Delivered on Lord's-day Morning, January 22nd, 1871 by
C. H. SPURGEON,
At the Metropolitan Tabernacle, Newington
"In that day there shall be a fountain opened to the house of David and
to the inhabitants of Jerusalem for sin and for
uncleanness."–Zechariah 13:1.
WE DO NOT GRUDGE to the seed of Israel after the flesh the first
application of this very precious promise. There will be a day when
those who have so long refused to acknowledge Jesus as the Messias
shall discern the marks of his mission, and shall mourn that they have
pierced him. When the tribes of Israel shall lament their sin with holy
earnestness, there shall be no mourning to exceed it, they shall weep
even as in the mourning of Hadadrimmon in the valley of Megiddo, when
the wellbeloved Josiah was slain. Discovering that their nation
rejected the Son of God, when they crucified Jesus of Nazareth their
deeply religious spirit shall be filled with the utmost bitterness of
repentance, and each man and each woman shall cry for pardon to the
Lord of mercy. Then, close upon the heels of the weeping shall come the
full and complete forgiveness; the transgression of the tribes shall be
put away in one day; they shall perceive that the very side which they
pierced has yielded a fountain to cleanse them from their sin; joyfully
shall they behold on Calvary the brazen serpent lifted up for their
healing, the Paschal Lamb slain for their redemption, the sin-offering
sacrificed in their stead. What a blessed day will that be when "all
Israel shall be saved: as it is written, There shall come out of Zion
the Deliverer, and shall turn away ungodliness from Jacob." O that you
and I might live to see that happy era when all the Jewish race shall
behold their Messiahs; for then shall the fullness of the Gentiles be
gathered in. Our history is wrapped up with theirs. "Through their fall
salvation is come unto the Gentiles. Now if the fall of them be the
riches of the world, and the diminishing of them the riches of the
Gentiles; how much more their fullness?"
"Wake, harp of Zion, wake again,
Upon thine ancient hill,
On Jordan's long deserted plain,
By Kedron's lowly rill.
The hymn shall yet in Zion swell
That sounds Messiah's praise,
And thy loved name, Immanuel!
As once in ancient days.
For Israel yet shall own her King,
For her salvation waits,
And hill and dale shall sweetly sing
With praise in all her gates."
Having said thus much, however, we shall now take our text as belonging
to ourselves in common with Israel, for in the gospel no promise is now
set about with a hedge, and reserved for any race peculiarly; there is
now "neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is
neither male nor female: for ye are all one in Christ Jesus." This
promise is our joy at this hour. O that I might be able so to speak of
it that many anxious hearts might now see its meaning and appropriate
its blessedness!
In order to explain the text we shall dwell upon three notes; if these
three be clearly sounded we shall understand the passage–a
fountain–opened–still open.
I. A FOUNTAIN.
What is this fountain which is said to be opened, and when and how was
it opened? It is a fountain opened to the house of David, and the
inhabitants of, for sin and for uncleanness. We observe, therefore,
that the blessing here spoken of deals with the greatest evils to which
mankind is subject–sin and uncleanness. We have all fallen; we have
all proved our fall by our sinful practice. Sin has separated us from
God and brought upon us the divine wrath; uncleanness, which is a
tendency still to sin, a defilement of our nature, prevents our
returning to our heavenly Father, and entering into renewed fellowship
with aim. This great evil in its double form is, according to the text,
distinctly recognized by God; it is not winked at, it is not treated as
a trifle that may remain, and yet man may be beloved of God and be
happy; no, but the evil being there, preparation is made for its
removal. The text says, not that the filthiness is concealed, that the
transgression is excused, but that there is a fountain opened for the
effectual removal of sin and uncleanness. In the gospel God never
trifles with human sin. We proclaim full, free, immediate forgiveness
to the very chief of sinners, but it is not in a way which makes men
think that sin is trivial in God's esteem, for there is coupled with
the declaration of pardon a description of the way in which God by the
sacrifice of his Son renders it possible for him to be merciful without
being unjust. In the substitution of Christ Jesus we see justice and
mercy peacefully embracing, and conferring double honor upon each
other. I repeat the word, the uncleanness is not concealed, the sin is
not winked at, but there is a fountain prepared for the purging away of
the defilement, and it is opened to the house of David, for the great
and mighty, and to the inhabitants of Jerusalem–the poor, common
people of every class. Hear this, ye who feel yourselves sinners, God
has provided means for delivering you from your sins.
The text recalls to your notice the double nature of the evil of sin,
and the character of the provision which meets the double evil. The
fountain is opened for sin, that refers, no doubt, to the guilt of sin,
to sin as offending God and deserving punishment. There is a fountain
opened in the atonement, by which the offense rendered to God's honor
and dignity is put away. What if we have sinned, yet the Lord has
punished that sin in the person of his own Son, he has thus fulfilled
his threatening, and proven the truth of his word. In Jesus Christ,
therefore, the guilt of those for whom he was a substitute is put away
consistently with the righteousness of the great Lawgiver. God is just
and yet the justifier of him that believeth in Jesus. But this would
not be enough; there is a second mischief, namely, that our nature has
become unclean and consequently estranged from God. Through our natural
corruption and the effect of our past sin, we are diseased morally and
spiritually, our mind is in itself biassed towards evil and averse from
good. God does not pardon sin and leave the sinner as he was in other
respects, but wherever forgiveness of the guilt is bestowed a renewal
of the nature is wrought; the fountain opened for pardon is also opened
for purification. The washing which takes away the offense before
heaven removes also the love of offending. Herein is double joy, for
does not every true penitent feel that mere pardon would be a poor boon
to him if it allowed him to continue in sin? My God, deliver me from
sin itself, for this is the great burden of my soul. Oh, could I have
the past forgiven, and yet live an enemy to my God, enslaved by evil
and a stranger to holiness–then were I still accursed! What if God
ceases to punish wickedness, yet sin in itself is a curse; to love the
wrong is the beginning of hell. Blessed be the Lord, when he opened the
fountain to cleanse his sinful people, he made it "of sin the double
cure," that it might at the same time cleanse us from its guilt and
power. For our double need there is, according to the text, one only
supply; no mention is made of two fountains, neither are there two
methods for the putting away of sin. But the one method is divine, God
himself has devised, ordained, and prepared it. Wouldst thou have sin
forgiven thee? Wash, for there is a fountain opened. Wouldst thou have
sin eradicated from thy nature, and thy heart made pure? Wash, for
heaven declares that the fountain is opened for this also. Imagine not
that God has proposed an ineffectual means of purgation. His
arrangements are never failures. Man may through his poverty provide a
feast which is so bare as to mock the hunger of those invited; his
starveling hospitality may be an insult to the greatness of human
necessity; but it is never so with God. For his banquet of mercy oxen
and fatlings are killed, milk and wine run in rivers, fat things full
of marrow are heaped up; no stint is found at Jehovah's board. When God
appoints a supply for any need, we may be assured that it is a real and
sufficient provision. O penitent souls, rest assured that in Jesus'
sacrifice there is an effectual provision for the forgiveness of sin,
and an infallible means for the purging of your nature from its
tendency to sin. God in the covenant of grace provides no seeming,
superficial semblance, but in very deed he satisfies the longing soul O
men and women, there is provided for your sin and your uncleanness that
which exactly meets your need.
According to the verse before us this provision is inexhaustible. There
is a fountain opened; not a cistern nor a reservoir, but a fountain. A
fountain continues still to bubble up, and is as full after fifty years
as at the first; and even so the provision and the mercy of God for the
forgiveness and the justification of our souls continually flows and
overflows. There is a supply so large that when thousands of the sons
of Adam come they find that there is enough for their demands, and as
new generations continue still to come all along the centuries, they
shall find that the supply has not in any degree been diminished. For
the sin of Adam and Abel the atonement was sufficient, but it shall be
equally so for the last repenting sinner. David saw the cleansing
flood, and washed away his crimson sins, but he left the fountain
undefiled, and it is as effectual for you and for me as it was for him.
For sinners in the last days the fountain is as full, as cleansing, and
as free, as for sinners in the first ages of the world.
Thus I have testified to you that for the great necessity of men in
this double form, there is a divinely appointed and inexhaustible
supply, and it is intended for high and low, rich and poor, for the
royal and the ragged, the prince and the pauper.
When was this fountain opened? When was this divine and inexhaustible
supply revealed to men? The answer may be given thus. The fountain was
opened for sin and for uncleanness when the Lord Jesus died. God, the
everlasting Word, was made flesh and dwelt among us, and in fullness of
time the weight of human sin was laid on him. In order to put that sin
away he must die, for death was the penalty for guilt; up to the cross
he went through agonies unspeakable, and at the last he yielded up his
soul; and when he did so sin was put away, and the fountain for the
cleansing of sin was effectually opened. When the soldier with the
spear pierced his side, and forthwith there came forth blood and water,
then was it proven that this was he who came not with water only, but
by water and by blood, a Savior who takes away the offense of sin as
touching God, and the defilement of sin in human nature.
Furthermore, the fountain may be said to be opened to each one of us
when the gospel is preached to us. "In that day there shall be a
fountain opened," means secondarily, that whenever the gospel of Jesus
Christ is fully and faithfully preached, then the cleansing efficacy of
the atonement of Jesus which aforetime was as a sealed fountain, is
opened to those who hear. And best of all, according to the connection
of the text, this fountain is opened in the day when men repent of sin.
Doth it not say that they shall mourn each family apart, and their
wives apart, and in that day shall there be a fountain opened! The
sinner does not find a Savior until he bewails his sin; when he sees
his own filthiness then it is that the way to have that filthiness
removed is made clear to him. God is always willing to forgive, but we
are not always willing to be forgiven. The fountain is experimentally
opened to each one of us when we spiritually discern it, believe in it,
and are made partners of its cleansing power. Years ago a German prince
who was entertained by the French Government, was taken to the galleys
of Toulon, where a number of men were held as convicts on account of
their crimes. The commandant decreed that in honor of the prince's
visit, some prisoner whom he might choose should be set at liberty. The
prince went round amongst the prisoners, and talked with them, they all
knowing that he had the power to liberate some one of them. He found
that according to their talk they were nearly all innocent, and had
been condemned by mistake, or by flagrant injustice. He passed them all
by, and spoke with one who talked in another style. He was guilty upon
his own confession. "I certainly," said he, "have no reason to complain
of my hard work in the galleys, for if I had my due I should have been
put to death for my crimes." He went on to acknowledge with much
humility the former evils of his life, and the justice of his sentence.
The prince set him free, and said, "This is the only man in the whole
of this place who is fit to be pardoned; he has a sense of his
transgressions, he may be trusted in society." So too, the pardoning
mercy of God passes by those who say each one in their souls, "I am not
guilty, I have not been more sinful than other people, I see nothing
very remarkable in my case, and if I were sent to hell the sentence
would be too severe." Although there is a fountain for sin and
uncleanness by Jesus Christ, it is not opened personally to your
experience, you cannot see it, do not appreciate it, and will not
participate in its benefits unless you know yourself to be a sinner;
but if there be here one really guilty, one who feels his sin to be
deserving the wrath of God, then this day I have authority from the
Most High to say to him, there is a fountain opened for sin and
uncleanness. You mourn your sin, you confess your guilt, you wish you
could mourn it more, you feel yourself undeserving and unworthy–then
you are the man to whom the mercy of heaven is this day freely
proclaimed. Jesus has come forth on purpose to bind up the
broken-hearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of
the prison to them that are bound. The time for the actual opening of
the cleansing fountain to us is the time when the heart confesses its
guilt, and desires pardon of the Most High. Dear friend, has this time
come to you? I pray you as you love your soul consider your ways,
acknowledge your transgressions, and rest not till the blood of
atonement has made you clear from guilt. Need the subject be pressed
upon you? Surely your own reason should lead you to be anxious upon a
matter so vital to your soul's eternal interests. How sad it will be if
there be a fountain and yet you die unwashed! If there be a Savior, and
you perish for ever, what wretchedness it will be!
II. My chief business, this morning, is to sound forth the second note
of my text–it is a fountain OPEN.
The means by which sin and sinfulness can be put away are at this
moment accessible to the sons of men. The atonement is not a fountain
hid and concealed, and closed and barred and bolted, it is a fountain
open. The doctrine I have to teach is very simple and plain; there is
no room here for oratory and elocution, and polished periods; it is the
plainest gospel doctrine in the world, and yet I am very, very happy to
have to speak it to you, for I do trust God may bless it to many, that
they may find the pardon of their sin, and the removal of their
uncleanness. I would sooner tell you the good news from heaven in
broken accents than anything else with the tongue of an angel.
The fountain which God has provided is open at this day. Now what is
meant by this? It means partly that the gospel is so preached that you
can understand it; the gospel at this day is not concealed in Latin, as
it was before the days of Luther, it is not wrapped up in types and
shadows, as it was in the old dispensation; the gospel is preached in
many places in this country as plainly as words could deliver it, so
plainly that he that runs may read it. I will tell it to you again. God
must punish sin, but he has laid the punishment on Christ, and
whosoever believeth in Christ Jesus is forgiven. Why do not men accept
the Savior? Why do they not come and trust him? for when they trust him
they are saved at once. Ah! my hearers, if any of you do not wash from
your uncleanness it is not because you do not know how; if our gospel
be hid it is not our fault, it is hid to them that are lost, in whom
the God of this world hath blinded their eyes. God is our witness, we
have never sought after excellency of speech, nor the gaudiness or
elegance of language, but as of simplicity, we have set before your
souls this fact that Jesus Christ is the substitute for sinners, and
that you must simply trust in him and you shall be saved. At your own
peril be it if you reject the gospel; but if you do so, at least bear
us this witness, that we have set forth Christ visibly crucified among
you, not hanging up veils of human speculation of our own spinning, or
curtains embroidered with curious devices of logic and theology, or of
ceremony and ritual. We have cried aloud in plain words–
"There is life in a look at the Crucified One."
We have bidden you look to Jesus, and have told you, in God's name,
that as you look to the Crucified you shall find eternal life. Blessed
are the people that know the joyful sound; more blessed still if they
yield obedience thereto.
In the next place, it is meant that the provision made in Jesus is
accessible to you all, and there is no barrier on account of
uncircumcision or natural descent. When first Peter began to preach the
gospel, if he had heard that there was a Gentile in the congregation I
am afraid he would have put in a question as to whether a Gentile could
be saved; it took some time to bring Peter's mind round to the belief
that to the Gentiles also the gospel was to be preached. Paul seemed
far more readily to imbibe that idea; but now to me, a Gentile
preaching to you Gentiles, this difficulty does not arise, but how
thankful we ought to be that it does not! "Is he the God of the Jews
only? Is he not also the God of the Gentiles? Yes, of the Gentiles
also." Our Lord Jesus, by his death, has rent the veil, and pulled down
every wall of separation, so that the same Messiah who was sent to the
seed of Abraham after the flesh is sent to us also who were sinners of
the Gentiles, but who become of the seed of Abraham when we believe in
Christ, for Abraham was the "father of the faithful." The fountain is
open then in the removal of the barrier which divided the natural
Israel from the rest of mankind.
So, too, at this day, when we read that the provision made for the
removal of sin and sinfulness is open, we learn that it is personally
approachable by us. Certain fanatics in our day will have it that grace
comes to us through priests; there is the fountain, but you must not
touch a drop of the purifying stream yourself; that venerable gentleman
in white, or black, or blue, or scarlet, or violet, as the day of the
month or the change of the moon may be, must stand at the fountain head
and catch the water as it flows, and then after he has practiced upon
it sundry manipulations you may drink from his hand, but you who are
unordained must not go to the fountain for yourselves. Ah, my brethren,
but we know better than to make gods of men, or saviours of sinners
like ourselves. We dispense with priests, for we know that the fountain
of salvation is open for us to come personally, and directly, and
without any intervention. There is one Mediator between God and man,
the Man Christ Jesus, but no other mediator is there. One of our
colporteurs, some years ago abroad, was selling his Testaments, when
the cure of a parish said to him, "Your books say a very great deal
about pardon, but I do not see much in them about confession." The
colporteur was about to reply, when a public notary, who was present,
taking up the Testament, said to the priest, "Ah, my dear sir, what you
say is very true, the New Testament does not say much about confession
to priests; do you not remember that Jesus Christ saved the dying thief
without the help of a priest, and that St. Stephen, when he was stoned
was not shriven by a confessor, but entered glory without a priest!"
"Ah," said the cur,–"but the rules of the church were very different
in those days from what they are now." Full surely they were! We will
go back however to the primitive times, and as the dying thief said,
"Lord, remember me," so will we turn our eyes to that once crucified
Savior, sitting in the highest heaven, and breathe the selfsame prayer,
"Lord, remember me:" and as Stephen looked up directly into heaven, and
found peace even amidst that stony shower, so on our dying bed, our
glance shall be to the Christ in the open heaven; and we shall find
rest in our last hours. Blessed be God, the doctrine of justification
by faith is now so openly declared that priestcraft cannot hold us
captives. The nations no longer need to crouch at the feet of shaveling
impostors. Now that there is a fountain open, we can say, "Begone, ye
priests, the whole herd of you, to whichever church ye belong; we who
have believed are truly priests every one of us, and ye are mere
pretenders. We have done with you; a plague and curse to humanity have
ye been too long, and the gospel ends your detestable trade.
The text yet further signifies that the fountain is not marred by any
amount of sin which we have already committed. If there be a fountain
opened on purpose to remove filth, that man must be insane who shall
say that his need of washing is a barrier to prevent his using it.
Shall I stand outside the bath and say, "I am prevented from bathing
because I am filthy"? everyone detects at once my illogical talk. If
the fountain is open for sin, then sin is a qualification for washing
in it. If Christ be a Savior for sinners, then no man may say that on
the ground of sin Jesus cannot be his Savior; rather might he say, "The
more truly I am a sinner the more surely is Christ Jesus suited to me."
The exceeding heinousness of my sin, though I had been guilty of
adultery, of murder, of crimes innumerable, cannot be a preventative to
my being washed in the fount of atonement, because on account of my sin
that fountain is provided, on purpose to put it away that cleansing
flood was poured forth. Yet it ever is of the nature of sin, when the
soul begins to know the bitterness of it, to make us fear that sin is a
disqualification for mercy, and a reason why we should not believe in
Christ Jesus the great propitiation for sin. O sinner, do not believe
that sin unfits thee for a Savior, but believe that the Redeemer is
come on purpose to save such as thou art. Some little time ago an
earnest lady seeking the good of others, met with a poor girl some
twenty years of age, who had most fearfully fallen and become a gross
sinner, though still so young. She talked with her frequently, and at
last saw in her tokens of repentance, but the poor girl's complaint
was, "I can never be restored, I am so bad, nobody would ever take
notice of me." "Have you not a mother?" "No," said the girl, "she died
years ago." "Have you not a father?" "Yes, but I have not heard of him
for years." "Does he know where you are?" "No, I do not want he
should." "Do not you think he would receive you back into his house?"
"No, that I know he would not, I could not expect him to do so; if I
were in his place I would not receive such a one as I am." "Have you
ever written to him since you have gone astray?" "No, I have kept out
of the way of everybody that knew me; I do not want anybody to know
what I am." "Have you tried your father whether he will receive you?"
"No, I knew it was no good, pray do not mention it." "But," said the
good sister, "who can tell? I think I will try and see if your father
will receive you now that you are truly penitent for the past." "Oh,
yes, I hate the sin, but my father would not receive me, it is of no
use to ask him." "Well," said the visitor, "I will try;" and so she
wrote a note to the father, giving him the daughter's address, telling
him about her repentance, and entreating that she might be forgiven.
What do you suppose was the reply? The next post brought the penitent
girl a letter, on the envelope of which was written in large letters,
"IMMEDIATE;" and when she opened it–well, I cannot tell you all her
father said, but it just came to this, "Come and welcome, I am ready to
forgive you; I have been praying night and day that you might be
restored to me." Now, just what that father was to his poor lost girl,
in tenderness and readiness to forgive, God is to sinners; if there be
any unwillingness it is not on his part, it is all in their hearts, for
the answer to every prayer for mercy is, God is ready, nay, he waiteth
to be gracious, his heart yearneth over his erring ones. "How shall I
give thee up?" saith he; "How shall I make thee as Adam how shall I set
thee as Zeboim? mine heart is turned within me, my repentings are
kindled together. I will not return to destroy Ephraim: for I am God,
and not man." Our guilt therefore is no legitimate reason why we should
not avail ourselves of the provisions of grace.
Neither is there any effectual barrier in the consideration of our
inward sinfulness. If you say, "I could not be a Christian, I have such
a bad disposition, I could not become holy it is impossible." This is
true so far as you are concerned, but things impossible with men are
possible with God. There is a fountain open for this very reason that
this uncleanness of yours might be put away. Christ's blood will prove
more than a match for the evil of your heart; his Spirit can renew you,
make you a new creature, and from this day forward the things you hated
you shall love, and the evil things you have delighted in shall become
detestable to you. Is it not written, "Behold, I make all things new"?
The fountain of cleansing is not sealed by any demands in the gospel
requiring one to prepare yourself for it before you come. The fountain
is open, and if you are filthy, you are welcome to come to it. All that
is asked of you is that you believe in Jesus; this he gives you, it is
his own work in you. You must also repent and hate the sin which you
have committed; this also he works in you, causing you by his Spirit to
loathe the sin which aforetime you delighted in. Had there been a sort
of purgatorial preparation, had there been a kind of quarantine through
which the sinner had to pass before he could be renewed and forgiven,
then were not the fountain completely open; but between you, a sinner,
and acceptation before God, there need not be even a step of delay;
believe now, and by believing you shall obtain the perfect pardon and
the renewal of your soul.
Nor is there any other real barrier to shut up the fountain from the
sinner. Some will say, "Perhaps I am not elected." My friend, read the
text, the fountain is open; open for all ranks, "the house of David and
the inhabitants of Jerusalem." The doctrine of election, true as it is,
does not make my text a falsehood, or close the fount of grace upon any
seeking soul. Can you think of any other doctrine? Does any other truth
discourage you? Whatever it is I need only quote the text in order to
answer your suspicion: The fountain is open for sin and for
uncleanness, who dares say it is shut? If any theologian should say so,
methinks I would push him into the fountain to make way for the sinner
to come. There cannot be anything in theology, nor in nature, nor in
heaven, nor earth, nor hell, which can shut what God declares to be
open. If thou wiliest to be saved, if thou comest to Christ believing
in him, there is nothing to shut up the fountain of life or prevent
thee from being cleansed and healed. If there be any shutting and
forbidding it is thy heart that is closed, and thy pride which forbids.
No difficulties remain save only difficulties of thine own creating,
there is none with God. There is a fountain opened by him for sin and
for uncleanness, and thou hast enough of both, therefore come with them
even as thou art. "I believe in the forgiveness of sins;" dost thou? It
is an old doctrine of the Christian church–dost thou believe it?
Methinks I hear thee say, "I believe in the forgiveness of everybody's
sin but mine own." Brother, I believe in the forgiveness of thy sins.
There was a time when it would not have troubled me to believe for
thee, but it troubled me to believe for myself; now, can I believe for
myself and for thee also. If thou desires forgiveness, take it; if thou
desires a new heart and a right spirit, Jesus will give them to thee;
the fountain is open, and none shall dare to deny access to the anxious
heart. Jesus says, "Him that cometh unto me I will in no wise cast
out." Would God that some were drawn of the Holy Spirit to come to-day
and partake of the mercy which is so richly provided and so freely
presented.
III. We have a rich consolation in the last point. The fountain is OPEN
STILL.
The text says the fountain is opened, and I do not upon the closest
inspection discover that it declares that it was afterwards shut; I
find no intimation that the opening was for an occasion only; on the
contrary, the opening is left as a fact accomplished. What a blessing
is this to every child of God here; the fountain is still open for sin
and uncleanness! What a comfort it is to that young man who but lately
believed. Some little time after conversion there usually comes a
period of surprising discoveries. The heart has believed in Jesus and
found rest, and it has deluded itself into the idea that it is now so
clean delivered from sin that it will never fall into it any more; but
on a sudden it is tempted, it is overtaken in a fault, and then the
devil cries, "You! Why, you are not saved, you are not a believer, see
where you are now." Many remind me of a little girl who I trust was
converted to God she in her simplicity quoted that sweet little hymn to
her teacher, and said, "Teacher, I laid my sins on Jesus,' and now I
love him so much that I never mean to do any more sins to lay on him."
That is just what we thought when we were first pardoned; we did not
quite say so, but we thought so. "All the past? Yes, that is all on
him; now for the love we bear his name we will never sin again." So we
thought; but, alas! we soon found that we were in the body still. When
sin is seen to be still within us, how sweetly does the text ring out,
like a silver bell, glad tidings of great joy–there is a fountain
opened! You went at first to Jesus, young believer, go again. The
fountain is not shut; you have washed in it once, it is not closed nor
dried up, wash again; the same Christ you wanted when you first
believed is there now as ready and willing as ever. His blood is
equally efficacious, go, thou surprised one, and wash again:–
"This fountain from guilt not only makes pure,
And gives, soon as felt, infallible cure;
But if guilt removed return, and remain,
Its power may be proved again and again."
It will happen as we grow older and make progress in the Christian
life, that we shall discover every day some fresh degree of defilement
acquired by our pilgrimage through a sinful world. Do you ever go to
rest a single night without feeling that you have been in many places
during the day, and that there is fresh dust upon the garment, new soil
upon the feet? Ah! bethink thee every night there is a fountain opened.
To-day's sins can be as easily put away as yesterday's sins; and
to-day's sinfulness, which I feel unconquerable for the moment, can be
conquered still. I can go to Christ again and say, "Let thy blood kill
this sin of mine, and soften my heart into tenderness and holiness once
more." The fountain is still open, and no man can shut it.
I know that you in business, coming into contact with the world, must
sometimes encounter some very trying circumstances. When perhaps you
thought all would be plain sailing you meet with terrible storms.
Though minded to live in peace, you fall into a sort of wrestling match
with ungodly men; you are obliged to stand up for your own, and you try
to do so with moderation of temper, yet your spirit becomes ruffled;
and you have to say afterwards, when undergoing self-examination, "I do
not know that I did exactly what I ought to have done; besides, my
quiet walk with Christ has been broken by this strife with the sons of
men; woe is me that I dwell in Mesech and tabernacle in the tents of
Kedar." Beloved, there is a fountain open, go again by simple faith and
look to Jesus once again and you will find fresh pardon, and the grace
which restores the heart to its repose in Jesus. Your inner life will
be again refreshed as you wash in the life-restoring fount prepared for
you.
If you are at all like me you will at times feel your inner life to be
sadly declining. I am ashamed to confess it, but even when I seek to
live nearest to God, I feel an evil heart of unbelief struggling within
me. There may come times when you will anxiously enquire, "Can I be a
child of God at all? I cannot arouse my feelings towards God, my
passions will not stir; even in holy duties I lack the living power;
there is the wood, but where is the fire for the burnt offering? I
would fain be zealous, earnest, intense, fervent, but I am sluggish, a
very dolt in the Master's cause." At such times we are apt to say, "I
must try to make myself somewhat better than this by some means, before
I dare again to hope in God;" and then we go off to our own selves and
our own works, and we sink in the deep mire where there is no standing.
It is a happy thing if at such moments we turn again to Christ, end
say, "O my Master, unworthy as I am to be thy follower, though vilest
of all those those names are written on thy roll, yet I do believe in
thee still. To thy cross I will cling, I will never let go my hope, for
thou hast come to save sinners even such as I am, and on thee I will
continue to trust. "My dear brethren, you will find that while this
restores your peace, it at the same time excites you to seek after
higher degrees of holiness. It is the idea of the worldling that if sin
be pardoned so easily men will live in it, but it is not so; to the
spiritual mind the great love displayed in the pardon of sin is the
very highest motive for overcoming every unhallowed propensity. A sense
of blood-bought pardon seals the death-warrant of the most favored sin.
Ever shall we find our safest mode of battling with sin to be a new
resort to the cross. Happy is it for us that the blood cleanseth from
all sin; that is, it continues to do so every day. I should die in
despair if it were not for this truth, that there is a fountain open
still.
Some of us may have a long time to live possibly, but we shall never
outlive that open fountain. Others may die soon, but, dear brother, in
the last moment your eye may glance at the open fountain, and if the
sins of all your life should rise before you, if in grim procession
your transgressions should pass before your eyes each one accusing you,
you may fly to the open fountain and they will disappear; and if the
old Adam should rise even at the last, and some strong corruption
should seek to prevail, there is the fountain open which will purge
away the corruption of the flesh, and work in you the new nature yet
more mightily, and preserve you to the Lord's eternal kingdom and
glory.
I desire to close this sermon, all too poverty-stricken, with this
thought. See here what our work is as a church. We have not to provide
an atonement for the sinners round about us, but we have to point them
to the fountain which is already opened. I want every one of you church
members to be always telling others of the way of salvation. "It is so
simple," you say; well, then you have no excuse if you do not tell it.
Make your neighbors know the way of salvation, din it into their ears,
constrain them to know it, so that if they die it shall not be for want
of knowing the way of life.
I want to remind you as a church of one most important fact. Here is
our preparation for the season of revival which I hope God is about to
give us. The fountain open for the sinner is also open for the child of
God. Let us all wash again. Have you grown cold? Come and get your
spiritual life revived. Do any of you fear that you are becoming
worldly and carnal? Come to Jesus, for where you first found life there
you shall find it more abundantly. Come and wash again. I desire as
your pastor to receive another baptism in the sacred atoning flood, and
then to come and preach to you in its heavenly power. I pray God, that
my dear brethren, the deacons and elders, may each one individually
apart confess his sin, and apart receive the washing. And then I want
every member, every Sunday-school teacher, and every worker, to prepare
to serve God by receiving another of these blessed cleansings. In the
old tabernacle there was a laver, and the priests washed their feet and
their hands in it, which had to be filled up every now and then,
because it was exhausted or foul; now we have not a brazen laver, but
we have a fountain which never can be dried, and never becomes defiled.
If you wash your feet in a little pool, the water is muddy directly,
but if you wash in a running stream, as I have often done when climbing
the Alps, or in a living fountain, you may wash, hundreds of you, and
the water bears all defilement away and is just as bright as if it had
never been touched by your feet. So there is here for all the church
members a blessed flowing fountain; come and wash, I beseech you, even
now.
I pray God backsliders may come hither, that those who have gone
farther astray than in heart, and have wandered into outward actions of
rebellion, may come to the fountain which is still open, and be
cleansed anew. What sin it will be on our part if we neglect what God
has provided! Though we have often come before, let us come again. I
should like to suggest that this afternoon we each of us should spend a
season alone, and pray for a renewed application of that blood which
speaketh better things than that of Abel. The Master, after the last
Supper, took a towel and girded himself, and went round with a basin
and washed all his disciples' feet, and when he had done it said, "And
ye are clean every whit." That is what I want him to do to all the
members of this my beloved church now. You cannot serve God while you
are defiled; you need fresh cleansing for successful service. O may he
take the towel now in his infinite condescension, and visit each one
and wash you one by one. Pastors, deacons, elders, members, may we all
avail ourselves of the open fountain at this hour. O that the Holy
Spirit might give to each one of us that cleansing which shall make us
fit for service, O that we shall be useful during the coming months in
the ingathering of his poor lost ones, to his praise and glory. May God
grant it, for his name's sake. Amen.
PORTIONS OF SCRIPTURE READ BEFORE SERMON–Zechariah 12, and 13:1.