C. H. SPURGEON,

at the metropolitan tabernacle, newington.

“And as he entered into a certain village, there met him ten men that were lepers, which stood afar off: and they lifted up their voices, and said, Jesus, Master, have mercy on us. And when he saw them, he said unto them, Go show yourselves unto the priests. And it came to pass, that, as they went, they were cleansed.”-Luke 17:12-14.

Several interesting topics might fairly be found in these verses. We see here the abounding fruit of sin, for here were ten lepers in a group, and the abundance of divine power to meet it, for they were all cleansed. So also we see how Christ must come first, and ceremonies second: first the work of grace, and then the outward showing of it. The Lord’s tenderness towards outcasts, his attention to prayers from a distance, and his regard for the ceremonial law so long as it was in force, might each one yield an instructive meditation. I have, however, only one thought which I wish to bring under your notice, and to press upon you, perhaps almost to repetition and monotony. That thought I would engrave as with an iron pen upon the hearts and minds of all here present who desire to find eternal salvation. May the Holy Ghost imprint it upon every living soul.

These ten lepers were required by the Saviour to perform an act of faith in him before they had the slightest evidence in themselves that he had wrought a good work upon them. Before they began to feel their foul blood cleansed, before the horrible dryness of leprosy had yielded to healthy perspiration, they were to go towards the house in which the priest lived to be examined by him and to be pronounced clean. They were to exhibit faith in Christ Jesus’s power to heal them by going to exhibit themselves as healed, though as yet they were in the same condition as before. They were to start to the place where they should be examined by the priest, believing that Jesus had healed them, or would heal them, though, as yet, they had no internal evidence whatever that their flesh should become as that of a little child. This is the point I wish to dwell upon-that the Lord Jesus Christ bids sinners believe in him, and trust their souls to him, though they may not yet discern in themselves any work of his grace. Just as these men were lepers, and nothing but lepers, so you may be sinners, and nothing but sinners, and yet you are bidden to exhibit faith in Jesus Christ while you are just what you are. As these men were to start straight away to the priest with all their leprosy white upon them, and to go there as if they felt they were already healed, so are you, with all your sinnership upon you, and your sense of condemnation heavy on your soul, to believe in Jesus Christ just as you are, and you shall find everlasting life upon the spot. This is my point, and it is of the first importance. Sinners, as sinners, are to believe in Jesus for everlasting life. The voice to each one of them is, “Awake, thou that sleepest, and arise from the dead, and Christ shall give thee life.”

Now, first, I shall notice what signs are commonly looked for by unconverted men as reasons for believing in Christ; which, indeed, are no reasons at all: then, secondly, I shall try to show what is the real ground and reason for faith in Christ; and, thirdly, what will be the issue of a faith in Christ similar to that of the lepers.

First, then, I say that we are to believe in Jesus Christ-to trust him to heal us of the great disease of sin-though as yet we may have about us no sign or token that he has wrought any good work upon us. We are not to look for signs and evidences within ourselves before we venture our souls upon Jesus. The contrary supposition is a soul-destroying error, and I will try to expose it by showing what are the signs that are commonly looked for by men.

One of the most frequent is a consciousness of great sin, and a horrible dread of divine wrath, leading to despair. Strange to say, we constantly meet with persons who say, “I could believe in Jesus Christ if I felt more burdened by a sense of sin. I could trust him if I were driven more entirely to despondency and to despair; but I am not depressed enough; I am not broken-hearted enough; I am sure I am not brought low enough, and therefore I cannot trust Christ.” Strange notion, that if the night were darker we should see the better! Strange idea, that if we were nearer death we should have better hope of life! Now, my friend, you are speaking and acting in distinct disobedience to Christ; for he would have you trust himself, not on the ground of your feeling much or little, or on the ground of your feeling anything at all, but simply because you are sick and he has come to heal you, and is abundantly able to work your cure. If you say, “Lord, I cannot trust thee unless I feel this or that,” then you, in effect, say, “I can trust my own feelings, but I cannot trust God’s appointed Saviour.” What is this but to make a god out of your feelings, and a saviour out of your inward griefs? Is your own heart to save you by its dark insinuations against divine love? Is unbelief, after all, to bring you salvation because you refuse to believe your God? And despair-wicked despair, which gives the lie to God-is that to be trusted in, and not the Saviour whom God has sent into the world to save sinners? Is there, then, a new gospel, and does it run, “He that denies the power of Jesus and despairs of his love shall be saved”?

You know that Jesus justifies the ungodly, and cleanses the wicked from their sin through his precious blood; and though you know this to be true, you say, “I cannot trust the Crucified, I cannot rely upon his full atonement unless I feel my guilt to be unpardonable, and disbelieve my God.” I pray that you may never feel as you foolishly think you ought to feel; for feelings of despair dishonour the Lord and vex his Spirit, and certainly cannot be good for you. It comes to this-that you are making a god of your despair, and a Christ out of your horrors, and so you are setting up an antichrist in the place where Christ alone should be. Come, young friend, though you have not been terrified and alarmed and heart-broken to the extent of some, will you trust Christ with your soul, and ask no questions? I pray you, trust Jesus once for all.

“Cast thy guilty soul on him,

Find him mighty to redeem;

At his feet thy burden lay;

Look thy doubts and cares away;

Now by faith the Son embrace;

Plead his promise, trust his grace.”

That is the point. Can you trust Jesus? for that is what he bids you do. How strange it seems that anyone should raise a question about trusting him! How insane and insulting to be willing to trust our feelings and not trust the Saviour! These ten lepers felt no change whatever wrought upon them when Jesus bade them go off to be examined by the priest; yet away they went, and as they went they were made whole. Trust Jesus Christ just as you are, without those feelings which you have hitherto supposed to be necessary as a sort of preparation. Trust him at once, and follow him, and he will make you whole before you have taken many steps in the path of faith and obedience. O Lord God, lead all my hearers and readers to trust thy Son at once.

Many other persons think that they must, before they can trust Christ, experience quite a blaze of joy. “Oh,” says-one, “I heard a Christian say that when he found the Saviour he was so happy that he did not know how to contain himself, and he sang like a whole band of music in one-

‘Happy day, happy day,

When Jesus washed my sins away.’

Oh that I could be as full of joy as these ‘happy day’ people!” Just so. But what mischief will you make out of that? Are you going to find evil even in our delights? Will you feed your unbelief on the joy of the Lord? What strange perversity! “why,” you say, “must I not be happy before I can believe in Christ?” What? What? Must you needs have the joy before you exercise the faith? How unreasonable! Because we tell you that such and such a root produces a sweet fruit, will you say that you must have the fruit before you will accept the root? Surely that is bad reasoning. We who have experienced this joy came to Christ in order to obtain it, and did not wait until we found it, or else we should have waited until now. We came to Jesus just as we were: some of us were very wretched, but we came just as we then were, and we trusted Christ, and we were made whole. Then followed joy and peace; but if we had waited till we felt joy and peace before we came, we should have been standing out against the gospel plan, which is, that men are to trust the Saviour before they feel the slightest benefit from him. O sinner, is not this common sense? Must we not take medicine before we are cured by it? must we not eat bread before it removes our hunger? Must we not open our eyes before we see? Before the Lord Jesus has either comforted you or healed you consciously, you are to come and just do what he bids you, and trust in him to save you. Neither the gloom of horror nor the blaze of delight is to be looked for before faith, but faith is to precede all and that faith is a simple, humble reliance upon Christ.

We have known others who have expected to have a text impressed upon their minds. A kind of superstition has grown up that a special scripture must, somehow or other, hover over the mind, and continue there, so that you cannot get rid of it, and then you may hope that you are saved. In old families there are superstitions about white birds coming to a window before a death, and I regard with much the same distrust the more common superstition that if a text continues upon your mind day after day you may safely conclude that it is an assurance of your salvation. I hope I have never taught you to draw any such a conclusion. Far be it from me to assist you into a confidence which has so questionable a foundation. The Spirit of God often does apply Scripture with power to the soul; but this fact is never set forth as the rock for us to build upon. Will you find anything in the Bible to support the supposition that the vivid recollection of a text is a seal of conversion? It has often happened that some word of God does greatly comfort the soul; but why should you demand the same? Have you any right to say, “I will not believe God’s word unless he impresses it upon me”? Is it a lie, then? “No, it is true,” say you. Remember, if it is not true, an impression upon your mind would not make it true, and if it is true, why do you not believe it? If it is true, accept it. If there be any force about a promise, pray God to make you feel its force and power; but you ought to feel its force and power, and if you do not, sin lies at your door. As a reader of the Scriptures you must not fall into the idea that you are to wait till some Scripture burns its way into your soul; but you must read attentively, and believe what the Lord God says to you. Furthermore, I would have you remember, it is not reading the Scripture that saves you; it is believing in Christ. What did Christ himself say? He said to the Bible readers of his day, “Ye search the Scriptures, for in them ye think ye have eternal life; but ye will not come unto me that ye might have life.” Good as the searching of Scripture is, it is nothing without coming to Christ. You will only read your own condemnation in the Bible if you remain out of Christ. Even the Bible itself may be made into a stumbling-block if you substitute Bible-reading for closing in with Christ and putting your trust in him. Your immediate business is to trust Jesus, and no measure of reading will compensate for neglect of faith. What if no special text of Scripture were ever laid home to your heart at all, yet here it stands, “Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved.” That is your business, my dear hearer, if you are to get peace at once; and I earnestly hope that some of you are going to get it before this sermon is over. I have asked your souls of my God, and I have got them for a prey to-night. They shall be David’s spoil, and you shall be led in chains of grace to Jesus. Who among you will put his trust in Jesus? for, if you do so, you shall surely find eternal salvation the moment you believe in his dear name.

There is another way in which some men try to get off believing in Christ, and that is, they expect an actual conversion to be manifest in them before they will trust the Saviour. Now, understand that Christ has wrought salvation in no man who is unconverted. There must be a perfect turning round of us-a complete conversion from sin to holiness. But that is salvation, and not a preparation for salvation. Conversion is the manifestation of Christ’s healing power. But you are not to have this before you trust him; you are to trust him for this very thing. When a man with a disease goes to an eminent physician, does he say, “Doctor, I will trust you with my case when I have reached a certain stage”? “Nay,” says the physician, “if you have reached that state you will be in a fair way of healing, and you won’t want me.” Your wisest plan is to go to your physician just as you are; and if you can be sure that he is an infallible healer, just put yourself into his hands as if you knew nothing, and he knew everything, and as if you would not have a will or way in it, but would leave yourself entirely with him. That is the thing to do with the Lord Jesus, the infallible Physician of the souls of men. Why, you poor wretched sinner, you say, “I am not a saint. I cannot be saved.” Who said you were a saint? It is Christ’s work to make you into a saint. “Oh, but I do not repent as I should.” It is Christ’s work to make you repent as you should, and to him you must come for repentance. “Oh, but my heart won’t break.” It is Christ who is to break your heart-not you who are to break it, and then come to him with it ready broken. Come to Jesus just as you are, with your hard, stony, senseless heart, and trust that and everything else to his saving power. “I do not seem even to have a strong desire,” says one. Christ himself gives every spiritual desire by his Holy Spirit. He is a Saviour that begins the alphabet of mercy at A. He does not ask you to get as far as B, C, D, and promise then to meet you; but he begins at the beginning. The good Samaritan when he found the man beaten by the thieves came where he was. That is what Jesus does. He does not say, “Now, then, you wounded man, get up, and come to me, and I will pour the oil and wine into you.” No; but he goes where the wounded one lies in utter helplessness, stoops over him, removes his rags, cleanses his wounds, pours in the oil and wine, and lifts him up, and bears him to the house of mercy. Poor soul! My Master is not a half Saviour, but a whole one; and if you are lying at the gates of death, hard by the doors of hell, he is as able to save you as if you were sitting on the doorstep of heaven. Just where you are, and as you are, trust Christ to save you, and you shall be saved. Do not look for conversion first, but expect it as the result of faith.

We have known some who have had a very curious idea, which I can hardly put into words, namely, that if they were to be saved they would experience some very singular sensation. They could believe in Christ if they felt in a mysterious fashion. It is rather difficult to understand people, but when I have been talking to some enquirers I have thought that they expected even a physical sensation-a sensation within their bodies. I remember one saying to me, “Sir, I was quite sure I was saved, for I felt so light.” Poor simpleton, what does it matter whether you felt light or heavy! What has that to do with it? Perhaps you were light-headed, or half out of your mind with absurd excitement. Beware of such nonsense. To feel light may be interpreted into being weighed in the balances and found wanting; it is a sensation which may frighten as much as console. “Oh,” says one, “but I felt so singular.” Yes, and many who are now in Bedlam could say the same. What does it matter what you felt? It is not feeling that will save you. Believing on Jesus will bring you the blessings of grace; but strange feelings may be produced by what you have eaten, or by the weather, or by hysteria, or a hundred other things. Do you not know that when politics are being discussed, or when some other subject is under dispute, an earnest orator will often stir men with excitement till their flesh creeps? But what of that? Excitement does not save anybody. Many are melted to tears by a novel or a play; but what is the benefit? You may be moved with religious excitement, and half the emotion may be purely physical, and there may be nothing of the grace of God in it. The wiser way is calmly to sit down and say, “Here is God’s way of salvation-salvation through his crucified Son, Jesus Christ; and he has promised that if I trust his Son he will save me from sinning, and make a new man of me, and heal me of my spiritual diseases. I will trust him, for I am sure that the witness of God is true.” By that simple and deliberate act of faith you are saved; the power to believe your God is the evidence that the cure has begun, and begun well. If you have, indeed, trusted him, Jesus has undertaken your case, and he will save you.

The very fact that you can and do believe has within it the essential force by which you will be delivered from the alienation of your mind. He that believes God is no longer an enemy to him. Those whom we trust we soon learn to love. This, you see, demands no singular sensation or excitement; this is plain and clear enough. “But must we not be born again?” says one. Yes, truly; and he that believes in Christ is born again. Though as yet he knows it not, the first mark of life is within his soul, for the first sure token of spiritual life is trusting Jesus Christ alone. The best evidence is not trusting marks, signs, evidences, inward feelings, impressions, and so on; but just getting out of that and trusting Jesus. There lies the essence of the saving change, the getting from self to the Lord God in Christ Jesus. A certain mariner has a fine anchor, one of the best constructed anchors ever used in the navy. He has it on board his ship, and yet it is not a pennyworth of use to him. While he has it on board his ship it does not answer the purpose of an anchor: his vessel drifts with the anchor on board. He drags it out upon the deck and looks at it. What an anchor! Would not that hold in the day of storm? He admires his anchor as if it were a mass of gold. The winds howl and the waves roar, but he feels safe with his anchor on board. Fool, this anchor is of no use to you while you can see it. A ship’s anchorage cannot be in the ship itself. “Suppose I hang the anchor from the side of the vessel.” It is of no use there. What must you do with it? Fling it overboard. Let it down into the deep, even to the sea-bottom. It is gone. You cannot see where it is. All right! That will do. Now, soul, fling your anchor of trust overboard. Do not let it hang to your feelings, or to your impressions, or to anything that is in you; but overboard let it go, deep into the waters of infinite love, and let it get a grip on Jesus. Outside of you your hope must be; for as long as your confidence is within you, or has any dependence upon yourself, it is like an anchor on board, which can only increase the weight of the ship, but certainly cannot help it in the day of storm. There is the truth. God grant you grace to accept it.

And now, secondly, and as briefly as I can, I want to bring forward what the reason is for our believing in Jesus Christ. What warrant have I, as a sinner, for trusting myself with Jesus Christ?

No warrant whatever within ourself need be looked for. The warrant for our believing Christ lies in this-first, there is God’s witness concerning his Son Jesus Christ. God, the Everlasting Father, has set forth Christ “to be the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only, but also for the sin of the whole world.” God the Father says to men, “I am able to forgive you justly through the death and righteousness of my Son. Trust me, and I will save you.” What do you want more than that? He that believeth not hath made God a liar, because he hath not believed his witness concerning his Son. Why, surely, if God declares a thing, you do not need further evidence. “Let God be true, and every man a liar.” What can be firmer than the voice of God, who cannot lie? Beloved hearers, I feel as if I really ought not to bring any other evidence before you. It looks so like insulting the Lord by trying to defend him, as if his perfect truth needed my testimony to support it. Angels never doubt God. Those bright and glorious beings never suspect their Maker. Worms of the dust! Worms of the dust, how can you doubt the God that made you? Oh, let it not be so. And when his testimony is that he is a God ready to pardon the guilty, waiting to forgive all those that trust his Son, why should we doubt such a gracious declaration? My soul, I charge thee trust thy Saviour, and raise no further question, but let the matter be assured and established within thee.

The next warrant for our believing is Jesus Christ himself. He bears witness on earth as well as the Father, and his witness is true. Consider who this Christ is whom we are bidden to trust. Look at his person. He is God, “very God of very God.” Can we doubt him? He is perfect man, and he has taken perfect manhood upon himself for our sakes. Can we doubt him? He has lived a perfect life. When did he ever lie? Who can charge him with falsehood? He has died “the just for the unjust, to bring us to God”; and God has accepted the sacrifice of his dear Son. What surer proof of his truthfulness can he give us than his death for us? O trembler, why wilt thou refuse thy confidence to one so worthy of it? Canst thou doubt Calvary? Wilt thou despise the cross? Wilt thou say, “I want some other warrant for trusting Christ besides his own person and his finished work”? I feel ashamed almost to be pleading here for such a thing as this. Tell me wherein my Lord was ever false. O sons of men, tell me when once he refused to receive a sinner that came to him. You know that he is risen from the dead, and that he has gone into heaven, and sitteth now at the right hand of God, and will shortly come, and dare you treat him as a mere pretender? Can you not trust in him? Can you dare distrust him? Do you want signs and wonders over and above those which are in himself? If one should rise from the dead you would not believe, if you do not believe Jesus, for you have more than Moses and the prophets, when you have Christ himself risen from the dead. Will you not trust him? I would like to get you by the hand, my brother, and put it personally to you,-Do you mean it, that you suspect my Saviour and cannot trust your soul with him? Do you mean it? Nay, with tears I do entreat you, do not treat him so badly, but cast your soul on him at this instant, and believe him just as you are, and he will save you. He will not run back from his word, but he will wash out your guilt in his own blood if you will consent to be cleansed.

Still, to put this in another shape, you want to know why you are to believe: your warrant for believing lies in the fact that God commands you to believe. “He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved; but he that believeth not shall be damned.” “Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved.” And this commandment we have received from our Master-that we preach this gospel unto every creature under heaven: and we do preach it in his name, commanding you in the name of Jesus Christ, the Son of God, that ye believe in him. This divine command is warrant enough for you. If God commands you to do it, you need not say, “May I do it?” Nobody can want any permission to keep the law: the command includes a permit. When the law of the gospel comes from God himself, dear hearer, what is there to do but to obey it and believe at once? The door is open, enter. The feast is spread, eat. The fountain is filled, wash.

Moreover, there is the promise made to you and to every creature, “Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved.” “He that believeth in him is not condemned.” Do you hear that? “He that believeth in him hath everlasting life.” He has eternal life, he has it now. These are promises rich and free for you. What more do you want? Oh, I know not what more I can say,-when Jesus commands you, when Jesus invites you, how can you stand back? O blessed Spirit, make this plain to men and lead them to believe.

I will add only this one more thing: I dare say these poor lepers believed in Jesus because they had heard of other lepers whom he had cleansed. Now, here stands one before you, a representative of many more in this place, who, if this were a fit time, would stand up and say the same. I came to Jesus full of sin, guilty and lost, with a hard heart and a heavy spirit; and I looked to him, trusting him alone to save me; and he has saved me. He has changed my nature, he has blotted out my sin, and he has made me love him, and love all that is good and true and generous, for his sake. It is not I, even I, that am left alone to tell you; but, as I have said, there are thousands in this Tabernacle, at this very hour, upon whom the same miracle of divine mercy has been wrought. Therefore trust my Lord Jesus, and you shall feel the same miracle wrought upon you. Where are you, friend, you who want so much persuading for your own good? If I have money to give away I do not find that I have to persuade anybody to have it. Jingle a guinea, and what ears men have! How soon they will rush where the coin gives forth its golden notes. Give bread away in a cold winter, or even a little soup, how the poor will crowd to get it! But when it is, “Trust Jesus, and your sin shall be forgiven you, and your nature shall be changed, and you shall be saved from sinning, and you shall be made pure and holy,” oh, my Master, what are they at that they want calling so often? Men not only require calling, they need compelling to come in.

“Dear Saviour, draw reluctant hearts.

To thee let sinners fly,

And take the bliss thy love imparts,

And drink, and never die.”

I must now close with the third point, which shall not occupy you many minutes; it is this, What is the issue of this kind of faith that I have been preaching? This doctrine of “only trust Jesus,”-what does it lead to? This trusting in Jesus without marks, signs, evidences, tokens, what is the result and outcome of it?

The first thing that I have to say about it is this,-that the very existence of such a faith as that in the soul is evidence that there is already a saving change. “Oh,” say you, “I do not see that. How can it prove that I am a new man because I trust myself with Christ?” Consider a little: it will be an evidence of a saving change already wrought, for it will show that you have come to be obedient to Jesus, and obedient upon a matter which your proud will has long struggled against. Every man by nature kicks against simply trusting in Christ; and when at last he yields to the divine method of mercy it is a virtual surrender of his own will, the ending of rebellion, the establishment of peace. Faith is obedience. Faith is the evidence that the warfare has been ended by unconditional surrender. They said to Jesus in olden times, “What shall we do that we may work the works of God?” and he answered, “This is the work of God-the most godlike work that ye can do-that ye believe on Jesus Christ whom he hath sent.” It is even so: in one sense faith is not a work at all, and in another sense it is the grandest of all works. Here is where God and you are at issue, this is the central point of the quarrel: you want to be saved by something in yourself, but God says that he will save you if you trust in Christ. Now, if you do trust Christ just as you are, it will be an evidence that you have been made obedient to God, and so obedient that a complete, deep-seated, radical renewal of your nature has evidently taken place.

It will be an evidence, also, that you are humble; for it is pride that makes men want to do something, or to be something, in their own salvation, or to be saved in some wonderful way, that they may tell other people how wonderfully they were saved. When you are willing just to be saved like a poor, good-for-nothing sinner as you are, then you are already saved from pride. I will not compliment you: you are a good-for-nothing wretch of a sinner; and if you will trust Jesus, as a man must do who truly bears that character, it will prove that you are humble, and this will be good evidence that a change has passed over your spirit.

Again, faith in Jesus will be the best evidence that you are reconciled to God, for the worst evidence of your enmity to God is that you do not like God’s way of salvation. You so much dislike God that you will not have heaven on God’s terms. You, the sinner, are so much at war with God that you will go to hell rather than be saved in God’s way. That is what it comes to. And when you give that up and say, “Lord, so long as I can be made whole-so long as I can be made to love thee-I am willing to be saved anyhow,” there will be evidence of a great change in you. When you cry, “Lord, I will be saved in thine own way, and I will therefore trust Christ as thou hast bidden me,” then God and you are reconciled upon a point of the chief importance. There is no battle between you now, for you are of one mind about trusting Christ. God has trusted his honour in Christ’s hands, and you are trusting your soul in his hands, so that God and you are now agreed to honour Jesus. The moment you have trusted Christ, that simple thing becomes in itself a distinct admission and indisputable proof that a great change has been wrought in your relation to God, and in your feelings in reference to him.

Now, mark you, before long, sooner or later, you will become delightfully conscious of the fact that you are saved. Many a man is saved, and for a time he questions the truth of the gracious work, but in due time the blessing is made clear to him. When a man trusts Jesus as these ten lepers did, and acts upon his trust, good always comes of it. See the ten men! They are going towards the priest, though they have not yet felt that they are healed. They are acting upon Christ’s authority, and he will not make fools of them, for they that trust in him shall not be ashamed nor confounded. They must start on their walk before they feel the healing; but as they are going they shall feel it. And you, too, trusting Christ without any sense of any good thing, shall not be long before you shall feel his blessed power upon your heart. I wish to speak my own experience simply to help those who are coming to Jesus. While I was coming to Christ I did not know that I was coming; and when I looked to Christ, I scarcely knew whether it was the right sort of look or no; but when I felt at last that Jesus had healed me, then I knew what I had done. Many a blessing God has given me as to which I have not found out that I had it till some time after my reception of it. I have read the feelings of certain good men, and I have said, “I wish I felt like them”; and some time after, when I looked back, I perceived that I was actually moving in their orbit, and passing through the self-same experience. Many a man wishes he was humble, and he is humble because he does not think he is humble. Many a person sighs, “I wish I had a tender heart,” but I am sure that his heart is tender because he mourns its hardness. He longs to be deeply sensitive before the Lord, but it is clear that he has a tenderness which he does not himself recognize. His ideal of tenderness is very high, and properly so, and therefore he dreads falling short of it. O my dear friend, if you trust Jesus in the dark, you shall one day enter into the light; and if you never should enjoy comfort you would still be safe-if all the way between this place and heaven you should never have a consciousness of being saved, yet if you have trusted Christ, you must and shall be saved, for he cannot possibly allow faith in him to be exercised in vain. Ere long, if you trust Jesus, you shall know his love. Trust him as you sink and you shall swim. Trust him as you feel yourself dying and you shall live. If you trust him before you feel any work of grace upon you, you shall soon discover that there was a work upon you, though you discerned it not. If you trust the Lord you are already the subject of a divine power, for nothing short of omnipotent grace could have led you to believe and live. The state and act of faith are simplicity itself; but to bring us into that simplicity God himself must new create us.

To put all in one, if you are ready to come to Christ, and trust him without any miracles, signs, or evidences, but will simply trust him alone, you have within you a power which will carry you through life, and preserve you in holiness even to the end. This morning I spoke about David’s encouraging himself in God.* When Ziklag was burnt, and his wives were gone, and his men talked of stoning him, he fell back on God alone. This is a high attainment, and yet it is one which has its parallel in the very dawn of faith in the sinner. It is a grand start in life for you, a poor sinner, to begin by trusting Christ alone, saying, “I, without anything good in me whatever, without anything that I can lay hold of as a hope for me, do cast myself, whether I sink or swim, upon Christ Jesus the Saviour of sinners, and ‘if I perish, I perish.’ ” This is a glorious beginning. To many a saintly life such a faith in the Lord alone has been a crowning act, and yet you, poor sinner, may exercise this same faith while yet you are a babe in Christ. You will often have to trust in this fashion in future life, and therefore it is well to begin as you will have to keep on. You will be brought, in business, in the family, and in the various trials of life, into such a condition that you will have to exercise a faith just of the same sort as that which you begin with; I would, therefore, have you learn the lesson while you are young. You will have to say, “Though I am weakness itself, and poverty itself, and do not see how I may be provided for, yet as the ravens and the sparrows are fed, so shall I be; and therefore I cast my nakedness upon God for clothing, and my hunger upon God for food, and my very life I cast upon him that he may preserve it to me between the jaws of death.” This is grand faith, and you must begin there, for if you do not you have not begun to build on the rock. Your first course must be the live rock, or else all will be insecure. To begin well is half the battle: mind that you get a foundation which can never be moved; for life has many trials, and woe to the man whose foundation fails him.

This is grand faith to die with as well as to live with. Now the curtains are drawn and the light of the sun is shut out, and the voices of friends begin to fail, and the ear is dull, and the eye-strings break. My soul, thou art now about to launch into the unseen world. What wilt thou do now? What, indeed, but faint into the arms of thy Father and thy God! Oh, my dear hearer, if you have learned to trust at the very first because of what Jesus is, and not because of what you are, then you will know how to die; for standing there, in the prospect of the great account, or rather lying there upon the bed, in prospect of the Lord’s coming, fears will come, and doubts will come, and terrors will come, if you are looking within, or looking back upon your past life and trying to find a reliance there. But if you can say, “My Saviour, into thy hands I commit my spirit: my naked soul I put into thy pierced hands again,” then may you breathe your last in peace, knowing whom you have believed, and being persuaded that he is able to keep that which you have committed to him until that day. When John Hyatt lay a-dying, one of his friends said, “Mr. Hyatt, can you trust your soul with Jesus now?” “Man,” said he, “trust him with one soul? That is nothing. I could trust him with a million souls if I had them. I know that he is able to save all who trust him.” I want you to begin, then, as these poor lepers did, by just taking Christ at his word, and going your way in the strength of that word before you feel any hopeful change within. In this fashion when you come to die you may look out for glory and expect it, though the brilliance has not yet transfigured you; you may look out for the eternal crown, look out for the harp, look out for the face of the Well-Beloved, and the bliss unspeakable, and expect them, even though the clouds gather around you. Before you pass the gates of pearl, or cross the chilly sea, you may enjoy the sight of the beatific vision by an unstaggering faith. Hope that is seen is not hope; but glorious is the faith which seeth him who is invisible, and grasps the substance of the things not seen as yet. By this power I even now anticipate the joys of the upper skies. Try, beloved, to do the same. O for more faith! It will be grand to know all heaven, though you have not seen it and felt it, because you knew and trusted the Lord of heaven. Hitherto you have found the promise true; now trust the Lord for glory as once you trusted him for grace, and you shall find ere long that his richest promises are sure.

God save you, every one of you, beloved; and may he do so at this very hour, for his dear Son’s sake. Amen.

Portion of Scripture read before Sermon-Luke 17.

Hymns from “Our Own Hymn Book”-504, 593, 538.

CHASTENED HAPPINESS

A Sermon

Delivered on Lord’s-day Morning, December 25th, 1881, by

C. H. SPURGEON,

at the metropolitan tabernacle, newington.

“They shall fear and tremble for all the goodness and for all the prosperity that I procure unto it.”-Jeremiah 33:9.

God’s ancient people sadly provoked him with their idolatries from age to age. He was longsuffering to them to the last degree, but at length he grew weary of them, and according to his own words “he abhorred his own inheritance.” He caused them to be carried away into captivity, and their land became a desert, or the heritage of strangers. Israel became a people scattered and peeled, and on the brink of national extinction, for their iniquities had hidden the face of the Lord from them. Yet the Lord, even Jehovah, had entered into a covenant concerning them with Abraham his friend, which covenant he had afterwards renewed with his servant David. This latter covenant the Lord is said by the prophet Jeremiah to remember even when Jerusalem is desolate. We read in the twentieth verse and onward these words: “Thus saith the Lord; If ye can break my covenant of the day, and my covenant of the night, and that there should not be day and night in their season; then may also my covenant be broken with David my servant, that he should not have a son to reign upon his throne.” Even in Israel’s worst days, when her representative man was the weeping prophet Jeremiah, and when her sorrows were greater than even he could express, yet the Lord revealed his love, and promised that blessed days should dawn for the seed of Abraham. These days have not yet come, but they shall surely arrive, for God hath not cast away his people whom he did foreknow. There is yet a history for Israel; her sun is clouded, but it has not set. As surely as stands the covenant with day and night, so surely shall the chosen people return from their captivity and possess the land which the Lord has given unto them. In those days the Lord will build them as at the first, and cleanse them from all their iniquities. Then they shall not be proud or arrogant, for his goodness shall startle and astound them and they shall be amazed even unto trembling when they see what great things Jehovah has done for them. The memory of their great national offences, and especially of their long rejection of the Messiah, shall cause them to wear their high dignity without pride: they shall be subdued by love to a childlike fear of again offending, they shall tremble as they see the Lord God of their fathers glorifying all his grace in them.

Thus much for the strict connection of the text. At this time we shall loosen the verse from its stall and bring it forth to our own pastures. Its primary signification is not its only teaching, for the words of the Lord are full of eyes, and look in many ways. We may use this promise in reference to all the Lord’s people, for the promise is sure to all the seed. That which is true of the Jew one way is true of all the chosen seed in the same sense or in another. No privilege of the covenant is absolutely private either to Jew or Gentile; but in its highest form, if not in its lowest, it is the common property of all the heirs of salvation. We are joint heirs with Christ Jesus, and as he inherits all blessing, so also do we. Paul, in his epistle to the Galatians, has well said, “If ye be Christ’s, then are ye Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise.” Let me, then, read the text again, and let us appropriate it to ourselves: “They shall fear and tremble for all the goodness and for all the prosperity that I procure unto it.” Such honour and blessing have all the saints.

Our text suggests at the outset the remark that all the good things which make up prosperity are to be traced unto the Lord. Woe unto us if we receive good and perfect gifts, and yet forget the Father of lights from whom they come. These benefits are not from beneath, but from above; let them not be passed by in ungrateful silence, but let us send upward humble and warm acknowledgments. He who forgets mercy deserves that mercy should forget him. God grant we may never be such practical atheists as to receive daily bounties from God, and not return a daily song. As each gleaming wave of the sea reflects the light of the sun, so let each ripple of our life flash with gratitude for the benediction of heaven. All good comes from the Altogether Good, who is of good the essence, the Creator, and the Giver. Especially is this true of all spiritual blessing,-of such goodness as comes not so much from benevolence to creatures as from mercy to sinners. As a being, I am grateful that my Creator is kind to me; but as a sinner, if my Judge smiles upon me, I admire his exceeding grace. His justice had left me unblessed to perish through my sin, if his mercy had not found a way to spare and to cleanse. You who know not only your insignificance, but also your unworthiness, are held under special bonds to lift up your hearts in fervent gratitude to the Lord.

Remark next, that temporal mercies are always best when they come in their proper order. I have no doubt our text includes both temporal and spiritual good; but certainly the temporals are arranged in the second rank, for the eighth verse runs: “I will cleanse them from all their iniquity, whereby they have sinned against me; and I will pardon all their iniquities, whereby they have sinned, and whereby they have transgressed against me”; and after this we have mention of goodness and prosperity. After pardon, peace and plenty are golden blessings; without it they might prove a curse. To an unforgiven sinner the richest enjoyments of this life are as the food which fattens the bullock for the slaughter, but when sin is pardoned, common mercies become tokens of a Father’s love, and ripen beneath the sun of divine love into an inexpressible sweetness. The children of God bless God for bread and water, because God has made these things matters of promise, and they come as covenant provisions. Cheered by grace, the child of poverty finds contentment in that which else might seem but prison fare. Much or little must depend upon the way in which you look upon it, and what to the believer is enough, might be to the worldling a mere pittance, because grace has not trained his mind to rejoice in the will of the Lord. Blessed be God if he has given to us first the fruits of the sun of grace, and then the fruits put forth by the moon of providence. The main thing is to be able to sing, “Bless the Lord, who forgiveth all thine iniquities, who healeth all thy diseases,” and after that it is most pleasant to add, “who satisfieth thy mouth with good things.”

What shall I say of the happiness of those persons who have spiritual and temporal blessings united, to whom God has given both the upper and the nether springs, so that they possess all things needful for this life in fair proportion, and then, far above all, enjoy the blessings of the life to come? Such are first blessed in their spirits and then blessed in their basket and in their store. In their case double favour calls for double praise, double service, double delight in God. Let them take for their example the Psalmist in the seventy-first psalm, who found himself increased in greatness, and comforted on every side, and then exclaimed, “I will also praise thee with the psaltery, even thy truth, O my God: unto thee will I sing with the harp, O thou Holy One of Israel. My lips shall greatly rejoice when I sing unto thee; and my soul, which thou hast redeemed.”

And yet, and yet, and yet, if we are very happy to-day, and though that happiness be lawful and proper, because it arises both out of spiritual and temporal things in due order, yet in all human happiness there lurks a danger. There is a wealth which hath a sorrow necessarily connected with it, and I ween that even when God maketh rich and addeth no sorrow therewith, yet he makes provision against an ill which else would surely come. Let me remind you of that memorable passage, “There the glorious Lord will be unto us a place of broad rivers and streams.” The Lord is all that to his believing people. But then broad rivers and streams have a danger appertaining to them, for these are waterways by which the pirates of the sea approach a city and plunder it; and hence for Zion’s protection it is added, “Wherein shall go no galley with oars, neither shall gallant ship pass thereby.” Thus the Lord gives the benefit without the danger naturally attendant upon it; he gives peace, but prevents carnal security, and he gives happiness but prevents the pride and presumption which are too apt to grow out of it. The text speaks of goodness and prosperity procured for us, and then tells us that all danger which might arise out of it is averted by a gracious work upon the heart. The Lord sends a chastened joy,-“they shall fear and tremble.” Instead of unduly exulting in their possessions, and becoming high-minded and vainglorious, the Lord’s people are kept lowly and self-distrustful, and thus their happiness brings glory to God, and the Lord’s word is fulfilled, “It shall be to me a name of joy, a praise and an honour before all the nations of the earth, which shall hear all the good that I do unto them.” This then is our subject, the sanctifying and mellowing of our joy. We shall try to see the Lord’s loving wisdom in this matter, that we may the more wisely love him, and the more intelligently estimate his prudent conduct towards us. We shall first notice this toning down of our joy; and then in the second place we shall observe the feelings by which this chastened effect is produced; and thirdly, we shall look to the measure in which most of us can enter into this experience of a joy, toned and tinted by fear and trembling.

Let us think a little about the toning down of our great joys. As I have said, we need grace in enjoying both temporal and spiritual prosperity, and therefore I shall speak upon them both. Even when we are filled with holy delight it is hard to carry a full cup with a steady hand. When most lifted up with spiritual joy we are not beyond gunshot of the enemy. We need the armour of God on the right hand as well as on the left. Even when we serve the Lord it must be with fear, and in his glorious presence we must rejoice with trembling.

In the cup of salvation there are drops of bitterness, and so must it be, for unmixed delight in this world would be dangerous. Unbroken prosperity in worldly things has proved perilous to many Christians. It is no theory, but a matter of sad fact, that many men, as they rise as to one world sink as to another. I am even afraid that long-continued health of body is not always for the health of a man’s soul; and that to be without care and trouble, is not the readiest way to soul-prosperity. When the sea is smooth the ship makes poor sailing. Men are bird-limed by their rest and ease, and have small care to fly heavenward. We are apt to lose our God among our goods. Is it not so? If the world’s roses had no thorns should we not think it paradise, and forego all desire for the gardens above? If Israel in Egypt had dwelt luxuriously, would a cry for deliverance have ever gone up to heaven? and had Pharaoh been content to ease their burdens, would they ever have marched for Canaan? Alas, we are apt to chill in our desires for heaven when we get to the warm side of the hedge, and hear the smooth side of the world’s tongue. When the flowers of earth charm us we cast our eyes downward and forget the stars of heaven-at least, the danger lies that way.

Wise men dare not ask for unmingled prosperity, for they are not sure they can bear it. When first we traval to the south and escape this land of fog we delight without measure in the sunshine, and are anxious to bask in it throughout the livelong day. Do you wonder? Yet before long experience suggests a sunshade, for the stranger finds that his head cannot endure the full rays of the sun. In the same way many a man has suffered a sunstroke in his mind, and heart, and character, by making money too fast and prospering too much.

There is a danger of another kind in a spiritual experience which is all smooth and pleasant. You all remember the fate of Moab who had been at ease from his youth, and had become settled upon his lees; may it never be ours. Yet I have seen professors lose their balance while filled with delight. I am not one of those who would speak evil of excitement in religion: men get excited about politics, why should they not be excited about eternal things? Still, there is a kind of delirious religion abroad which I would have men avoid. Its joys are not calm and quiet, but fanatical and noisy. Be ye sober. Do not give up the reins of your judgment and permit your feelings to run away with you. Some Christians have been so uniformly joyous that they have grown elated and self-conceited, even as Jeshurun waxed fat and kicked. A few have even supposed themselves to be absolutely perfect while in the flesh-a mere supposition, disproved by their own want of modesty. We have seen brethren carry their heads so high that they could hardly understand a poor believer who was wrestling against sin, and in the strength of God overcoming his corruptions: they have become censorious, and have condemned their brethren as if they had been appointed to be judges in Israel to set up whom they would, and put down whom they chose. Repose of mind, caused as much by sound bodily health as by spiritual joy, has made men think uncharitably of sick and sorrowful saints, who have been very dear to Jesus, though very doubtful of themselves. Alas! a succession of excitements has, in some cases, bred self-sufficiency, and this has made men light-headed, and they have been carried away by divers heresies. Ecclesiastical history will tell you that some who have boasted of their high spiritual delights have gone far in vain imaginings, and have ended in the worst forms of immorality. It is an extraordinary fact that super-spirituality has often been found to dwell next door to sensuality, and men have turned the wine of holy love into the vinegar of lust. I need not go to ancient chronicles to prove this: a word to the wise suffices. Even spiritual joy needs a dash of salt, if not of wormwood, to be mingled with it. Holy delight needs to be coupled with sacred grief; repentance must go with faith, patience with hope, humility with full assurance, and conscious self-emptiness with a sense of the all-sufficiency of Christ.

I would remind you next, that unmixed joy would be fallacious, because there is no such thing here below. If a man should become perfectly contented with the things of this world, it would be the result of a false view of things. This is an error against which we should pray; for this world cannot fill the soul, and if a man thinks he has filled his soul with it, he must be under a gross delusion. What is the best thing of earth-but a bubble, tinted with rainbow hues, but unsubstantial as a dream? Every earthly joy hath within it the seeds of its own destruction? Oh man, if thou didst but know thyself, much more thy God, thou wouldst be assured that visible things can never satisfy the desires of a spiritual being.

As to spiritual joy, I say that in no man’s experience can it be long without admixture and yet be true. Never at any moment can a Christian be in such a position that he has not some cause either for dissatisfaction with himself, or fear of the tempter, or anxiety to be faithful in service. Our streams of joy blend with currents of fear. Blessed be God, my sin is forgiven me: this joy calls up its balancing thought,-Oh that the Spirit of God may help me not to sin again. Again I sing,-Blessed be God, I have gotten the victory over an evil habit: but my song is followed by the prayer-Lord, enable me to conquer all evils, even those which as yet I know not. Thus joy and fear hang like the two scales of a balance,-I mean not the fear which love casts out, but the filial fear which love fosters. If God has preserved his servant in the day of battle, he has no room to boast, for here comes another enemy. Temptations come wave after wave, and, having breasted one, we prepare for another. We cannot yet shout the victory, for, lo, the foes advance squadron upon squadron; their routed battalions are succeeded by new armies, and it behoves us to quit ourselves like men. We dwell where in our God we have the utmost reason for delight, but where in all things we perceive the most weighty arguments for solemnity. Rejoice evermore, but cease not to fear and tremble for all the goodness and all the prosperity that the Lord has procured for you.

Once more, unmixed delight on earth would be unnatural. We are not in heaven yet, and perfect bliss lives not beneath these cloudy skies, nor within the pale sway of the moon. While we are in this body we groan, though we have the firstfruits of the Spirit, for we are in a creation which groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now. Our years must have their winters while the world revolves. When the Dutch had the trade of the East in their hands they were accustomed to sell birds of paradise to the untravelled people of these realms. These specimen birds had no feet, for they had craftily removed them, and the merchants declared that the species lived on the wing and never alighted. There was so much of truth in the fable that had they been really and veritably “birds of paradise” they would not have found a place for their feet upon this globe. Truly, birds of paradise do come and go, and Hit from heaven to earth, but we see them not, neither can we build tabernacles to detain them. While you are here expect reminders of the fact that this is not your rest. If you could attain to perfect joy on earth you might be justified in saying, “I have no longing for heaven; I am perfectly clear of sin, and care, and trouble; I may as well stay where I am. What need to go further if I can fare no better?” Let no man dream that things will ever come to this with him. Ah, ye lovely flowers of spring, this year ye have looked forth too soon. It is strangely mild weather for December, but spring has not yet arrived. Possibly it is so with some of my hearers: because the Lord is smiling upon you, it is very mild weather with your souls, and you dream that the winter of trouble is ended and that your heaven has begun. Be not deceived, you are not yet

“Where everlasting spring abides

And never-withering flowers.”

Perhaps a touch of frost may do you good by preventing your getting into an unnatural and unsound condition.

Thus much, then, upon the first point, the toning down of our joys, which is wisely managed by our Father’s wisdom and prudence.

Secondly, we are to see how this toning down is done, and observe the feelings by which this sobering effect is produced,-“They shall fear and tremble for all the goodness and for all the prosperity that I procure unto it.” Why fear and tremble? Is not this in part a holy awe of God’s presence? Remember that text, “Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure.” The argument for fear and trembling is the work of God in the soul. Because God is working in you there must be no trifling. If the eternal Deity deigns to make a workshop of my nature, I too must work, but it must be with fear and trembling.

So, then, the blessed presence of God in the believer’s joy, and the very fact that he has worked it in him, is a cause for the fear and trembling which comes over the spirit of the joyous believer, and that I think is the first meaning of our text. God has been very good to me, unspeakably good to me, and I have plainly seen the traces of his fatherly hand in my life. Yea, I have so seen them that I have cried out with adoring amazement in many a Bethel, “How dreadful is this place! It is none other than the house of God and the very gate of heaven.” So has it been with you, dear friends. When God has come very near to you in a blaze of mercy, when he has done things that you looked not for; when your mouth has been filled with laughter, and your tongue with singing because of his goodness, have you not at the same time felt overcome by the excess of his favour? Have you not been able to sympathize with Peter when, at the sight of his boat full of fish, he cried “Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord.” Have you not felt a solemn trembling like Manoah when he feared that he must die, because he had seen an angel of the Lord? I know it has been so with you. A little mercy would have made you sing, but a great mercy has made you sit in silence before the Lord, or fall on your knees in adoration. A common providence would have charmed you, but an extraordinary providence has overwhelmed you; you have lain in the dust at Jesus’ feet, feeling yourself to be but dust and ashes, and yet every particle of dust has been full of wondering love to God. This is one way in which God keeps his people right in the days of their joy: where a shallow drink might have intoxicated, he gives so deep a draught that the danger is past, and holy wonder takes the place of unholy pride.

But next to that there rises up in the mind of every favoured Christian a deep repentance for past sin. He asks himself this question, “How could I have lived as I have done when God has entertained such love towards me?” When I discovered the election of God’s grace, and when I saw at what a price I had been redeemed by our Lord Jesus, I was ashamed of all my evil ways. When I read my name inscribed on the palms of Jesus’ hands, when I understood that I was united to him by a union that never could be broken, I said to myself, “What a thousand fools I have been to have lived forgetful of my highest glory, unmindful of my dearest friend!” To have lived year after year in open enmity against my Lord seemed like a grim and ghastly dream, almost too horrible to be true. Have you not felt the same? Have you not felt ashamed and confounded at the memory of your former life? Have you not felt as if you could never open your mouth any more because of all your unkindness to your heavenly friend? Such penitent reflections keep the Lord’s people right, by creating a fear and trembling in the presence of his overflowing goodness.

Let me ask you another question. Has not your deepest sense of unworthiness come upon you when you have been conscious of superlative mercy? When the Lord has scourged and chastened you, you have seen your sins in your sorrows, and have been ashamed: but, by the memory of his great goodness, you have been far more corrected and humbled. When our secret sins are set in the light of God’s countenance, it is a light indeed! Oh, the shame my soul has known when the Lord has caressed me, when he has kissed me with the kisses of his mouth. Then I have said, “Ah, Lord, whence is this to me? What am I that thou dost deal thus lovingly with me?” It was when Jehovah came and showed himself to Job, not in chastening, not with fire of God, or whirlwind, nor with sore boils and blains, but as his own dear covenant God, it was then that Job said, “Now mine eye seeth thee, therefore I abhor myself in dust and ashes.” Love makes the crimson of sin more red than ever. Blood-bought pardon makes sin look black as sackcloth of hair. I tell you, sirs, it is not the flames of hell, but the glories of heaven, that most of all fill us with trembling before the Lord. Nothing touches the heart like undeserved and unexpected love. Love’s glance flashes to the very core of the heart, and makes the offender, like Peter, go forth and weep bitterly. Do we not each cry, “Would God I could never sin again. Oh, that I could perfectly serve my God without a slip, even to my last day, because of his great love to me.” We tremble and are afraid, because of the unutterable grace which has met our utter unworthiness, and rivalled it, until grace has gotten unto itself the victory.

Have you never noticed how the Lord brings his people to their bearings, and keeps them steady, under a sense of great love, by suggesting to their hearts the question, “How can I live as becometh one who has been favoured like this?” Did you ever feel that the glory of the palace of love made you afraid to dwell in it? When you have put on your best apparel, those garments which are whiter than any fuller on earth could make them, the matchless righteousness of God, have you not felt fearful of defiling your robes? Did you ever see yourselves adorned as a bride for her husband in all the gifts and graces of the Holy Spirit, and have you not said to yourselves “What manner of people ought we to be?” You have scarcely known which way to turn, or how to move. You feared to walk lest you should defile those silver sandals and those feet so newly washed; you did not know what to touch for fear you should stain those hands which Christ had jewelled with his love and made white as ivory with his effectual cleansing. Have you not felt as if you dared not speak till you had prayed, “Lord, open thou my lips.” You have been afraid to look for fear your eyes should glance on evil; and therefore you have prayed, “Turn away mine eyes from beholding vanity.” There has been such a fear, such a caution, such a holy jealousy upon you that, instead of being uplifted by favour, you have been humbled thereby. Grace never makes a man vain. When a soul is adorned with glory and beauty, and made to shine like the star of the morning, it owns its borrowed comeliness and brightness, and is mildly radiant with reflected rays. When raised up by the special favour of our God into communion with himself, we are afraid of trespassing against the decorum of almighty love, fearful of violating the propriety of sovereign grace. The Lord our God is a jealous God; and he will be had in reverence of those who are round about him. This fact has made us feel like those apostles who were filled with fear as well as with great joy. To know how to behave ourselves in the house of God has been our anxiety. We have felt like a poor countryman, bred and born in the wilds, who finds himself in a court, and feels strange in such a place. Thus have we been clothed with humility as we have worn the garments of praise. Exalted to be kings and priests, our kingdom and priesthood have called forth our careful thought, and vainglory has thus been banished.

And have you never felt a fear lest God’s goodness should he abused by you? I have been smitten to the very heart as with a secret blow in moments of delight, when I have thought, “And suppose, after all, I should not serve God faithfully in my favoured position, and should not be approved of him at the last? What if I should seem to be an apostle, and prove to be a Judas? What if I should speak of Christ, and yet be nothing better than a sounding brass or a tinkling cymbal?” That heart-piercing fear will wound pride if anything will. Have you never been thus put to the question by your conscience? Have not other questions arisen of a similar character? You have seen your children around you, and you have been happy with them, but have you not thought, “How if I should not train them aright, and they should grow up to be a sorrow to me, and a dishonour to the church of God?” When prospered in business, have you never said to yourself, “What if I should become a worshipper of the golden calf? What if covetousness should eat out the heart of my devotion? What if, when my Master calls me to account for my talents, he should cast me away for having hid them in a napkin?” Have you never been tried by such thoughts? If you have never thus examined yourself, you had better do so at once. He who has never questioned his own condition had better make an immediate enquiry. He who has never felt great searchings of heart needs to be searched with candles. It is idle to take things for granted, for all of us must be tried by fire, and even “the righteous scarcely are saved.” No man’s hell shall be more terrible than that of the self-confident one who made so sure of heaven that he would not take the ordinary precaution to ask whether his title-deeds were genuine or no.

One more thought may also occur to the most joyous believer. He will say, “What if after rejoicing in all this blessedness I should lose it?” “What,” cries one, “do you not believe in the final perseverance of the saints?” Assuredly I do, but are we saints? There’s the question. Moreover, many a believer who has not lost his soul has, nevertheless, lost his present joy and prosperity, and why may not we? The good man has shone as a star of the first magnitude, but suddenly he has dwindled into darkness: he has been unwatchful, and in consequence by the dozen years together he has had to go softly in the bitterness of his soul. We have known fathers in Israel who have stepped aside, and though they have by deep repentance found their way to heaven, they have gone sorrowing thither. Look at David’s history. Who happier all the early part of his life? Note that one sin with Bathsheba, and ask who more tried and troubled than David throughout the rest of his pilgrimage? The doctrine of final perseverance was never intended for the comfort of any who are afraid of self-examination, or who are not watchful; for it is by no means at variance with the other doctrine that many who made sure of heaven in their own minds will never enter there, because Jesus never knew them. Great joy may be only a meteor, great excitement may be a mirage of the desert, great confidence may be a will-o’-the-wisp luring to destruction. The highest seats in the synagogue do not secure for their occupants a place among the shining ones above. Many rejoicing professors will yet discover that their spot was not the spot of God’s people, and their song was not the new song which God doth put into the mouth. And what if that should be your case and mine? So, when I stand upon my high mountain, let me pray, “Lord, hold thou me up.” Let him that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall, for he is the man who is most in danger. He who is fullest of holy delight is still to watch, for did not Jesus say, “What I say unto you I say unto all, watch”? God grant that we may be helped to watch against the arrow which flieth by day as much as against the pestilence which walketh in darkness.

Thus you see how the Lord, by working upon our innermost feelings, sobers us in the hour of joy, even as the text hath it,-“They shall fear and tremble for all the goodness and for all the prosperity that I procure unto it.”

By way of practical application, let us now consider the measure in which you and I can enter into this experience. I thought to myself, if I begin to make individual applications I shall have before me a never-ending task, because every man has had a distinct experience of this truth if he has safely stood upon the high places of joy. We have hundreds of us perceived the benefits of the dark lines and shadings of life’s picture, and we see how fit and proper it is that trembling should mingle with transport. As the fruit of experience I have learned to look for a hurricane soon after an unusually delightful calm. When the wind blows hard, and the tempest lowers, I hope that before long there will be a lull; but when the sea-birds sit on the wave, and the sail hangs idly, I wonder when a gale will come. To my mind there is no temptation so bad as not being tempted at all. The worst devil in the world is when you cannot see the devil at all, because the villain has hidden himself away within the heart, and is preparing to give you a fatal stab.

“More the treacherous calm I dread

Than tempests thundering overhead.”

This general statement may suffice, and as I cannot make an application to each one personally, I think I will apply the truth to this church as a whole. When this building was not yet ready for opening we held a meeting in it, and I remember among the speakers there was one who is now with God, Mr.Jonathan George, of Walworth, and he made use of this text in a little speech that he made:-He said, “It would be well for us all to remember, when God blesses us with any measure of prosperity, that prosperity is very hard to bear. How is that? Cannot Christianity or the grace of God bear it? No, it is because of the extreme carnality and pride of our hearts. Here is a portion of Scripture we should all recollect: ‘They shall fear and tremble for all the prosperity that I send.’ It is a blessing when God has succeeded our poor efforts, and poured out a blessing upon us, if we are jealous of our own hearts, and fear and tremble. Oh God, how rich, how beneficent thou art! Let us not lose thy full blessing by our own pride; by pointing to some second cause, and saying, ‘It was I; it was ourselves; it was our ministers.’ ” Verily I say unto you the words of the man of God have been fulfilled. How I have feared and trembled because the Lord’s mercy to us has been so extraordinary. As a church we have enjoyed so many years of growth, and prosperity, and unity, and happiness, that one is apt to fear that it cannot last much longer. Certainly it cannot be perpetuated except by fresh power from the Lord who is wonderful in working. One begins to think, “Must not something happen to spoil our concord? Will power always continue with the word preached? Will not the candle burn low in the socket? Such holy jealousy, if faith be also active, will help to keep us right. Evils may be prevented by the foresight of them. Through grace, by our fear of falling we may be helped to stand.

Brethren, we are just now in a critical time of our life as a church. Whatever of novelty there was about our movements has long since vanished, and those who came among us from curiosity know us no more. Your pastor’s ministry cannot be expected to be as fresh and vigorous as it used to be, for upon his head the grey hairs far outnumber the darker ones, and perhaps grey hairs are stealing over his preaching too. If natural vigour fails, now is the time to see whether the power which has sustained us be of God or no. We know what the answer to the text will be-out of weakness we shall be made strong.

Besides, my brethren, certain invaluable helpers who were with us in the beginning-and rare men they were-are going home; one by one our leaders are being called away: will more be found? Will they be of equal worth and weight? I know they will; yet, these are solemn questions. We are in the middle of the river now, and in the middle the river is deepest and hardest to ford. Now we need that underneath us there should be the everlasting arms. I am weaker than ever, you also are weaker than ever; but the eternal God fainteth not. We have the same old gospel, and you will not grow tired of it, though it is preached by the same old Spurgeon. The Holy Spirit will abide with us, and that will make up for the weakness of our spirit. You who have been earnest at prayer will not, I hope, lose your zeal, for the mercy-seat is still accessible.

To persevere is the difficulty. It would be easy to burn at a stake for five minutes; but to be surrounded with smouldering faggots of green wood, and to burn by slow degrees, would be torture indeed; yet such is the patience of saints. Keeping up your burning zeal, your personal holiness, your evangelizing efforts, and all your spiritual works after twenty-seven years is no mean test of your faith. He that endureth to the end the same shall be saved. Yes, brethren, these are the thoughts that come into my mind, and prevent my ever saying we have done well, and may rest on our oars. Far from anything like exaltation or self-congratulation, I feel more than ever inclined to lie low at the feet of my Master and kiss the very dust he stands upon. I feel more disqualified, more unsuitable, more unable for my Lord’s work than ever, and yet I am glad in the Lord, and find joy in his name. Since there is an everlasting arm that never can be palsied, since there is a brow that knows no wrinkle, and a divine mind that is never perplexed, we go forward in hope, and cast ourselves upon our eternal helper once again. You have heard of the ancient giant Antæus, who could not be overcome, because as often as Hercules threw him to the ground, he touched his mother earth, and rose renewed. Such be your lot and mine, often to be cast down, and as often to rise by that downcasting. “When I am weak then am I strong.” Let us glory in infirmity, because the power of Christ doth rest upon us. Let us be content to decrease that Christ may increase; to be nothing that Jesus may be all in all. If we do fear and tremble for all the goodness that God has procured for us, it is not a fearing that he will change, or a trembling lest he should be defeated. The fear and trembling are for ourselves, and not for him. I have no fear and trembling about the gospel. I have preached it many years in this place, and its attractive perfume is undiminished. I read the other day of a grain of musk which had been kept for ten years in a room wherein the air was perpetually changed; it scented that chamber from year to year, and yet when it was weighed by the most delicate scales no diminution of its bulk was apparent. So the gospel continues to be as ointment poured forth, savouring the thousands that come hither year by year, and yet it is as full of fragrance and freshness as ever, and so shall it be even if for a thousand ages it should be our theme. Come we then with comfort back to the unalterable gospel, to the undying Spirit, to the unchanging God: here is room for joy unspeakable and full of glory. Up with your banners, then! Forward to new victories! In the name of the God of Jacob let us be steadfast, unmoveable, always abounding in the work of the Lord. Amen.

Portion of Scripture read before Sermon-Psalm 103.

Hymns from “Our Own Hymn Book”-249, 808, 809.

END OF VOLUME XXVII.