SERMON XXXVII
THE WORTHY COMMUNICANT
Luke xviii. 14
I tell you, this man went down to his house justified rather than the other.
Which of these two men was the more fit to come to the Communion? Most of you will answer, The publican: for he was more justified, our Lord himself says, than the Pharisee. True: but would you have said so of your own accord, if the Lord had not said so? Which of the two men do you really think was the better man, the Pharisee or the publican? Which of the two do you think had his soul in the safer state? Which of the two would you rather be, if you were going to die? Which of the two would you rather be, if you were going to the Communion? For mind, one could not have refused the Pharisee, if he had come to the Communion. He was in no open sin: I may say, no outward sin at all. You must not fancy that he was a hypocrite, in the sense in which we usually employ that word. I mean, he was not a man who was leading a wicked life secretly, while he kept up a show of religion. He was really a religious man in his own way, scrupulous, and over-scrupulous to perform every duty to the letter. He went to his church to worship; and he was no lip-worshipper, repeating a form of words by rote, but prayed there honestly, concerning the things which were in his heart. He did not say, either, that he had made himself good. If he was wrong on some points, he was not on that. He knew where his goodness, such as it was, came from. ‘God, I thank thee,’ he says, ‘that I am what I am.’ What have we in this man? one would ask at first sight. What reason for him to stay away from the Sacrament? He would not have thought himself that there was any reason. He would, probably, have thought—‘If I am not fit, who is? Repent me truly of my former sins? Certainly. If I have done the least harm to any one, I shall be happy to restore it fourfold. If I have neglected one, the least of God’s services, I shall be only too glad to keep it all the more strictly for the future.
‘Intend to lead a new life? I am leading one, and trying to lead one more and more every day. I shall be thankful to any one who will show me any new service which I can offer to God, any new act of reverence, any new duty.
‘I must go in love and charity with all men? I do so. I have not a grudge against any human being. Of course, I know the world too well to be satisfied with it. I cannot shut my eyes to the fact that millions are living very sinful, shocking lives—extortioners, unjust, adulterers; and that three people out of four are going straight to hell. I pity them, and forgive them any wrong which they have done to me. What more can I do?’
This is what the Pharisee would have said. Is this man fit to come to the Communion? At least he himself thinks so.
On the other hand, was the publican fit? That is a serious question; one which we cannot answer, without knowing more about him than our Lord has chosen to tell us. Many a person is ready enough, in these days, to cry ‘God be merciful to me a sinner!’ who is fit, I fear, neither to come to the Communion, nor to stay away either.
It was not so, I suppose, with the old Jews in our Lord’s time. The Pharisees then were hard legalists, who stood all on works; and, therefore, if a man broke off from them, and threw himself on God’s grace and mercy, he did it in a simple, honest, effectual way, like this publican.
But now, I am sorry to say, our Pharisees have contrived to make themselves as proud and self-righteous about their own faith and repentance, as the Jewish Pharisees did about their own works and observances; and there has risen up in England and elsewhere a very ugly new hypocrisy. People now-a-days are too apt to pride themselves on their own convictions of sin, and their own repentance, till they trust in their repentance to save them, and not in Christ, just as the Pharisee trusted in his works to save him, and not in Christ; and when they pray, I cannot help fearing (for I am sure many of their religious books teach them it) that they pray very much like that Pharisee, ‘God, I thank thee that I am not as other men are, carnal, unconverted, unconvinced of sin, nor even as that plain, moral, respectable man. I am convinced of sin; I am converted; I have the right frames, and the right feelings, and the right experiences.’ Oh, of all the cunning snares of the devil, that I think is the cunningest. Well says the old proverb—‘The devil is old, and therefore he knows many things.’
In old times he made men trust in their own righteousness: and that was snare enough; now he has learnt how to make men actually trust in their own sinfulness, and so turn the grace of God into a cloak of pride, and contempt of their fellow-creatures.
My friends, do you think that if the publican, after he had said, ‘God be merciful to me a sinner!’ had said to himself, ‘There—how beautifully I have repented—how honest I have been to God—I am all right now’—he would have gone down to his house justified at all? Not he. No more will you and I, my friends. If we have sinned, what should we be but ashamed of it? Ay, utterly ashamed. And if we really know what sin is—if we really see the sinfulness of sin—if we really see ourselves as God sees us—we shall be too much shocked at the sight of our own hearts to have time to boast of our being able to see our own hearts. We shall be too full of loathing and hatred for our sins, too full of longing to get rid of our sins, and to become righteous and holy, even as God is righteous and holy, to give way to any pride in our own frames and feelings; and, instead of thinking ourselves better men than our neighbours because we see our sins, and fancy they do not see theirs, we shall be almost ready to think ourselves worse than our neighbours, to think that they cannot have so much to repent of as we; and as we grow in grace, we shall see more and more sin in ourselves, till we actually fancy at times that no one can be as bad as we are, and in lowliness of mind esteem others better than ourselves. We may carry that too far, too. Certainly there is no use in accusing ourselves of sins which we have not committed; we have all quite enough real sins to answer for without inventing more. But still that is a better frame of mind than the other; for no man can be too humble, while any man can be too proud.
But let us all ask God to open our eyes, that we may see ourselves just as we are, let our sins be many or few. Let us ask God to convince us really of sin by his Holy Spirit, and show us what sin is, and its exceeding sinfulness; how ugly and foul sin is, how foolish and absurd, how mean and ungrateful toward that good God who wishes us nothing but good, and wishes us, therefore, to be good, because goodness is the only path to life and happiness; and then we shall be so ashamed of ourselves, so afraid of our own weakness, so shocked at the difference between ourselves and the spotless Lord Jesus, that we shall have no time to despise others, no time to admire our own frames, and feelings, and repentances. All we shall think of is our own sinfulness, and God’s mercy; and we shall come eagerly, if not boldly, to the throne of grace, to find grace and mercy to help us in the time of need; crying, ‘Purge thou me, O Lord, or I shall never be pure; wash thou me, and then alone shall I be clean. For thou requirest, not frames or feelings, not pride and self-conceit, but truth in the inward parts; and wilt make me to understand wisdom secretly.’
Then, indeed, we shall be fit to come to the Holy Communion; for then we shall be so ashamed of ourselves that we shall truly repent of our sins—so ashamed of ourselves that we shall long and determine to lead a new life—so ashamed of ourselves that we shall have no heart to look down on any of our neighbours, or pass hard judgments on them, but be in love and charity with all men; and so, in spite of all our past sins, come to partake worthily of the body and blood of Him who died for our sins, whose blood will wash them out of our hearts, whose body will strengthen and refresh us, body and soul, to a new and everlasting life of humbleness and thankfulness, honesty and justice, usefulness and love.
SERMON XXXVIII
OUR DESERTS
Luke vi. 36–38
Be ye therefore merciful, as your Father also is merciful. Judge not, and ye shall not be judged: condemn not, and ye shall not be condemned: forgive, and ye shall be forgiven. Give, and it shall be given unto you; good measure, pressed down, and shaken together, and running over, shall men give into your bosom. For with the same measure that ye mete withal, it shall be measured to you again.
One often hears complaints against this world, and against mankind; one hears it said that people are unjust, unfair, cruel; that in this world no man can expect to get what he deserves. And, of course, there are great excuses for saying so. There are bad men in the world in plenty, who do villanous and cruel things enough; and besides, there is a great deal of dreadful misery in the world, which does not seem to come through any fault of the poor creatures who suffer it; misery of which we can only say, ‘Neither did this man sin, nor his parents: but that the glory of God may be made manifest in him.’
But still our Lord tells us in the text, that, on the whole, there is order lying under all the disorder, justice under all the injustice, right under all the wrong; and that on the whole we get what we deserve. ‘Be ye therefore merciful, as your Father also is merciful. Judge not, and ye shall not be judged: condemn not, and ye shall not be condemned: forgive, and ye shall be forgiven. Give, and it shall be given unto you; good measure, pressed down, and shaken together, and running over, shall men give into your bosom. For with the same measure that ye mete withal, it shall be measured to you again.’
Of course, as I said just now, it is not always so. None knew that better than the blessed Lord: else why did he come to seek and save that which was lost? But still the more we look into our own lives, the more we shall find our Lord’s words true; the more we shall find that on the whole, in the long run, men will be just and fair to us, and give us, sooner or later, what we deserve.
Now, to deserve a thing, properly means to serve for it, to work for it and earn it, as a natural consequence. If a man puts his hand into the fire, he deserves to burn it, because it is the nature of fire to burn, and therefore it burns him, and so he gets his deserts; and if a man does wrong, he deserves to be unhappy, because it is the nature of sin to make the sinner unhappy, and so he gets his deserts. God has not to go out of his way to punish sin; sin punishes itself; and so if a man does right, he becomes in the long run happy. God has not to go out of his way to reward him and make him happy; his own good deeds make him happy; he earns happiness in the comfort of a good conscience, and the love and respect of those about him; and so he gets his deserts. For our Lord says, ‘People in the long run will treat you as you treat them. If they feel and see by experience that you are loving and kind to them, they will be loving and kind to you; as you do to them, they will, in the long run, do to you.’ They may mistake you at first, even dislike you at first. Did they not mistake, hate, crucify the Lord himself? and yet his own rule came true of him. A few crucified him; but now all civilized nations worship him as God. Be sure, then, that his rule will come true of you, though not at first, yet in God’s good time. Therefore hold still in the Lord, and abide patiently; and he shall make thy righteousness as clear as the light, and thy just dealing as the noon-day.
Now this is a very blessed and comfortable thought. Would to God that all of us, young people especially, would lay it to heart. How are we to get comfortably through this life? Or, if we are to have sorrows (as we all must), how can we make those sorrows as light as possible? How can we make friends who will comfort us in those sorrows, instead of leaving us to bear our burden alone, and turning their backs on us just when our poor hearts are longing for a kind look and a kind word from our neighbours? Our Lord tells us now. The same measure that you mete withal, it shall be measured to you again.
There is his plan. It is a very simple one. It goes on the same principle as ‘He that saveth his life shall lose it, and he that loseth his life shall save it.’ If we are selfish, and take care only of ourselves, the day will come when our neighbours will leave us alone in our selfishness to shift for ourselves. If we set out determining through life to care about other people rather than ourselves, then they will care for themselves more than for us, and measure their love to us by our measure of love to them. But if we care for others, they will learn to care for us; if we befriend others, they will befriend us. If we show forth the Spirit of God to them, in kindliness, generosity, patience, self-sacrifice, the day will surely come when we shall find that the Spirit of God is in our neighbours as well as in ourselves; that on the whole they will be just to us, and pay us what we have deserved and earned. Blessed and comfortable thought, that no kind word, kind action, not even the cup of cold water given in Christ’s name, can lose its reward. Blessed thought, that after all our neighbours are our brothers, and that if we remember that steadily, and treat them as brothers now, they will recollect it too some day, and treat us as brothers in return. Blessed thought, that there is in the heart of every man a spark of God’s light, a grain of God’s justice, which may grow up in him hereafter, and bear good fruit to eternal life.
Yes; it is a pleasant thing to find men better than we fancied them. A pleasant thing; for first, it makes us love them the more, and there is nothing so pleasant as loving. And more; it does this—it makes us more inclined to trust God’s justice. We say to ourselves, Men are, we find, really more just and fair than they seem to us at times; surely God must be more just and fair than he seems to us at times. For there are times when it does seem a hard thing to believe that God is just; times when the devil tempts poor suffering creatures sorely, and tries to make them doubt their heavenly Father, and say with David, What am I the better for having done right? Surely in vain have I cleansed my heart; in vain have I washed my hands in innocency. All the day long have I been punished, and chastened every morning. Yes; when some poor woman, working in the field, with all the cares of a family on her, looks up at great people in their carriages, she is tempted, she must be tempted to say at times, ‘Why am I to be so much worse off than they? Is God just in making me so poor and them so rich?’ It is a foolish thought. I do believe it is a temptation of the devil, a deceit of the devil; for rich people are not really one whit happier or lighter-hearted than poor ones, and all the devil wishes is to make poor people envy their neighbours, and mistrust God. But still one cannot wonder at their faith failing them at times. I do not judge them, still less condemn them; for the text forbids me. Or again, when some poor creature, crippled from his youth, looks upon others strong and active, cheerful and happy. Think of a deformed child watching healthy children at play; and then think, must it not be hard at times for that child not to repine, and cry to God, ‘Why hast thou made me thus?’
Yes. I will not go on giving fresh instances. The world is but too full of them.
But when such thoughts trouble us, here is one comfort—ay, here is our only comfort—God must be more just than man. Whatsoever appearances may seem to make against it, he must be. For where did all the justice in the world come from, but from God? Who put the feeling of justice into every man’s heart, but God himself? He is the glorious sun, perfectly bright, perfectly pure; and all the other goodness in the world is but rays and beams of light sent forth from his great light. So we may be certain that God is not only as just as man, but millions of times more just; more just, and righteous, and good than all the just men on earth put together. We can believe that. We must believe it. Thousands have believed it already. Thousands of holy sufferers, in prisons and on scaffolds, in poverty and destitution, on sick-beds of lingering torture, have believed still that God was just and righteous in all his dealings with them; and have cried in the hour of their bitterest agony, ‘Though thou slay me, O Lord, yet will I trust in thee!’
Yes. God is just. He has revealed that in the person of his Son Jesus Christ. There is God’s likeness. There is proof enough that God is not one who afflicts willingly, or grieves the children of men out of any neglect or spite, or respecteth one person more than another. It may seem hard to be sure of that: unless we believe that Jesus is the Christ, the co-equal and co-eternal Son of the Father, we never shall be sure of it. Believing in the message of the ever-blessed Trinity, we shall be sure; for we shall be sure that, ‘Such as the Father is, such is the Son, and such is the Holy Ghost’—perfect love, perfect justice, perfect mercy; and therefore we can be sure that in the world beyond the grave the balance will be made even, again, and for ever; and every mourner be comforted, and every sufferer be refreshed, and every one receive his due reward—if they will only now in this life take the lesson of the text, ‘Judge not, and you shall not be judged: condemn not, and you shall not be condemned: forgive, and you shall be forgiven; for if you forgive every one his brother their trespasses, in like wise will your heavenly Father forgive you.’ Do that; and then you will get your deserts in the life to come, and by forgiving, and helping, and blessing others, deserve to be forgiven, and comforted, and blessed yourselves, for the sake of that Saviour who is day and night presenting all your good works to his Father and your Father, as a precious and fragrant offering—a sacrifice with which the God of love is well pleased, because it is, like himself, made up of love.
SERMON XXXIX
THE LOFTINESS OF GOD
Isaiah lvii. 15
For thus saith the high and lofty One that inhabiteth eternity, whose name is Holy, I dwell in the high and holy place; with him also that is of a contrite and humble spirit, to revive the spirit of the humble, and to revive the heart of the contrite ones.
This is a grand text; one of the grandest in the whole Old Testament; one of those the nearest to the spirit of the New. It is full of Gospel—of good news: but it is not the whole Gospel. It does not tell us the whole character of God. We can only get that in the New. We can get it there; we can get it in that most awful and glorious chapter which we read for the second lesson—the twenty-seventh chapter of St. Matthew. Seen in the light of that—seen in the light of Christ’s cross and what it tells us, all is clear, and all is bright, and all is full of good news—at least to those who are humble and contrite, crushed down by sorrow, and by the feeling of their own infirmities.
But what does the text tell us?
Of a high and lofty One, who inhabits eternity.
Of a lofty God, Almighty, incomprehensible; so far above us, so different from us, that we cannot picture him to ourselves; of a glory and majesty utterly beyond all human fancy or imagination.
Of a holy God, in whom is no sin, nor taint of sin; who is of purer eyes than to behold iniquity; who is so perfect, that he cannot be content with anything which is not as perfect as himself; who looks with horror and disgust on evil of every shape; who cannot endure it, will at last destroy it.
Of a God who abides in eternity—who cannot change—cannot alter his own decrees and laws, because his decrees and laws are right and necessary, and proceed out of his own character. If he has said a thing, that thing must be; because it is the thing which ought to be.
How, then, shall we think of this lofty, holy, unchangeable God—we who are low, unholy, changing with every wind that blows?
Shall we say, ‘He is so far above us, that he cannot feel for us? He is so holy that he must hate us, and will our punishment, and our damnation for all our sins?’
‘He is eternal, and cannot change his will; and, therefore, if he wills us to perish, perish we must.’
We may think so of God, and dread God, and cry ‘Whither shall I flee from thy Spirit, and whither shall I go from thy presence?’ We may call to the mountains to fall on us, and to the hills to cover us, till we try to forget at all risks the thought of God: and if we do not, there are plenty who will do it for us. The devil, who slanders and curses God to men, and men to God, and to each other—he will talk to us of God in this way.
And men who preach the devil’s doctrine, will talk to us likewise, and say, ‘Yes, God is very dreadful, and very angry with you. God certainly intends to damn you. But I have a plan for delivering you out of God’s hands; I know what you must do to be saved from God—join my sect or party, and believe and work with me, and then you will escape God.’
But, after all, would it not be wiser, my friends, to hold your own tongues, and let God himself speak?
If he had not spoken in the first place, what should we have known of him? Can man by searching find out God? We should not have known that there was a high and lofty One, who inhabits eternity, if he had not told us. Had we not better hear the rest of his message, and let God finish his own character of himself?
And what does he say?
‘I dwell—I, the high and lofty One, who inhabit eternity—with him also, who is of a contrite and humble spirit, to revive the spirit of the humble, and to revive the heart of the contrite ones.’
Oh, my friends, is not this news? good news and unexpected news, perhaps, but still as true as what went before it? God hath said the one, and we believe it: and now he says the other; and shall we not believe it too?
Come, then, thou humble soul; thou crushed and contrite soul; thou who fearest that thou art not worthy of God’s care; thou from whom God has taken so much, that thou fearest that he will take all—come and hear the Lord’s message to thee—God’s own message; no devil’s message, or man’s message, but God’s own.
‘I will not contend for ever, neither will I be always wroth; for then the spirit would fail before me, and the souls which I have made. I have seen thy ways, and will heal thee. I will lead thee, also, and restore comforts to thee and to thy mourners. I create the fruit of the lips. I give men cause to thank me, and delight in giving. Peace, peace to him that is near, and to him that is far off, saith the Lord. If thou art near me, thou art safe; for if I were to take all else from thee, I should not take myself from thee. Though thou walkest through the valley of the shadow of death, I will be with thee. And if thou art far off from me, wandering in folly and sin, I cry peace to thee still. Why should I wish to be at war with any of my creatures? saith the Lord. My will is, that thou shouldst be at peace. I am at peace myself, and I wish to make all my creatures at peace also, and thee among the rest. I am whole and perfect myself, and I wish to heal all my creatures, and make them whole and perfect also, and thee among the rest.
‘But the wicked? Ay, this is their very misery, that there is no peace to them. I want them to enter into my peace, and they will not. I am at peace with them, saith the Lord. I owe them no grudge, poor wretches. But they will not be at peace with themselves. They are like the troubled sea, which casts up mire and dirt, and fouls itself. I cast up no mire nor dirt. I foul nothing. I tempt no man. I, the good God, create no evil. If the troubled sea fouls itself, so do the wicked make themselves miserable, and punish themselves by their own lusts, which war in their members. But they cannot alter me, saith the Lord; they cannot change my temper, my character, my everlasting name. I am that I am, who inhabit eternity; and no creature, and no creature’s sin, can make me other than I am.
And what is that? What is the name, what is the character, what is the temper of him who inhabits eternity? Look on the cross, and see.
The cross, at least, will tell you what kind of a God your God is. A good God; a God of love; a God of boundless forbearance and long-suffering. Good God! The folly and madness of men’s hearts, who look on God dying on the cross for them, and begin forthwith puzzling their brains as to how he died for them; how Christ’s blood washes away their sins; how it is applied, and to whom; puzzling their brains with theories of the atonement, and with predestination, and satisfaction, and forensic justification, and particular redemption, and long words which (four out of five of them) are not in the Bible, but are spun out of men’s own minds, as spiders’ webs are from spiders—and, like them, mostly fit to hamper poor harmless flies.
How Christ’s death takes away thy sins, thou wilt never know on earth—perhaps not in heaven. It is a mystery which thou must believe and adore. But why he died, thou canst see at the first glance—if thou hast a human heart, and wilt look at what God means thee to look at—Christ upon his cross. He died because he was love—love itself—love boundless, unconquerable, unchangeable—love which inhabits eternity, and therefore could not be hardened or foiled by any sin or rebellion of man, but must love men still; must go out to seek and save them; must dare, suffer any misery, shame, death itself, for their sake; just because it is absolute and perfect love, which inhabits eternity.
Look at that—look at the sight of God’s character, which the cross gives thee; and then, instead of being terrified at God’s will and decree being unchangeable and eternal, it will be the greatest possible comfort to thee that God’s will is unchangeable and eternal, because thou wilt see from the cross that it is a good will—a will of mercy, forbearance, long-suffering towards thee and all mankind, eternal in the heavens as God himself.
Then let those be afraid who are not afraid; and let those who are afraid, take heart. Let those who think they stand, take heed lest they fall. Let those who think they see, take care that they be not blind. Let those be afraid who fancy themselves right and above all mistakes, lest they should be full of ugly sins when they fancy themselves most religious and devout. Let those be afraid who are fond of advising others, lest they should be in more need of their own medicine than their patients are. Let those fear who pride themselves on their cunning, lest with all their cunning they only lead themselves into their own trap.
But those who are afraid, let them take heart. For what says the high and holy One, who inhabits eternity? ‘I dwell with him that is of a humble and contrite heart, to revive the spirit of the humble, and to revive the heart of the contrite ones.’
Let them take heart. Do you feel that you have lost your way in life? Then God himself will show you your way. Are you utterly helpless, worn out, body and soul? Then God’s eternal love is ready and willing to help you up, and revive you. Are you wearied with doubts and terrors? Then God’s eternal light is ready to show you your way; God’s eternal peace ready to give you peace. Do you feel yourself full of sins and faults? Then take heart; for God’s unchangeable will is, to take away those sins and purge you from those faults.
Are you tormented as Job was, over and above all your sorrows, by mistaken kindness, and comforters in whom is no comfort; who break the bruised reed and quench the smoking flax; who tell you that you must be wicked, and God must be angry with you, or all this would not have come upon you? Job’s comforters did so, and spoke very righteous-sounding words, and took great pains to justify God and to break poor Job’s heart, and made him say many wild and foolish words in answer, for which he was sorry afterwards; but after all, the Lord’s answer was, ‘My wrath is kindled against you three, for you have not spoken of me the thing which was right, as my servant Job hath. Therefore my servant Job shall pray for you, for him will I accept;’ as he will accept every humble and contrite soul who clings, amid all its doubts, and fears, and sorrows, to the faith that God is just and not unjust, merciful and not cruel, condescending and not proud—that his will is a good will, and not a bad will—that he hateth nothing that he hath made, and willeth the death of no man; and in that faith casts itself down like Job, in dust and ashes before the majesty of God, content not to understand his ways and its own sorrows; but simply submitting itself and resigning itself to the good will of that God who so loved the world that he spared not his only begotten Son, but freely gave him for us.