the Lord say that to you, dear hearer, if you are still dead in sin.

Now, notice how the Lord puts his hand to the work. He heals sin as a disease. He cannot look at it in any other light without destroying men. He says, “These creatures of mine do not love me; they must be diseased in their minds, I will heal them. They see no loveliness in my Son: they must be blind, I will open their eyes.” Thus mercifully tracing our sin to its cause the Lord manifests his grace and heals the maladies of our nature.

And, blessed be God, the disease that we suffer from is a disease which he knows all about, because the text says, “I have seen his ways.” Oh sinner, you will not have to tell God the symptoms of your complaint: he has seen your ways, he has seen right through your heart, and there is no physician so able to deal with a patient as the man who knows the constitution of the patient, and knows his habits, and knows all his secret history. God knows all that, and, because he knows it, it is a blessed thing that he-he, himself-with that infinite knowledge says, “I will heal him.” Who else but he would know enough to be able to heal a sinner of all the sin that lies concealed within him?

And God does in very deed heal sinners. I daresay you have heard the common talk in the world. They say, “These evangelical ministers preach salvation for sinners; what is this but encouraging sin?” The gentlemen who make the observation are generally not particularly sweet themselves, but, however, we will say nothing about that; although it is an odd thing to hear accusations against the morality of the gospel from gentlemen whose own morality is not of the most delicate kind. But, still; we have a better answer. Suppose we open a hospital. Thank God, there are many in London! Here is a fever hospital. Do you hear people objecting, “Oh, you are encouraging fever.” The only qualification for admission to a fever hospital is for a person to have a fever: if they have the fever they can come in. If it is a small-pox hospital, the only thing that is wanted is that they shall have the small-pox, and they may enter freely. Why don’t you cry that this free statement of gratuitous admission will encourage contagious diseases. Fools! You know better. You know that the hospital is the enemy of the disease, and men are received in sickness that they may be delivered from its power. You know that it is the same with the gospel. We almost scorn to answer you; for you must be aware that to say that Jesus Christ is able to take the very vilest sinner and to save him is to promote morality in the best manner. What is salvation? Do you think we mean by that the saving people from going down to hell, and letting them live as they lived before? We never meant anything of the sort. We mean that Jesus Christ heals people of the disease of sin; that is to say, he takes the sin away, changes their mind, renews their heart, makes them hate the sin which once they loved, and leads them to seek after the holiness which once they despised. It is true he has opened a house for thieves, drunkards, and harlots; and set the door wide open and said, “Come and welcome.” But what for? Why, the sinner who enters comes to be no more a drunkard, to be no more a thief, to be no more unchaste: for this object is the guilty one invited to come to Christ, that he may have his heart renewed, not that he may have his putrid sores bound up and skinned over with some Madame Rachel stuff that may conceal the evil, but that the gangrene may be cut out and the ulcer may be removed, and the dire cancer may be torn up by the roots. This is what the gospel is for, and Jesus Christ proclaims to-night by these lips of mine that however guilty you may have been, if you desire to be healed from the plague of sin, he can and will heal you upon your believing on him. He says, “I have seen his ways, and I will heal him.” Come and welcome; come and welcome, ye guiltiest of the guilty. Oh, may his infinite mercy do more than invite you? May it compel you to come in; according to that message of his at the royal supper, “Go ye out into the highways and hedges, and compel them to come in that my house may be filled.” May his infinite mercy constrain you to come.

Then the text goes on to say, “I will lead him also.” The poor soul of man, even when healed, does not know which way to go. There is not a more bewildered thing in this world than a poor sinner when first he is awakened. Have you ever gone with a candle into a barn where a number of birds have roosted? Have you disturbed them? Have you not seen how they dart hither and thither, and do not know which way to fly? The light confuses them. So it is when Christ comes to poor sinners. They do not know which way to go; they see a little, but the very light confuses them. Now, the loving Lord comes in, and he says, “I will lead him also.” Oh, how sweetly does the Lord lead sinners first to his dear Son and bid them find in him their all in all. Then he leads the sinner to the mercy-seat, and he says, “Ask, and it shall be given you; seek and ye shall find.” Then he leads the sinner to that grand old book, the Bible, and he says, “Read there, and as you read it I will open it up to you. I will open your eyes to see its hidden treasures and wonders, and lead you into all truth.” “Come,” says he, “I will lead you farther. I will lead you in your daily life. I will lead you as to how to act amongst the ungodly; yea, I will lead you in the paths of righteousness for my name’s sake.” Now, is not this very wonderful-that God should lead men who formerly would not be led, men who for years went their own way and resisted all that his judgments and providences could do to turn them? “Yes,” says he, “I will lead them;” and it is wonderful how readily men will be led when God’s grace renews them. I have seen the stout-hearted man who used to revile Christ and his people become a babe in grace. The idea of ever going inside a place of worship, especially of a dissenting sort, would have put him in a temper: he would spit on the ground and curse at the very mention of such a thing, and yet that man has become the most earnest of Christians-the very man to go out and bring in others, and he has loved Christ more than many who were born and bred in the midst of religion. The Lord can make a little child to lead a lion, and can make the most obstinate rebel tender and sensitive beyond others.

I heard a man pray once at a prayer-meeting, and he did shout and halloa at such an awful rate that I did not enjoy his prayer a bit. A friend asked him, some time afterwards, whatever made him make such an awful noise in prayer. “Why,” said he, “I have only been converted a very little time. I am the master of a vessel, and I used to storm and rage and go on at the sailors; and now when I get warm I cannot help making a noise. I begin to shout and halloa as I did before when I served the devil.” When I heard this, I said, “Well, I hope he will go on with it.” I like to see the same zeal manifested in the cause of God that a man is accustomed to use in other things when he is really warmed up. We often see people who have been most earnest against Christ become most earnest for him. Look at Saul of Tarsus: you do not want a better instance. He is exceeding mad against Christ, and nobody can stop him, till the Lord says, “I have seen his ways, and I will heal him.” And what short work God made of Saul of Tarsus. Three days made a perfect cure of his eyes; but I do not suppose it took three minutes to do the essential part of the healing in his soul. He is as full of enmity to Christ as ever his heart can be, but in a moment the light shines, and he falls from his horse to the ground, and he hears the voice, “Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me?” He answers, “Who art thou, Lord?” and the answer is, “I am Jesus whom thou persecutest.” The man is changed in a shorter time than it takes to tell. It is all done. O grace of God do the like to many here to-night, and let it be seen that thy “wills” and “shalls” will stand against all human sin, and all the obstinacy of the most corrupt heart. “I have seen his ways, and I will heal him. I will lead him also.”

Then there comes the last part of the text, “I will restore comforts to him”; for God begins by knocking our comforts away. He takes away the comfort we once had in our false peace, and he makes us mourn for sin. But after a while he restores comfort to us. What sort of comfort? The comfort of perfect forgiveness, the comfort of complete acceptance. The Father sets a warm kiss upon the child’s cheek, and that is the comfort of adoption. Whereas we were heirs of earth we become heirs of heaven, and have the comforts of hope. We receive the comfort of daily fellowship, for we are admitted to speak with God, and to draw near to him; the comfort of perfect security, for we are led to feel that whether we live or die it does not matter, we are safe in the arms of Jesus; the comfort of a blessed prospect beyond the grave in the land of the hereafter, where the flowers shall never wither; the comfort of knowing that all things work together for good; the comfort of having the angels for our servants, and heaven for our home. “I will restore comforts to him,” and all this-all this to the man of whom it is said, “Thou didst debase thyself even unto hell.” All these comforts for him! A crown in heaven for one who, but for mercy, had been damned in hell; a harp of everlasting music for hands that once delighted in lascivious music; new songs in glory for lips that once used the blasphemous oath; the presence of Jesus and the likeness of Jesus for one that often rolled in the mire with the drunkard, or went into worse mire with the unchaste and the unclean. Tell it! Tell it! Tell it unto sinners the most despairing-that, if they will but come back, their heavenly Father will receive them in the name of Jesus. Go ye forth, and tell it at the corners of your streets. Go and tell it in the dens and thieves’ kitchens! Tell it in the prisons-yea, even in the condemned cell! Go to the very gates of hell, and tell it to every soul that is this side the pit of Tophet, and as yet out of its eternal fire-that, if the wicked will but forsake his ways, and the unrighteous man his thoughts, and turn unto the Lord, he will have mercy upon him, and our God will abundantly pardon.

Tell it to thyself, poor sinner, thou that tremblest while I speak, thou who wouldest fain sink through the floor because of thy sense of sin. Thy Father comes to meet thee to-night; if thou dost not embrace him it is thy fault, not his. His voice speaks, and says, “Come, and welcome! come, and welcome! Dear child of mine, come to me!”

“From the cross of Calvary,

Where the Saviour deigned to die,

What transporting sounds I hear

Bursting on my ravished ear.

Love’s redeeming work is done,

Come and welcome, sinner, come.”

O grace of God bring in the great sinners, for Jesus’ sake. Amen.

Portion of Scripture read before Sermon-Isaiah 51.

Hymns from “Our Own Hymn Book”-248, 49 Sankey (“The Great Physician”), 219.