Delivered on Thursday Evening, April 27th, 1871, by
C. H. SPURGEON,
At the Metropolitan Tabernacle, Newington
"But of him are ye in Christ Jesus, who of God is made unto us wisdom,
and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption: that, according
as it is written, he that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord."–1
Corinthians 1:30, 31.
WE MEET SOMEWHERE IN THE OLD TESTAMENT with the expression "salt
without prescribing how much." Beyond all question the name, person,
and work of Jesus are the salt and savor of every true gospel ministry,
and we cannot have too much of them. Alas! that in so many ministries
there is such a lack of this first dainty of the feast, this essence of
all soul-satisfying doctrine. We may preach Christ without prescribing
how much, only the more we extol him the better. It would be impossible
to sin by excess in preaching Christ crucified. It was an ancient
precept, "With all thine offerings thou shalt offer salt;" let it stand
as an ordinance of the sanctuary now: "With all thy sermonisings and
discoursings thou shalt ever mingle the name of Jesus Christ, thou
shalt ever seek to magnify the alpha and omega of the plan of
redemption." The apostle in the first chapter of this epistle was
anxious to speak to the Corinthians about their divisions and other
serious faults; but he could not confine himself to that unpleasant
theme; as naturally as possible his heart bounded over the mountains of
division to his Lord and Master. Divisions did but remind him of the
great uniting one who has made all his people one, and human follies
did but drive him nearer to the infallible Christ who is the wisdom of
God. Though Paul had to write many sharp things to those ancient
Plymouth Brethren at Corinth, yet how sweetly did he prevent all
bitterness by dipping his pen in the honeyed ink of love to the Lord
Jesus, and admiration of his person and work! Let us, dear friends, if
we have to preach, preach Christ crucified; and if we are private
persons, let us in our household life, and in all our conversation,
make his name to be as ointment poured forth. Let your life be Christ
living in you. May you be like Asher, of whom it is said, he dipped his
foot in oil may you be so anointed with the Spirit of your Lord that
wherever you put down your foot, you may leave an impression of grace.
The balmy south wind bears token of having passed over sunny lands; may
the ordinary bent and current of your life bear evidence in it that you
have communed with Jesus.
To-night we have before us a text which is extraordinarily
comprehensive, and contains infinitely more of meaning than mind shall
grasp, or tongue shall utter at this hour. Considering it carefully,
let us observe, first, that the apostle here attributes the fact that
we are in Christ Jesus to the Lord alone. He shows that there is a
connection between our very being as Christians, and the love and grace
of God in Christ. "Of him" (that is of God) "are ye in Christ Jesus."
So we will first speak about our spiritual existence. Then Paul goes on
to write of our spiritual wealth, which he sums up under four heads:
wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption; but which
indeed, I might say, he sums up under one head, for he declares that
Christ is made of God unto us all these four things: and then he closes
the chapter by telling us where our glorying ought to go–it should
return to the source of our spiritual existence and heavenly wealth.
"He that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord."
I. To begin, then, where God began with us–OUR SPIRITUAL EXISTENCE.
"Of him are ye in Christ Jesus." Different translators have read this
passage in divers ways. "Of him," they think properly should be
"Through him:" that is, "Through God we are in Christ Jesus." Are you
this day united to Christ–a stone in that building, of which he is
both foundation and topstone–a limb of that mystical body, of which he
is the head? Then you did not get there of yourself. No stone in that
wall leaped into its place; no member of that body was its own creator.
You come to be in union with Christ through God the Father. You were
ordained unto this grace by his own purpose, the purpose of the
Infinite Jehovah, who chose you, or ever the earth was. "Ye have not
chosen me, but I have chosen you." The first cause of your union with
Christ lies in the purpose of God who gave you grace in Christ Jesus
from before the foundation of the world. And as to the purpose, so to
the power of God is your union with Christ to be attributed. He brought
you into Christ; you were a stranger, he brought you near; you were an
enemy, he reconciled you. You had never come to Christ to seek for
mercy if first of all the Spirit of God had not appeared to you to show
you your need, and to lead you to cry for the mercy that you needed.
Through God's operation as well as through God's decree you are this
day in Christ Jesus. It will do your souls good, my brethren, to think
of this very common-place truth. Many days have passed since your
conversion, it may be, but do not forget what a high day the day of
your new birth was; and do not cease to give glory to that mighty power
which brought you out of darkness into marvellous light. You did not
convert yourself; if you did, you still have need to be converted
again. Your regeneration was not of the will of man, nor of blood, nor
of birth; if it were so, let me tell you the sooner you are rid of it
the better. The only true regeneration is of the will of God and by the
operation of the Holy Ghost. "By the grace of God I am what I am." He
"has begotten us again unto a lively hope." "He that hath wrought us to
the selfsame thing is God." "Of him are ye in Christ Jesus." Through
the operation and will and purpose of God are you this day a member of
Christ's body and one with Jesus. Give all the glory, then, to the Lord
alone.
But suppose we read it as we have it in the text, and then we shall not
have an allusion to the source of our spiritual life, but to the
dignity of it. "Of God are ye in Christ Jesus." Being in Christ you are
of God. Not of the earth earthy now, not of Satan, not of the bondage
of the law, not of the powers of evil, but of God are you; God's
husbandry, God's people, God's children, God's beloved ones. "Ye are of
God," little children, "and the whole world lieth in wickedness." On
you hath God's light shone, to you hath God's life come, in you God's
love is made manifest, and in you shall God's glory be fully revealed.
What a dignity is this to be "of God!" Some have thought it a great
thing to have it said, "These are they which are of the prince's
household," and others have been yet more boastful when they have been
pointed at as parts of an imperial court; but you are of the divine
family, descended from him who only hath immortality. "they shall be
mine, saith the Lord, in the day when I make up my jewels." "For the
Lord's portion is his people, Jacob is the lot of his inheritance." Of
God, are you, every one of you who are in Christ Jesus: ye are
Christ's, and Christ is God's. The Creator, the Upholder, the Sublime,
the Invisible, the Infinite, the Eternal claims you. You have a part
and lot with him, and you are herein uplifted to the highest degree of
exaltation because you are in Christ.
Here, then, you have the dignity of the Christ life–it is of God, as
its source is through God.
But note the essence of the Christ life. "Of God are ye in Christ
Jesus." You have no life before the Lord, except as you are in Christ
Jesus. Apart from him, you are as the branch that is severed from the
vine–dead, withered, useless, obnoxious, rotten. Men gather these
branches, and cast them into the fire, and they are burned. A ghastly
sight it must be on the battle-field, to see on all sides arms, legs,
and various portions of limbs torn away from the bodies to which they
belonged, and scattered in hideous disorder! Once of the utmost
service, these severed limbs are useless now. Every one knows that they
are dead, for they cannot live divided from the vital regions: even
thus if you and I could be separated from Christ, our vital head,
death–spiritual death–must be the inevitable result. Our life hinges
upon union to our Lord. "Because I live, ye shall live also." Out of
Christ we abide in death, but in Christ we live, and we are of God. Our
spiritual being, and the fact that our spiritual being is an exalted
one, both hang upon this–that we are in Christ. Beloved Christian
friends, I can congratulate you upon your being able to know that you
are in Christ, and that so you are of God; but I must not speak so
broadly to all this congregation. I must rather put a grave enquiry,
and ask each of my hearers: Are you all in Christ Jesus? could the
apostle write to you, and say: "Of God are you in Christ Jesus." Have
you ever been the subject of a work of God, putting you into Christ
Jesus?" Are you now of God in Christ Jesus so as to be depending for
everything upon him, dwelling in him, and he in you; feeling his life
within you, and that your life is hid with him in God? Beloved hearer,
there is no joy in this world like union with Christ. The more we can
feel it, the happier we are, whatever our circumstances may be. But if
you are without Christ, you are without hope. Joy comes not where Jesus
comes not. No Savior, then no peace in life or death. Oh remember,
beloved hearer, that you will soon die. Where, where will you look for
consolation in your last moments? Your soul will soon have to fly
through tracks unknown, and face the burning throne of judgment. What
will you do then, without the hand of love to guide you and the
righteousness of Christ to cover you? He who wraps himself about with
Christ's matchless robe can say–
"Bold shall I stand in that great day,
For who aught to my charge shall lay?
While through thy blood absolved I am
From sin's tremendous curse and shame."
But he that hath no Savior, it were better for him that he had never
been born. That day is cursed, and hath no blessing, on which he first
saw the light. Jesus Christ is willing to receive you if you desire to
come to him. Noah's ark was shut, but not until the flood came, it was
open till then; Christ is the ark of the covenant, and the door is not
shut yet. Let not this, however, cause you to delay, for the flood will
rise, and the rains will fall, and then to those who shall knock at the
door, it will be said, "Too late! too late! Ye cannot enter now."
Of him, beloved believers in Christ, are ye in Christ Jesus. All you
are, even to your bare existence as Christians, you have to trace to
"the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, which according to his
abundant mercy hath begotten us again unto a lively hope by the
resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to au inheritance
incorruptible and undefiled, and that fadeth not away."
II. Now let us turn to the second part of our subject, and contemplate
OUR SPIRITUAL WEALTH. Christ Jesus is of God made unto us wisdom,
righteousness, sanctification, and redemption. Here are four
things–only it is to be noticed that in the original Greek the second
and third have a peculiar connecting link, which the others have not.
The wisdom stands alone, and the redemption, but the righteousness and
sanctification have a special link, as though we should be taught that
they always go together, that they should always be considered as
united–a warning to modern theology, which so often divideth what God
hath joined together.
Let us take the first blessing first, asking to be partakers of it at
this very moment. Jesus Christ is made unto us wisdom. You noticed when
we read the chapter that the apostle had been speaking of some other
wisdom which he treated somewhat roughly. It had set itself up in
opposition to the cross of Christ, and the apostle handled it with no
gentle handling. There have always been those in the world who have
conceived that wisdom would come to them as the result of the exercise
of their own thoughts assisted by culture; that is to say, they hoped
to know divine truth by their own thoughts and the additional light
arising from the thoughts of other men. They fancied that wisdom would
rise out of the human mind, and would not need to be taught us from
above. There were those in Paul's days who were always ruminating,
considering, contemplating with themselves, and then disputing,
dialoguing, and conversing with others. These were the philosophers of
the time. They looked for wisdom through man, and expected to find it
in the shallow brain of a poor son of Adam. They so believed that they
themselves were wise; that though they affected modesty and did not
call themselves "the Sophoi, or wise;" but "the Philosophoi," or lovers
of wisdom, yet for all that, in their innermost hearts they esteemed
themselves to be an inner circle of instructed persons, and they looked
upon the rest of mankind as the unilluminated and the ignorant. They
had found a treasure which they kept to themselves, and virtually said
to their fellow-men, "You are almost without exception hopelessly
ignorant." Now, the apostle, instead of pointing to his own brain, or
pointing to the statue of Socrates or Solon, says Jesus Christ is made
of God unto us wisdom. We look no more for wisdom from the thoughts
that spring of human mind, but to Christ himself; we do not expect
wisdom to come to us through the culture that is of man, but we expect
to be made wise through sitting at our Master's feet and accepting him
as wisdom from God himself. Now, as it was in the apostle's day, so is
it very much at this present. There are those who will have it that the
gospel–the simple gospel–such as might have been preached by John
Bunyan or Whitfield, or Wesley, and others, was very well for the many,
and for the dark times in which they lived–the great mass of mankind
would be helped and improved by it; but there is wanted, according to
the wiseacres of this intensely luminous century, a more progressive
theology, far in advance of the Evangelism now so generally ridiculed.
Men of mind, gentlemen of profound thought, are to teach us doctrines
that were unknown to our fathers; we are to go on improving in our
knowledge of divine truth till we leave Peter and Paul, and those other
old dogmatists far behind. Nobody knows how wise we are to become.
Brethren, our thoughts loathe this; we hate this cant about progress
and deep thought; we only wish we could know as much of Christ as the
olden preachers did. We are afraid that instead of getting into greater
light through the thinkings of men, the speculations and contemplations
of the scribes, ancient and modern, and the discoveries of the
intellectual and eclectic, have made darkness worse, and have quenched
some of the light that was in the world. Again has it been fulfilled:
"I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and will bring to nothing the
understanding of the prudent. Where is the wise? where is the scribe?
where is the disputer of this world? hath not God made foolish the
wisdom of this world?" It seemeth to me to be greater wisdom to believe
what Christ hath said than to believe what my deepest thoughts have
discovered; and though I have thought long upon a subject, and turned
it over and over, and think I know more of it than another man, yet, in
one simple word of Christ there is more wisdom than in all my thoughts
and ruminatings. I am never to look to myself for wisdom, and to fancy
that I am the creator of truth or the revealer of it; but ever to go to
him, my Lord, my teacher, my all, and to believe that the highest
culture, the best results of the highest education are to be found by
sitting at his feet, and the best results of the deepest meditation,
too, are to be gained in lying down in the green pastures, beside the
still waters, where he, as the good Shepherd, leads me. Brethren, when
we read that Christ is made of God unto us wisdom, let us recollect
what wisdom is. Wisdom is, I suppose, the right use of knowledge. To
know is not to be wise. Many men know a great deal, and are all the
more fools for what they know. There is no fool so great a fool as a
knowing fool. But to know how to use knowledge is to have wisdom. Now,
that man is wise in three respects who has Christ for his wisdom.
Christ's teaching will make him wise of thought, and wise of heart. All
you want to know of God, of sin, of life, of death, of eternity, of
predestination, of man's responsibility, Christ has either personally,
or by his Spirit in the word of God, taught you. Anything that you find
out for yourself, anything over and above revelation, is folly, but
whatever he has taught is wisdom; and he has so taught it that if you
learn it in the spirit in which he would have you learn it, it will not
be dry, dead doctrine to you, but spirit and life; and his teaching
will endow you with wisdom as well as knowledge. Scholars at the
cross-foot let us always be. Never let us go to any other school than
Schola crucis, for the learners of the cross are the favourites of
wisdom. Let Corpus Christi be the college in which we study. To know
Jesus, and the power of his resurrection, this is wisdom.
But, in addition to profiting by our Lord's instruction, the Christian
learns wisdom through his Master's example. "Wherewithal shall a young
man cleanse his way?" How shall I be made wise in action? Policy says,
"Adopt this expedient and the other;" and the mass of mankind at this
age are guided by the policy of the hour; but policy is seeming wisdom
and real folly. Remember it is always wisest to act in any condition as
Jesus would have acted, supposing him to have been in that condition.
Never did he temporise. Principlo guided him, not fashion nor personal
advantage. You shall never be a fool if you follow Christ, except in
the estimation of fools; and who wishes to be wise in a fool's esteem?
But sometimes it may be said: "To do as Christ would have done would
involve me in present difficulty or loss." It is true; but there is no
man that loseth aught in this life for Christ's sake who shall remain a
loser, for he shall receive tenfold in this life, and in the world to
come life everlasting. The wisest action is not always the most
pecuniarily profitable. It is wise sometimes for men to be poor, ay,
even to lose their lives. Truest wisdom–not sham wisdom, not temporary
wisdom–you shall manifest by following the example of Christ, though
it lead you to prison or to death. His teachings and his example,
together, will give you the wisdom which cometh from above.
Above all, if you have the Redeemer's presence, he will be made of God
unto you wisdom in a very remarkable sense. Never forget or doubt that
Jesus is still with his people. They who know how to enter into the
secret place of the tabernacles of the Most High, find him still at the
mercy-seat. He feedeth among the lilies, and they who know the lilies
know where to find him; and those who live with him, and catch his
spirit, have their garments perfumed as his are with myrrh, and aloes,
and cassia. These may be thought to be mad by some, and others may call
them fanatical enthusiasts; but these are the wisest of mankind. O
happy men that live at the gates of heaven while yet on earth, that sit
at the feet of the blessed in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus while
they are toiling along through the pilgrimage of this life! This is to
be wise, to have Christ's teaching, Christ's example and above all,
Christ's presence; so may the poorest find the Lord Jesus made of God
unto them wisdom.
Pause just a minute. Let none of us ever be so foolish as to suppose
that when we have received Jesus and his gospel, we have occasion to
blush when we are in the company of the very wisest of the present day.
Carry a bold face when you confront the brazen faced philosophy which
insults your Lord. The man who does not believe the Bible does not know
so much as thou dost. Blush not, though with mimic wisdom the
unbeliever tries to laugh or argue thee down. He who knows; not Christ,
though he propounds wonderful theories as to the creation of mankind
and the formation of the world, and though he has a glib tongue, is
only an educated fool, a learned idiot, who thinks his own rushlight
brighter than God's own sun. "Ah I but he has been to college, and he
has a degree, and he is esteemed by men; for he has written books that
nobody can comprehend." "The fool hath said in his heart, There is no
God;" and I do not care even if he be a Solon, if he has said that
there is no God, he is a fool. Do not blush, then, if you find yourself
in his company, do not make yourself the blushing one because the fool
is there. Self-conceit were to be avoided and loathed; but this is not
self-conceit, but a holy courage in a case which demands of you to be
courageous. To know Christ is the best of all philosophy, the highest
of all sciences. Angels desire to look into this; but I do not know
that they care a fig for half the sciences so valued among men. If you
know Christ you never need be afraid of being ashamed and confounded
whatever company you may be in. If you stood in a senate of emperors,
or amidst a parliament of philosophers, and only told them of the God
that came in human flesh, and loved, and lived, and died to redeem
mankind, you would have told them a greater mystery and a profounder
secret than reason could discover. Be not ashamed, then, amid the
intellectual pride of this boastful age.
At the same time let me remind you of another evil: do not seek to
complete your wisdom at any other source: be satisfied that in keeping
close to Christ you have the highest and truest wisdom. As I would not
have you cowed before the pretender, neither would I have you envy him,
or seek to supplement the wisdom that is in Christ Jesus by the wisdom
that is of man. Are you so foolish, having begun with Jesus, will you
end with a German neologian, or a French wit, or a Puseyite dreamer?
Have you taken Christ's word to be your guide, and will you go and tack
on to that some decree of Convocation, some rubric of a church, some
minute of Conference, or other invention of human brain and fallen
fancy? God forbid! Array yourself solely in this armor of gold, and go
forth and gleam in the sun, and angels themselves shall marvel at you
as they see your brightness. "Jesus Christ is made of God unto you
wisdom."
It is high time for us to proceed to review the next blessing. He is
made of God unto us righteousness. This was a great want of ours, for
naturally we were unrighteous, and to this hour in ourselves we are the
same. Righteous we must be to be acceptable with God, but righteous we
certainly are not personally, and by merit. All our righteousnesses are
as filthy rags, and we are unable to stand before the great King; but
there is one who says: "Take away his filthy garments from him," and
that same Deliverer, even the Lord Jesus Christ, is made of God unto us
righteousness. You know how we usually speak of this as a double work.
His blood cleanseth us from all guilt; by it pardon is bestowed upon
the believer. He that looks to Christ is absolved from all
sin–completely so. Then, in addition to that cleansing, which we call
pardon, there is the clothing, the arraying in the righteousness of
Christ–in a word, there is justification by faith. The doctrine of
imputed righteousness seems to me to be firmly established in the word
of God. Yet I have sometimes fancied I have heard a little too much
stress put upon the word "imputed," and scarcely enough upon the word
"righteousness;" for though I know that righteousness is imputed to us,
yet I believe it is not all the truth that we are righteous by
imputation. It is true, most true, but there is something true beyond
it. Not only is Christ's righteousness imputed to me, but it is mine
actually, for Christ is mine. He who believes in Jesus, has Jesus
Christ to be his own Christ, and the righteousness of Christ belongs to
that believer, and is his. We are not merely imputedly righteous, but
the righteousness of our substitute is legally, actually, truly our
righteousness. I am not now speaking of nature–that would have to do
with sanctification–but I am speaking of repute before God. He reckons
us to be righteous in Christ, and he does not reckon wrongly; the
imputation is not a legal fiction or a charitable error. We are
righteous. Depend upon it, God's imputation is not like human
imputation, which makes a thing to be what it is not: we are in Christ
made actually righteous, because we are one with him. Do you think that
there is an unrighteous member of Christ's body? God forbid! Do you
think Christ mystical to be a building with an unholy stone in it? Is
Christ a vine with branches, which bear deadly fruit? As he is, so are
we also in this respect. His salt has seasoned the whole lump. In the
mystical body, every member is made righteous before God, because
joined to the living head. Here is an actual righteousness given to us
through the righteousness of Jesus Christ our Lord. He is made of God
unto us righteousness. Consider this, O believer–you are to-night
righteous before God. You are a sinner in yourself worthy to be
condemned, but God does not condemn you, nor ever will he do so, for
before the eye of his justice you are arrayed in perfect righteousness.
Your sin is not upon you: it was laid upon the Scapegoat's head of old.
All your iniquities were made to meet upon the head of the Crucified
Savior: he bore your transgressions in his own body on the tree. Where
are your sins now? You may ask the question without fear, for they have
ceased to be. "As far as the east is from the west, so far hath he
removed our transgressions from us." "He hath cast our iniquities into
the depths of the sea." Glory be to his name, there is no sin in
existence against a believer. Is it not written: "He hath finished
transgression, made an end of sin [what stronger expression can there
be?], and brought in everlasting righteousness"? And that is true of
you to-night, Christian, as true of you to-night as it will be when you
are in heaven. You are not so sanctified to-night as you will be in the
glory land, but you are as righteous as you can be even there. In God's
sight you are as much "accepted in the Beloved," as you will be when
you stand on the sea of glass mingled with fire. You are beloved of
God, and dear to him and justified, so that even to-night you can say:
"Who shall lay anything to the charge of God's elect? It is God that
justifieth. Who is he that condemneth?" You cannot lift up a louder
boast than that, even when you shall see your Savior, and shall be like
him because you see him as he is. By faith this righteousness is yours
at this present moment, and will always be yours without a change;
yours when your spirit is cast down, as much as when your joys abound.
You are accepted not because of anything in yourself, but because you
stand in the Lord your righteousness.
I remarked some time ago that the next blessing in our text is pinned
on to this one. I need not not say much about that fact, but just note
it. Righteousness and sanctification must always go together, and
though they are two different things, or else there would not have been
two different words, yet they blend into each other most remarkably,
hence the Greek joins the two words by a close link. Our sanctification
is all in Christ; that is to say, it is because we are in Christ that
we have the basis of sanctification, which consists in being set apart.
A thing was sanctified of old, under the law, when it was set apart for
God's service. We were sanctified in Christ Jesus when we were set
apart by the divine Spirit to be the Lord's own peculiar people for
ever. Election is the basis of sanctification. Moreover, the power by
which we are sanctified comes to us entirely by virtue of our union
with Christ. The Holy Spirit who sanctifies us through the truth, works
in us by virtue of our union with Jesus. That which becomes holy in us
is the new life. The old nature never changes into a holy thing; the
carnal mind is not reconciled to God, neither, indeed, can be. The old
man is not sent to the hospital to be healed, but to the cross to be
crucified. It is not transformed and improved, but doomed to die and to
be buried. The ordinance of baptism, which is placed at the outset of
Christ life, is meant to show, by our immersion in the liquid tomb,
that it is by death and burial that we pass into life by the power of
resurrection. If any man be in Christ, he is not an old creature mended
up: he is a new creature. "Old things are passed away; behold all
things are become new." Now, it is because this new life is the great,
the true matter of sanctification, and because it comes to us by virtue
of our oneness with Christ, that Jesus Christ is made to us the power
and the life by which we are sanctified. Beloved, let your hearts add
another meaning: let Jesus always be the motive for your
sanctification. Is it not a strange thing that some professors should
look to Christ alone for pardon and justification, and run away to
Moses when they desire sanctification? For instance, you will hear
persons preach this doctrine: "The Christian is to be holy, because if
he be not holy he will fall from grace and perish." Do you not hear the
crack of the old legal whip in all that? What is that but the yoke of
that covenant which none of our fathers were able to bear? It is the
bondage of Egypt, not the freedom of the children of God. Christ talks
not so, nor his gospel. Think not to make thyself holy by motives of
that kind. They are not right motives for a child of God. How then
should we urge the child of God to holiness? Should it not be in this
way: "Thou art God's child: walk worthy of him who is thy Father"? His
love to thee will never cease. He cannot cast thee away: he is faithful
and never changes, therefore love him in return. This is a motive fit
for the child of the free woman, and it moves his heart. The child of
the bond woman is driven by the whip, but the child of the free woman
is drawn by cords of love. "The love of Christ constraineth us;" not
fear of hell, but love of Christ; not fear that God will cast us away,
for that he cannot do, but the joy that we are saved in the Lord with
an everlasting salvation constrains us to cling to him with all our
heart and soul, for ever and ever. Rest assured, if motives fetched
from the gospel will not kill sin, motives fetched from the law never
will. If you cannot be purged at Calvary, you certainly cannot be
cleansed at Sinai. If "the water and the blood, from the riven side
which flowed," are not sufficient to purify thee, no blood of bulls or
of goats–I mean, no argument from the Jewish law, or hope of salvation
by your own efforts–will ever furnish motives sufficiently strong to
cast out sin. Let your reasons for being holy be found in Christ, for
he is made of God unto you sanctification! I have ever found, and I
bear my witness to it, that the more entirely for the future as well as
for the present, I lean upon my Lord, the more conscious I am of my own
emptiness and unworthiness; and the more completely I rest my whole
salvation upon the grace of God in Christ Jesus, the more carefully do
I walk in my daily life. I have always found that self-righteous
thoughts very soon lead to sinful actions; but that, on the other hand,
the very faith which leads to assurance, and makes the heart rest in
the faithfulness of God in Christ, purifies the soul. "He that hath
this hope in him purifieth himself, even as he is pure." Jesus, the
Savior, saves us from our sins, and is made of God to us
"sanctification."
Now the last item of our boundless wealth catalogued in the text is
"redemption." Somebody says: "That ought to have come first; because
redemption, surely, is the first blessing that we enjoy." Ay, but it is
the last as well. It is the alpha blessing, I grant you that–but it is
the omega blessing too. You are not yet redeemed altogether. By price
you are–for he that redeemed you on the tree did not leave unpaid a
penny of your ransom; but you are not yet altogether redeemed by power.
In a measure, you are set free by divine power; for you have been
brought up out of the Egypt of your sin, you have been delivered from
the galling bondage of your corruption, and led through the Red Sea, to
be fed upon the heavenly manna; but you are not altogether redeemed by
power as yet. There are links of the old chains yet to be snapped from
off you, and there is a bondage still about you from which you are ere
long to be delivered. You are "waiting for the adoption, to wit, the
redemption of the body." You will fall asleep, rejoicing that you were
redeemed; but you will not, even when you die, have received the full
redemption. When will that come–the full redemption? Only at the
second advent of the Lord Jesus; for when the Lord shall descend from
heaven with a shout, then the bodies of his saints, which have long
been lying in the prison-house of the sepulcher, shall be redeemed by a
glorious redemption from the power of death. "I know that my redeemer
liveth." The bodies of the saints shall come again from the land of the
enemy. Then their body, soul, and spirit–their entire manhood, which
Christ hath bought, shall be altogether free from the reign of the
enemy. Then will redemption be completed. Remember the saints in heaven
without us cannot be made perfect, that is to say, they wait till we
arrive among them, and when all the rest of the chosen ones shall be
gathered in, and the fullness of time has come, then shall the bodies
of the dead arise; and then, in body and soul made perfect, the year of
the redeemed shall have fully come. "Lift up your heads; for your
redemption draweth nigh." Here, then, is my joy, that Christ is my
redemption. My soul is free from slavery, but my poor trembling and
much suffering body feels the chains of death. Weakened by pain, my
body shall in all probability bow before the stroke of death's sword.
Unless the Lord soon come, it must be the portion of this frame to feed
the worm and mingle with the dust: but, O my body, thou art redeemed,
and thou shalt rise in power and incorruption; thou shalt yet adore the
Lord without weariness, and without pain shalt thou serve him day and
night in his temple. Even thou, O my weary body; even thou shalt be
made glorious like unto the Lord himself: Thou shalt rise and live in
the brightness of his presence.
All, then, that you can possibly want, O Christian, is in Christ. You
cannot conceive a need which Jesus does not supply. "Wisdom,
righteousness, sanctification, redemption," you have all in him. Some
gather a flower here; some gather another there; some will go farther,
and pluck another there; and some will go yet beyond to grasp a fourth;
but when we win Christ we have a posey; we have all sweet flowers in
one.
"All human beauties, all divine,
In my Beloved meet and shine
Thou brightest, sweetest, fairest one,
That eyes have seen or angels known."
But we cannot stay on this tempting subject, though even amid my
present pain I would fain talk on by the hour together; and therefore I
must finish with the last point; and on that only a word.
You see then, brethren, our very existence as Christians, and all that
we possess as Christians, we get from God by Jesus Christ; let all our
glory then be unto him. What insanity it is to boast in any but in our
Lord Jesus! How foolish are they that are proud of the beauty of their
flesh-worms' meat at the best! How foolish are they who are proud of
their wisdom! The wisdom of which a man is proud, is but folly in a
thin disguise. How foolish are they that are vain of their wealth! He
must be a poor man who can think much of gold. He must be a beggar
indeed who counts a piece of dirt a treasure. They that know Christ,
always value these things at their right estimate, and that is low
indeed. If any glory–and I suppose it is natural to us to glory, there
is a boasting bump on all our heads–let us glory in the Lord; and here
is a wide field and ample sea-room. Now, put out every stitch of
canvas, run up the topgallants, seek as stiff a breeze as you will,
there is no fear of running on a lee shore here, or striking a rock, or
drifting on a quicksand! O men, O angels, O cherubim, O seraphim, boast
in Jesus Christ! Wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption
is he, therefore ye may boast and boast, and boast again! You will
never exaggerate. You cannot exceed his worth, or reach the tithe of
it. You can never go beyond the truth, you do not even reach beyond the
skirts of his garments. So glorious is God that all the angels' harps
cannot sound forth half his glory. So blessed is Christ that the
orchestra of the countless multitudes of the redeemed, though it
continue for ever and for ever its pealing music, can never reach to
the majesty of his name or the glory of his work. "Give unto the Lord,
O ye mighty, give unto the Lord glory and strength. Give unto the Lord
the glory due unto his name." Let time and space become great mouths
for song; let the infinite roll up its waves; let all creatures lift up
their voices in praise of him that liveth and was dead; but chiefly, O
my soul, since to him thou owest in a double sense thine existence,
give thy praise to him from whom all blessing comes. Give thou the
homage of thine intellect to him who is thy wisdom. Let thy conscience
and love of rectitude adore him who has made thee righteous. Give the
tribute of thy soul to him who sanctifies thee; let thy sanctified
nature consecrate itself continually; and to him that hath redeemed
thee give thou never-ceasing praise. I wish it were possible for me to
rise to the height of my text, but my wings flag; I cannot ascend as
the eagle, and face the full blaze of the sun; I can but mount a little
as the lark, and sing my song, and then return to my nest. God grant
you to know the Lord Jesus in his fullness in your personal experience.
O you to whom Christ is no wisdom, how foolish are you! O you to whom
he is no righteousness, you are condemned sinners! O you to whom he is
no sanctification, the fire of God's wrath will consume you! O you to
whom he is no redemption, you are slaves in hopeless bondage! God
deliver you! May you be led to put your trust in Jesus even now.
PORTION OF SCRIPTURE READ BEFORE SERMON–1 Corinthians 1.
Mr. Spurgeon earnestly requests the prayers of the Lord's people for
his restoration to health. He has now been laid aside for eight most
painful weeks, and at present there are very feeble signs of recovery.
Twentieth Thousand. Price Two Shillings and Sixpence.
"FEATHERS FOR ARROWS;" Or, Illustrations for Preachers and Teachers,
from My Note Book. By C. H. SPURGEON.
"A treasury of figures and metaphors–and plenty of them–from Mr.
Spurgeon's Note Book which he has done well to reduce to 280 pages of
type, for the benefit of Christian workers, to whom the book is Now
presented as a sincere offering of hearty brother-help.'"–The Latter
Rain.