DELIVERED BY
C. H. SPURGEON,
AT THE METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE, NEWINGTON.
"Shall horses run upon the rock? Will one plow there with oxen?" Amos
6:12.
THESE expressions are proverbs, probably taken from the familiar adages
of the country, but, anyhow, right worthy to be used as proverbs. The
wiser men become, the more sententious are their utterances, the more
terse and full of meaning are their sayings and, therefore, the wisdom
of the wise condenses into proverbs and the language of Prophets is
sure to abound in them. But a proverb is generally a sword with two
edges, or, if such a metaphor might be tolerated, it has many edges, or
is all edge and hence it may be turned this way and that way and its
back stroke will be as sharp as its direct cut, for every part of it
will have force and point. A proverb has often many bearings and you
cannot always tell what was the precise meaning of him who uttered it,
except by the connection.
Now, I believe that the connection would abundantly tolerate two senses
in this place. An ancient commentator asserts that there are seven
meanings of it and that any one of them would be consistent with the
context. I cannot deny the assertion, for if it is correct, it is only
one among many instances of the manifold wisdom of the Word of God.
Like those curious carved Chinese balls in which there is one ball
within another, so in many a holy text there is sense within sense,
teaching within teaching and each one worthy of the Spirit of God.
The first sense of the text I would say just a word or two upon is
this–the Prophet is expostulating with ungodly men upon their pursuit
of happiness where it can never be found. They were endeavoring to grow
rich and great and strong by oppression. The Prophet says, "you have
turned judgment into gall and the fruit of righteousness into hemlock."
They had transformed the judgment seat into a place where justice was
bought and sold and the Book of the Law was made to be the instrument
of chicanery and high-handed fraud. "Yet," says the Prophet, "there is
no gain to be gotten this way–no real profit, no true happiness. As
well may horses run upon the rock and oxen plow the sand–it is a
foolish attempt, it is labor in vain."
And truly, dear Hearers, if there are any of you, and probably there
are, who try to content yourselves with this world and hope to find a
Heaven in the midst of your business and your family without looking
upward for it, you labor in vain! If any of you endeavor to find
pleasure in sin and think that it will go well with you if you despise
the Law of God and seek your own pleasure by breaking the natural laws
which concern your body, you will find that you have made a great
mistake! You might as well seek for roses in the grottoes of the sea,
or look for pearls on the bare pavements of the city! You will find
what your soul requires nowhere but in God. To seek after happiness in
evil deeds is to plow a rock of granite. To labor after true prosperity
by dishonest means is as useless as to till the sandy shore.
"Why do you spend your money for that which is not bread, and your
labor for that which satisfies not?" Young man, you are killing
yourself with ambition and if your objective were worthy, we might not
be so grieved, but your ambition is selfish–you seek only your own
honor and emolument–and this is a poor, poor objective for an immortal
soul. And you, too, Sir, are wearing out your life with anxiety–your
mind and body both fail you in endeavoring to amass riches, as if a
man's life consisted in the abundance of the things which he possesses!
You are plowing a rock! Your avarice will not bring you joy of heart or
content of spirit, but will end in failure.
And you, too, who labor to weave a righteousness by your works apart
from Christ and fancy that with the diligent use of outward ceremonies
you may be able to do the work of the Holy Spirit upon your own
heart–you, too, are plowing thankless sand! No harvest will ever repay
your self-elected toils. Merit can no more spring from human hands than
fruit from an iron rod! The strength of fallen nature exerted at its
utmost can never rescue a soul from the storm of wrath which awaits the
guilty. You may row hard to bring that galley of yours to shore, but it
shall be broken by the fierce storm. Why, then, attempt the impossible
when faith would, in a moment, calm the sea and bring the ship to
shore?
Woe unto those who kindle a fire, surround themselves with sparks and
delight themselves in the blaze of their own kindling, for they shall
have this of the Lord–they shall go down in sorrow!
So far, I believe, I have not misread the text, but have mentioned a
very probable meaning of the words as they stand in the context. But,
still, another strikes me which I think equally suitable and upon it I
shall dwell, by God's help. It is just this. God will not always send
His Prophets to warn people, or employ His ministers to call them to
repentance. When it turns out that men's hearts remain obdurate and
they do not and will not repent, then God will not always deal with
them in mercy. "My Spirit shall not always strive with man." There is a
time of plowing, but when it comes to be quite evident that the heart
is willfully hardened, then Wisdom, itself, suggests to Mercy that she
should give over her efforts. "Shall horses run upon the rock? Will one
plow there with oxen?"
No, there is a limit to the efforts of kindness and in fullness of time
the labor ceases–the rock remains a sterile rock, forever unplowed.
I. Taking that sense, we shall speak upon it and remark, first, that
MINISTERS LABOR TO BREAK UP MEN'S HEARTS. This is the first effort of
the wise preacher. The servant of Christ who teaches the Gospel,
whatever he may be called, is a sower of seed–and though it may appear
useless to sow seed upon rocks, we are bound, while acting as
evangelists, to sow our Seed everywhere. Broadcast is our Master's
rule–"Go you into all the world and preach the Gospel to every
creature." Hence in our Lord's parable a handful fell upon the highway
where the birds devoured it and another handful fell upon the rocky
soil where it sprung up, but tomorrow perished because it had not depth
of earth.
It was no business of the sower to select the soil. He was to sow as he
went along, for so his Master told him. But I think he would not be
blamed, but commended if he threw double handfuls over there where the
soil was evidently rich and well prepared! As a sower he was to sow
broadcast and leave the Seed to fall where it might under the guardian
care of Him who sent Him to sow. But when he became a farmer, he would
have further duties and among the rest, that of breaking up the fallow
ground that he might no longer sow among thorns.
We have so often sown on the rock and have been so frequently
disappointed because of the hardness of the unrenewed heart, that much
time must be spent by the pastor, as a lover of men's souls, in trying,
by the power of the Holy Spirit, to break up the hard earth–to make it
so that it will be receptive of the Seed and ready to nurture the
Living Grain after it has fallen there. There are many Truths of God
which are used in this plowing and driven in like sharp plowshares to
break up the heart. Men must be made to feel that they have sinned and
they must be led to repent of sin. They must receive Christ, not with
the head, only, but with the heart–for with the heart man believes
unto righteousness.
There must be emotion–we must cut into the heart with the plowshare of
the Law. A farmer who is too tenderhearted to tear up and harrow the
land will never see a harvest! Here is the failing of certain
Divines–they are afraid of hurting anyone's feelings and so they keep
clear of all the Truths which are likely to excite fear or grief. They
have not a sharp plowshare on their premises and are never likely to
have a stack in their barn. They angle without hooks for fear of
hurting the fish and fire without bullets out of respect to the
feelings of the birds! This kind of love is real cruelty to men's
souls. It is much the same as if a surgeon should permit a patient to
die because he would not pain him with the knife, or by the necessary
removal of a limb. It is a terrible tenderness which leaves men to sink
into Hell rather than distress their minds! It is a diabolical love
which denies the eternal danger which assuredly exists and argues the
soul into presumption because it thinks it a pity to excite terror and
so much more pleasant to prophesy smooth things.
Is this the spirit of Christ? Did He conceal the sinner's peril? Did He
cast doubts upon the unquenchable fire and the undying worm? Did He
lull souls into slumber by notes of flattery? No, but with honest love
and anxious concern He warned men of the wrath to come and bade them
repent or perish! Let the servant of the Lord Jesus in this thing
follow his Master and plow deep with a sharp plowshare which will not
be balked by the hardest clods! This we must school ourselves to do. It
may be contrary to our impulses and painful to our feelings, but it
must not be left undone to gratify our love of ease and our desire to
please our hearers.
If we really love the souls of men, let us prove it by honest speech
which costs us pain; by earnest warning which it is more grievous to us
to utter than to others to hear! This part of our work is essential to
man's welfare and can by no means be omitted. The hard heart must be
broken, or it will refuse the Savior whose Glory lies very much in His
being sent to bind up the broken-hearted. There are some things which
men may or may not have and yet may be saved–but
those things which go with the plowing of the heart are indispensable
and, therefore, men must have them or hopelessly perish! The heart must
be broken up–there must be a holy fear and a humble trembling before
God! There must be an acknowledgment of offenses committed and a
penitent petition for mercy. There must, in a word, be a thorough
plowing of the soul before we can expect that the Seed should bring
forth fruit!
II. But the text indicates to us that AT TIMES MINISTERS LABOR IN VAIN.
"Shall horses run upon the rock? Will one plow there with oxen?" There
are some hearts–there are some in this house tonight, there are some
who are always here–who are very hard soil. When the plowman plows, he
soon discovers what he is at work upon. I do not suppose that anybody
but a minister with considerable experience will understand what I say
when I declare that there is a sympathy between the preacher of the
Gospel and his hearers of a very intimate kind, even as there is a
mutual action between the soil and the plowman.
Though our hearers are silent, they probably speak more to the preacher
than he does to them. In a short time a plowman feels whether the plow
will go or not and so does the minister. He may use the very same words
in one place which he has used in another, or they may seem to him to
be so, but he feels in the one place great joy and hopefulness in
preaching, while with another audience he has heavy work and little
hope mingles with it. The plow in the last case seems to jump out of
the furrow–and a bit of the blade is broken off every now and then. He
says to himself, "I do not know how it is, but I know I can't get on at
this," and he becomes conscious that his Master has sent him to work
upon a particularly heavy soil. The people were so far attentive that
nobody was asleep–they seemed to drink in every word and yet they were
as unmoved as so many statues!
They did not feel and did not appear as if they could feel anything.
The preacher was ready to stop and burst into tears to see how utterly
unfeeling his audience had become, but that did not alter them. He
hoped it was no vain regard for his own reputation which distressed
him, but that a sincere desire for their good and for the honor of the
Truth of God moved him to holy jealousy. But he felt a kind of
heart-breaking coming over him because he could make no headway. He was
doing his best. The very same that he had done in other places with
abounding success and with a sense of joyous ease, he was now doing in
heaviness of spirit, conscious that he was wasting effort and that his
pleadings were lost upon the people.
All laborers for Christ know that this is occasionally the case. You
must have found it so in a Sunday school class. You must have known it
to be so in a cottage meeting or in any other gathering where you have
tried to teach and preach Jesus. You have said to yourself every now
and then, "Now I am plowing a rock. Before, I turned up rich soil which
a yoke of oxen might plow with ease and a horse might even run at the
work. But now the horse may tug and the oxen may wearily toil till they
gall their shoulders–but they cannot cut a furrow–the rock is
stubborn to the last degree." There are such hearers in all
congregations. They are as iron and yet they are side by side with a
fine plot of ground!
Their sister, their brother, their son, their daughter–all these have
readily felt the power of the Gospel, but they do not feel it. They
hear it, respectfully hear it and they allow it free course so far that
they permit it to go in one ear and out the other, but they will have
nothing more to do with it. They would not like to be Sabbath-breakers
and stay away from worship. They, therefore, do the Gospel the
questionable compliment of coming where it is preached and then
refusing to regard it! They are hard, hard, hard bits of rock–the plow
does not furrow them.
Many, on the other hand, are equally hard, but it is in another way.
The plow seems to touch them when they hear the Word of God preached,
but it is in seeming only–the impression is not deep or permanent.
They receive it with joy, but retain it not. They listen, apparently
with deep attention and they are ready enough to go to a place of
worship, as often as ever you like, but it never comes to practice with
them. They will hear about repentance, but they never repent. They hear
about faith, but they never believe. If we were to preach anything
other than the Truth of God they would be indignant, for they are very
good judges of what the Gospel is–but they have never accepted the
Gospel! They will not eat, but still they insist that good bread shall
be put on the table. They will not wash, but they will have the hose
continually open before them.
They are great sticklers for the very things which they personally
reject. They are moved to feeling–they shed tears occasionally. A
sentimental tale would make them weep fast enough and, sometimes, the
pathos of the preacher stirs them in the same manner, for a time, but
their hearts are not really broken up by the Word. They go their way
and forget what manner of men they are. Their transient feeling is
rather an illustration of their hardness than an instance of true
emotion. They are hard, hard, hard, rocky-hearted through and through!
They are stony-souled enough to mock the Word of God by feeling and yet
not feeling–by the imitation of a sensibility which never amounts to
spiritual sensation. We have such in this congregation–the Lord have
mercy upon them! While I am speaking, I hope the description will come
home to them and that each one of them may listen for himself and feel
the plowshare tearing its rough but useful way.
Now, all this is worse because certain of these people, these
rocky-hearted people, have been plowed for years and they become harder
instead of softer! Once or twice plowing, a broken share or two and a
disappointed plowman or two, we might not mind if they would finally
yield–but these have, since their childhood, known the Gospel and
never given way before its power! It is a good while since their
childhood, now, with some of them! Their hair is turning gray and they
are getting feeble with years. I am addressing those who have heard the
Word of God preached in sincerity and earnestness, now, scores and
hundreds of times! You have heard wagonloads of sermons! You have been
entreated and persuaded times beyond number! You have had invitations
and expostulations multiplied ad infinitum!
Yes, and you have been prayed over and wept over, but your hearts are
still rocky–labor has been lost upon you. In fact, you used to feel
the Word, in a certain fashion, far more, years ago, than you do now!
The sun, which softens wax, hardens clay–and the same Gospel which has
brought others to tenderness and repentance has exercised a contrary
effect upon you and made you more thoughtless, more hardened, more
worldly and more contemptuous of Divine things than you were in your
youth! We knew it would be so–we told you so years ago–for though we
are always unto God a sweet savor, we are among men a savor of death
unto death as well as of life unto life! I fear that this sad result is
being illustrated in your case.
Why are certain men so extremely rocky? Some are so from a peculiar
dullness of nature. There are many people in the world whom you cannot
very well move. You would have to put a piece of dynamite under them
before you could alarm them, they are so very quiet and cool about
everything! They are the same in business–there is nothing sanguine
about them, no excitability, no possibility of stir or emotion. They
have a great deal of granite in their constitution and are more nearly
related to Mr. Obstinate than to Mr. Pliable. Now, I do not think very
badly of these people because one knows what it is to preach to an
excitable people and to get them all stirred up and to know that at the
end they are none the better, but relapse into inaction, whereas some
of the more dull and immovable people, when they are moved, are moved,
indeed! When they feel, they feel intensely, and they retain any
impression that is made.
A little chip made in granite by very hard blows will abide there,
while the lashing of water, which is easy enough, will leave no trace
even for a moment! It is a grand thing to get hold of a fine piece of
rock and to exercise faith about it! The Lord's own hammer has mighty
power to break and, in the breaking, great Glory comes to the Most
High. Worse, still, certain men are hard because of their
infidelity–not heart-infidelity all of it–but an infidelity which
springs out of a desire not to believe which has assisted itself by
manufacturing doubts and discovering difficulties. These difficulties
exist and were meant to exist, for there were no room for faith if
everything were as plain as the nose on one's face! These people have
gradually come to doubt, or to think that they doubt essential Truths
of God and this renders them impervious to the Gospel of
Christ–another sad means of hardening the heart till it rivals
granite.
A much more numerous body are very orthodox people, but very
hard-hearted people for all that. Worldliness hardens a man in every
way. It often dries up all his charity to the poor because he must make
money and he thinks that the poor societies are quite sufficient
excuses for neglecting the offices of charity. He thinks how
comfortable poor people are when they are attended to by relieving
officers! He pretends to believe that our union houses are perfectly
palatial establishments and that it would be wicked to give away a
penny because he might be helping an imposter and encouraging idleness!
At any rate, it is better for him to take care of his worthy self and
give the penny to Number One!
Worldliness hardens him in that way and so it does with regard to other
things. He has no time to think of the next world–he must spend all
his thoughts upon the present one. Money is tight and, therefore, he
must hold it tight and when money brings in so little interest, he
finds another reason for being the more niggardly. He has no
opportunity for prayer–he must get down to the counting house. He has
no time for reading his Bible–his ledger needs him. It is of no use to
speak to him about eternal things, for he is thoroughly engrossed with
the affairs of time. You may knock at his door, but his heart is not at
home–it is never at home–it is always in the counting house where he
lives and moves and
has his being. His god is his gold; his bliss is his business; his all
in all is himself! What is the use of preaching to him? As well may
horses run upon a rock, or oxen drag the plow across a field sheeted
with iron a mile thick!
With some, too, there is a hardness produced by what I might almost
call the opposite of stern worldliness, namely, a general levity. Some
are naturally butterflies–they never think or want to think! Half a
thought exhausts them and they must be diverted or their feeble minds
will utterly weary! They live in a round of pleasure and amusement.
Their chief delight is giggling–it does not amount to laughter, for it
is downright earnest men that laugh–these are too silly, too frivolous
for anything but mere childish giggling! They go through the world as
if it were a stage and all the men and women only players. It is very
little use preaching to them–there is no depth of earth in their
superficial nature. Beneath a sprinkling of shifting, worthless sand,
lies an impenetrable rock of utter stupidity and senselessness!
I might thus multiply reasons why some are harder than others, but it
is a well-assured fact that they are so and there I leave it to notice
a third point.
III. I shall now ask everybody to judge whether this running of horses
upon a rock and this plowing there with oxen shall always be continued?
I assert that IT IS UNREASONABLE TO EXPECT THAT GOD'S SERVANTS SHOULD
ALWAYS CONTINUE TO LABOR IN VAIN. These people have been preached to,
taught, instructed, admonished,
expostulated with and advised–shall this unrecompensed work be always
performed? We have given them a fair trial– what do Reason and
Prudence say? Shall we be bound to continue till we are worn out by
this unsuccessful work? We will ask it of men of business! We will ask
it of men who plow their own farms–do they recommend perseverance when
failure is certain? Shall horses run upon the rock? Shall one plow
there with oxen? Surely not forever!
I think we shall all agree that labor in vain cannot be continued
forever if we, first of all, think of the plowman. He is not much and
he does not need to be much considered, but still, his Master will
think of him. See how weary he grows when the work discourages him. He
goes to his Master with, "Who has believed our report, and to whom is
the arm of the Lord revealed? Why have You sent me," he asks, "to a
people that have ears but hear not? They sit as Your people sit and
they hear as Your people hear–and then they go their way and they
forget every Word that is spoken–and they obey not the voice of the
Lord by His servant."
See how disappointed the preacher becomes! It is always hard work when
you appear to see no progress although you do your utmost. Nobody likes
doing work which will not pay and from which nothing comes! I once
looked over a military prison and I saw the soldiers carrying shot from
one end of a yard to the other. And it was remarked to me by the warden
that some time ago they made the men pile the shot at one end in a
pyramid and then take it back to the other end of the yard and pile it
there. But as that gave them some kind of amusement, the work was not
thought sufficiently irksome and so they made the culprits carry a shot
to one end of the yard and bring it back, and thus no pile was formed
at either end!
The growing of the little pyramid, though they knew they would have to
move it again, afforded a measure of interest to the prisoners and as
the work was to be a matter ofpunishment and not of interest, even that
was denied them. How frequently we have felt like those poor soldiers
in prison, for we have carried the Gospel and brought it back again,
seeing no result to our endeavors! With many of you, our work has been
all wasted, all useless! Now, will God keep His servants in such work?
If they were His prisoners in a military prison, it would be natural He
should! But they are not– they are His sons and He loves them! Will He
keep them to such weary work as this?
Must they always do that which discourages and disappoints them? No
man, whoever he may be, likes to be given work which appears to be
altogether a waste of time and effort. To his own mind it seems to have
a touch of the ridiculous about it and he fears that he will be
despised of his fellows for aiming at the impossible. Shall it, then,
always be our lot to treat with hard-hearted men and women? Will the
great Farmer bid His plowmen spill their lives for nothing? Must His
preachers continue to cast pearls before swine? Shall they continue to
speak to deaf ears? Must they always expostulate with stones and
prophesy to those who are less sensible than the beasts of the field?
If the consecrated workers are so bid of their Lord, they will
persevere in their painful task–but their Master is considerate of
them and I ask you, also, to consider whether it is reasonable to
expect a zealous heart to be forever occupied with the salvation of
those who never respond to its anxiety? Shall the horses always plow
upon the rock? Shall the oxen always labor there? Then think
again–there is the Master to be considered. The Lord–is He always to
be
resisted and provoked and yet continue to have patience? Many of you
have had eternal life set before you as to be received by simply
believing in Jesus Christ–and you have refused to believe.
Now, my Lord might have said to me, "Go home. You have done your duty
with them. Never set Christ before them again–I am not going to have
My Son insulted." If you offer a beggar in the street a shilling and he
refuses and will not have it, you cheerfully put it into your purse and
go your way–you do not stand there begging him to have his needs
relieved. But, behold, our God in mercy has been begging sinners to
come to Him, imploring them to accept His Son! In His condescension He
has even come down to be like a salesman in the market, crying, "Ho,
everyone that thirsts, come to the waters and he that has no money,
come buy wine and milk, without money and without price." In another
place He says of Himself, "All day long have I stretched out My hands
to a disobedient and gainsaying generation."
Well, if the Lord of Mercy has been refused and the Lord of Love has
been despised so long in the sight of you who reverence Him, does not
some indignation mingle with your pity–and while you love sinners and
would have them saved–do you not feel in your heart that there must be
an end to such insulting behavior and such matchless patience? You
cannot always be pleading with those who will not be persuaded, for he
that refuses you refuses Him that sent you! I ask those whose hearts
are hard to think of the matter in this light and if they do not
respect the plowman, yet let them have regard to his Master.
And then, again, there are so many other people who are needing the
Gospel and who would receive it if they had it, that it seems as if it
would be wise to leave off wearying oneself about these people who will
not have it. What did our Lord say? He said that if the mighty things
which had been done in Bethsaida and Chorazin had been done in Tyre and
Sidon, they would have repented! What is more amazing, still, He says
that if He had worked the same miracles in Sodom and Gomorrah which He
worked in Capernaum, they would have repented in sackcloth and ashes!
Well, then, does it not occur to us at once to give the Word of God to
those who will have it and leave the despisers to perish in their own
willfulness? Does not Reason say, Let us send off this medicine for the
sick where there are sick people who will value it, for these people
refuse it"?
There are thousands of people willing to hear the Gospel! See how they
crowd wherever the preacher goes–how they tread upon one another in
their anxiety to listen to him! And if these people who hear him every
day will not receive the message of God, "in God's name," he says, "let
me go somewhere else where there is a probability of finding soil that
can be plowed." "Shall horses run upon the rock? Will one plow there
with oxen?" Must I work always where nothing comes of it? Does not
reason say, let the Word of God go to China, to India, or to the utmost
parts of the earth where they will receive it, for those who have it
preached in the corners of their streets despise it and think it a
common thing, if not an utter nuisance?
I shall not lengthen out this argument, but shall just put the question
again. Would any one of you continue to pursue an object when it proved
to be hopeless? Have you ever attempted to make a child who has been in
a fit and fretful, happy and good-tempered? You have said many kind and
gentle things and you have used a few sharp words, too, but as my
little lord would not come round, you have said to yourself, "Then let
him sulk until he has had it out." And if the Lord has sent His
servants to speak kind, gracious, tender things and men will not hear,
do you wonder if He should say, "Let them alone. They are joined unto
their idols. Let them alone."
There is a limit to the patience of men and we soon arrive at it. And
assuredly there is a limit, though it is long before we outrun it, to
the patience of God! "At length," He says, "it is enough, My Spirit
shall no longer strive with them. Now will I henceforth let them
alone." If the Lord does this, can any of us blame Him? Is not this the
way of Wisdom? Does not Prudence, itself, dictate it? If we put it to
any man of thoughtful mind here, he will say, "Yes, yes, it cannot
always be that the rock should be plowed by the oxen."
IV. Fourthly, THERE MUST BE AN ALTERATION, then, and that speedily. Can
this be altered? Can the oxen be
taken off the rock? Yes, it can be easily done and very likely it will
happen before long to some hard hearts now before me. It can be done
three ways. First, the person can be taken away so that the
unprofitable hearer shall no more hear the Gospel from the lips of his
best-approved minister. There is a preacher who evidently touches the
man a little and has some sort of power over him, but, as he rejects
his testimony and remains impenitent, the preacher shall be removed to
another town. The hearer shall now hear monotonous discourses which
will not touch his conscience nor disturb his lethargy. He shall go
into a lone village, or a foreign land where he shall be no longer
persuaded and entreated–and
there he will sleep himself into Hell! That may be readily enough
done–perhaps some of you are making arrangements, even now, for your
own removal from the house of hope.
Another way is to take away the plowman. He has done his work as best
he could, now call him off from his hopeless task. Let him go Home. He
is weary–let him go Home to his Master! The soil would not break up,
but he could not help that, let him have his wages. He has broken his
plow at the work–let him go Home and hear his Lord say, "Well done."
He was willing to keep on at the disheartening labor as long as his
Master bade him, but it is evidently useless, Therefore let him go
Home, for his work is done. He has been sick, let him die and enter
into his rest. This is by no means improbable.
Or, there may happen something else. The Lord may say, "Now, that piece
of rock shall never trouble the plowman any more. I will take it away."
And he may take it away in this fashion–the man who has heard the
Gospel but rejected it will die. I pray my Master that He will not
suffer this to happen in the case of any one of you, that you should
die in your sins–die impenitent–for then we cannot reach you any more
or indulge the faint hope for you! No prayers of ours can follow you
into eternity! The most ardent lover of your souls cannot hope that
there shall be an escape for you after death! There is one name by
which you may be saved and that name is sounded in your ears–the name
of Jesus! But if you reject Him now, even that name will not save you,
for He shall be your terror!
From His face you shall flee away and your great cry shall be, "Rocks,
hide me! Mountains, fall upon me! Hide me from the face of Him that
sits upon the Throne and from the face of the Lamb." You will dread Him
and well you may dread Him, though at this hour He waits to be gracious
to you. I pray you do not destroy your own souls by continuing to be
obstinate against Almighty Love. Oh that the Lord might do for you what
we cannot! May He make you willing in the day of His power, for
otherwise, as surely as you live and God lives, if it comes to close
quarters with you and your offended God–with no Christ between to be
the Mediator–it will go hard with you! "Beware," He says, "you that
forget God, lest I tear you in pieces and there be none to deliver
you."
Do not mind anything that I say on my own, but look at the Word of God
for yourselves and you shall find that the Inspired Scripture has in it
terrible threats against impenitent sinners! And there is no imagery,
(though borrowed from the mediaeval times, against which our
adversaries make so much noise), there is no imagery that at all
exaggerates the terror which must actually fall upon every soul that
commits suicide by rejecting the Savior and spits into the face of
God's own Christ by saying, "I would sooner be lost than have Him to
save me," for that is, virtually, what every unbelieving soul is
saying! O God, grant that some better thing may happen!
I close by asking, is there any alternative to all this? Can nothing
else be done? This soil is rock–can we not, somehow sow it without
breaking it? No, it must be broken. "You must be born again." "Except a
man receive the kingdom of Heaven as a little child he can in no wise
enter therein." There must be repentance, for without repentance there
is no remission of sin. But is there not a way of saving men, somehow,
without the Gospel and without the Grace of God? The Lord Jesus did not
say so–He told us to preach as follows–"He that believes and is
baptized shall be saved, but he that believes not shall be damned." He
does not hint at a middle course or hold out a "larger hope," but He
says, "he that believes not shall be damned," and so he must be.
God grant that no soul here may dream that there may, perhaps, be some
back door to Heaven, for the Lord has provided none. What then? Shall
the preacher be permitted to continue his fruitless toil of plowing?
Yes, he is willing. He is willing if there is only half a hope left
him–willing to go on and say–"Hear, you deaf and see, you blind, and
look you dead!" He will even speak so this day, for his Master bids him
preach the Gospel to every creature! But it will be hard work to repeat
the word of exhortation for years to those who will not hear it!
Happily, there is one other turn which affairs may take! There is a God
in Heaven! Let us pray to Him to put forth His power! Jesus is at His
side–let us invoke His interposition! The Holy Spirit is almighty–let
us call for His aid!
Brothers who plow and my Brothers and Sisters who help us as we plow
and long for our success, cry to the Master for help! The horse and the
ox evidently fail, but there remains One above who made both ox and
horse and who is able to work great marvels! Did He not once speak to
the rock and turn the flint into a stream of water? Let us pray to Him
to do the same now! And, oh, if there is one who feels and mourns that
his heart is like a piece of rock, I am so glad he has come so far as
feeling it, because he who feels that His heart is a rock gives some
evidence that the flint is beginning to be
transformed. O Rock, instead of smiting you tonight, as Moses smote the
rock in the wilderness and erred therein, I would speak to you!
O Rock, would you become like wax? O Rock, would you dissolve into
rivers of repentance? O Rock, fall down with that wish! Echo to the
voice of exhortation! O Rock, break with that good desire! O Rock,
dissolve with that longing for God because He is working upon you now!
Who knows, but at this very moment you shall begin to crumble? Do you
feel the power of the Word? Did the sharp plowshare touch you, just
now, and did you begin to break up? Break and break again, till by
contrition you are broken in pieces all asunder, for then will the good
Seed of the Gospel come to you and you shall receive it into your
bosom–and we shall all behold the fruit thereof!
And so I will fling one more handful of good Seed and have done. If you
desire eternal life, trust Jesus Christ and you are saved at once.
"Look unto Me and be you saved, all you ends of the earth," says
Christ, "for I am God, and beside Me there is none." He that believes
in Him has everlasting life! "Like as Moses lifted up the serpent in
the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever
believes in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life." O Lord,
break up the rock and let the Seed drop in among its broken
substance–and get a harvest from the dissolved granite, at this time,
for Jesus Christ's sake! Amen.
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Concealing the Words of God