Saving the Lost
(No. 2756)
A SERMON INTENDED FOR READING ON, LORD'S-DAY, DECEMBER 8, 1901.
DELIVERED BY C. H. SPURGEON,
AT THE METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE, NEWINGTON, ON LORD'S-DAY EVENING,
AUGUST 17, 1879.
"The Son of Man hats come to seek and to save that which was lost."
Luke 19:10.
OUR Lord's mission upon earth was a very gracious one. It had a narrow
side to it, for He came only as a Minister– not as a Savior, mark you,
but as Minister–to "the lost sheep of the house of Israel." He was, as
the Apostle Paul reminds us, "a Minister of the circumcision for the
truth of God." And He did not traverse any other country but Palestine,
in order to preach the Gospel to the people, but He kept Himself to the
seed of Abraham.
Yet there was abundant room for one personal ministry within that realm
alone. If a Christian worker were to say that he would confine his
labors to London, he certainly need not think that he would have a
restricted range! And our Savior's personal preaching in Palestine gave
Him more work than any one man could accomplish. But, even in that
restricted sense, it is remarkable that He should have said to the
woman of Canaan, "I am not sent but unto the lost sheep of the house of
Israel." The lost sheep were the peculiar desire of His heart–not so
much Israel, as "the lost sheep of the house of Israel." His eye was
especially fixed upon them, His Grace sought out the objects most
needing it. His mercy hungered after human misery in order that He
might relieve it so that there were always uppermost in His mind,
thoughts of pity and love towards the sons of men.
At this present moment, under the Gospel dispensation, there is no
division between Israel and the Gentile. I do not care whether I am an
Israelite or not, after the flesh, because in Christ Jesus there is
neither Jew nor Gentile. That is all abolished and all the fuss that
some people make about whether we are descended from the Jews is
nonsense and nothing better! If it is so, it does not matter in the
least. For now "there is neither Greek nor Jew, circumcision nor
uncircumci-sion, Barbarian, Scythian, bond nor free–but Christ is all
and in all." The middle wall of partition has been taken down once and
for all and, now, all over the world, this Truth of God stands in
reference not to this nation, or to that, alone, but to the whole human
race, "The Son of Man has come to seek and to save that which was
lost." Still do His eyes, with eagle keenness, spy out the lost. Still
do those eyes, with dove-like tenderness, weep for the lost! Still does
the eternal Savior live that He may seek and save that which was lost!
If you were never lost, you have no part or lot in His work of
salvation. But if you are lost, and know it, this is the very link
which unites you to the Savior! He has come to seek and to save just
such as you are and I hope, in the observations I am about to make,
that I shall be able to show that He came to save you!
I. I shall speak concerning OUR LORD'S MISSION. He has come to seek and
to save that which was lost.
Notice, first, what a gracious mission it was!It was a mission of pure
mercy and indescribable love. Our Lord Jesus Christ did not come into
the world to seek His own honor, but to seek and to save the lost. Not
to get anything for Himself, but to give everything to those who are
lost. His mission is one of undeserved goodness, on His part, towards
those who have treated Him evilly and who deserve very different
treatment at His hands. There was no law except His own love to compel
Christ to come to save sinners. They had no claim upon Him. When He
resolved to come, it was an act of matchless Grace. If He had not
chosen to come, He would still have been the ever-blessed Son of the
Highest, enshrined in everlasting Glory though everyone of us had
perished! His coming was Infinite goodness, returning good for evil,
coming down to our lost estate and determining, by superabundant
affection, to save us from it! Our Savior is embodied Grace,
Incarnate Love and His mission is Grace itself. Let us never forget
that He came to save the lost–not to save the good and the excellent.
Ah, my Brothers and Sisters, Christ's eyes look in the opposite
direction to ours. We usually look for some goodness on the part of men
before we help them, but He looks to their sin, degradation and need.
He is kind to the unthankful and the evil. He justifies those who are
not, in themselves, just–while we were dead in trespasses and sins,
"in due time Christ died for the ungodly." Grace, pure Grace, abounds
in Him and is blessedly manifested in His mission of saving the lost.
Further, while that mission is a very gracious one, I call your
attention to the fact that it is also a great one. Jesus Christ came to
seek and to save the lost and there are plenty of them. It is no small
charge that Christ has taken up when He speaks of saving the lost. What
a mass of our fellow countrymen are lost! I mean, in the common use of
the term, "the lost classes" that are morally gone astray and are, by
universal consent, put down among the lost. Look at whole nations of
mankind that are sunk up to their eyelids in infamous transgression,
lost to every sense of shame and decency. Christ, however, has come to
save just such as they are and, to tell the truth, the difference
between us and them, by nature, is not more than skin deep! We are a
little better washed on the outside than they are, but the inside of
the cup and platter of fallen humanity is pretty much alike in all men.
We may have been better taught. We may have been more restrained than
they have been, but a viper is still a viper wherever he may live and
man is, in every case, a lost man, a depraved and sinful creature. To
my mind, it seems a wondrous charge for Christ to undertake–to save
"the lost" without any qualification added to the word–just "the
lost."
What a mission Christianity had when it first came, for instance, into
Rome! When Christianity first came there it was inconceivably vile. Its
emperors were madmen! I think I cannot truthfully say less of such
monsters as Nero, Tiberius and Caligula, whose power seemed all to be
bent to supply themselves with the means for the indulgence of the most
abandoned forms of vice. The city of Rome was full of statues, the
larger part of which, thank God, have been utterly destroyed–and I
often wish the rest had been, for many of them are polluting and
depraving even to look upon. The city was full of idols as well as of
art and the principal images were not the more respectable ones, like
Jupiter and Mercury, but Venus and Bacchus and other abominations from
the filthy crowd of Olympus. The rich indulged themselves in every
luxury. Women, while their maids waited upon them, and dressed them,
practiced upon their female slaves cruelty of such a kind that one
would think that everything feminine had gone out of them. Slaves were
tortured and put to death–and nothing was ever said about such common
crimes. In the amphitheatre, into which the multitudes crowded, scores
and even hundreds of gladiators died in a single day–slaying each
other in mutual conflict to make a Roman holiday! The nation was full
of corruption, bribery, filthiness. A few characters shone out
brightly, the more renowned because they were so few, but the land, as
a whole, was such that, if Vesuvius had belched forth a torrent of fire
high enough to set all Italy in a blaze, and an earthquake had opened
its mouth and swallowed it all up, there would have been as much
justification for its destruction as for that of Sodom and Gomorrah of
old!
But Christianity came into Rome in the form of a poor fisherman and a
tent-maker, and others like them. And they began to say, "We must love
each other. You who are rich must count it a privilege to help the
poor. We must all fear and serve the one true God, for there is but
one. And God has made of one blood all nations to dwell upon the face
of the earth. You are not to treat men with cruelty. You are not to
have these bloody games. You are not to indulge these licentious
propensities. The Lord Jesus Christ, God's Son, has died to save us
from sin and all its consequences." It was a very still small voice
that was heard in Rome at first–and if it had not been for the
supernatural power of God, it would speedily have been silenced! But
its influence soon began to spread, for some of the rich men in the
city and some of the soldiers on guard in Caesar's palace, and many of
the poor slaves embraced the new religion and everywhere they were
renowned for kindness, gentleness, purity and love.
Then wicked men said, "We will put this new religion down," and
horrible persecutions followed. But, notwithstanding all that the
Christians suffered, Rome became leavened with the influence of
Christianity. By-and-by, slavery passed away, cruelties were no longer
indulged, the amphitheatre was abolished and many of the idol gods were
broken in pieces. The one invisible God was worshipped and the world
rose up like one that has been in an awful swoon, and dreamed dreadful
things–and she looked into the mirror and saw her face as though she
had been born-again! Christ had come to seek and to save lost society
and He did it in a marvelous way, as He can always do it and He will
continue to
do it, for this is the great errand of my Master, that wherever men are
sunken in sin and vice–wherever they are immersed in crime, or
satisfied with their self-righteousness–He has come to save them from
it!
Mark, also, that my Master's mission, while it is a gracious one and a
great one, is a very complete one. He comes to seek, that is, to find,
the lost. And coming into contact with lost humanity, He does not leave
it lost, for He saves those whom He seeks.
And what a condescending way of saving He has, for the text says, "The
Son of Man has come." He was no "Son of Man" once–He was and always
remains the eternal Son of God! But He deigned to take upon Him this
poor Nature of ours. He became a Man like ourselves–a condescension so
marvelous that though we hear of it now with little astonishment, yet,
if we sat down to think it over, it would remain an unexplained mystery
to bewilder us with its marvels of matchless Grace! Yes, the Son of God
became the Son of Man! As such, He lived. As such, He bled away His
life upon the Cross that He might redeem us! He has come as the Son of
Man that He might lift us up to be the sons of God! And, blessed be His
name, the deed is done and, by His Spirit's power, its glorious results
are still bringing untold blessings to all who trust Him!
Just once more, what a practical aim our Savior had in coming here! Our
Lord Jesus Christ did not come to propound a philosophy. He did not
come to explode ancient errors. He did not come to keep abreast of the
times. He did not come to do the pretty things that many ministers are
trying to do nowadays. He did not come to be rhetorical. He did not
come to be popular. He did not come that He might gain the esteem of
the multitude. He came to seek and to save the lost! Would God that His
Church would keep to the same kind of work! But His Church seems to me
to act in a great measure as if she were in the world simply to show
off her pretty self with all her fineries–to play her grand music and
tickle the ears of people with a Sunday concert and I know not what of
floral show to increase the attraction of it. "Christ Jesus came into
the world to save sinners"–and what are we who call ourselves His
disciples, doing? Many of us are doing a thousand other things than
this one great thing which alone is worthy of the service of the man
who calls himself a Christian and who, therefore, ought to be one who
is like Christ. He came to seek and to save the lost. Brothers and
Sisters, try to get at this work as closely as you can. Whatever else
you can or cannot do, do seek to be the means of saving souls! Whatever
you can do, that is fine and grand and that will bring you into esteem
among your fellow men, do try to save poor lost sinners, even though
they should be among the lowest of the low and the poorest of the poor!
Do try to do what you are called to do in your Master's name, for, by
the power of His matchless Gospel, you, also, can seek the lost and
bring them to Him to save them!
Thus much about our Master's mission.
II. Now I want, in the second place, to give a MESSAGE TO THE LOST ONES
FROM MY TEXT.
I do not know where you lost ones are, but here, somewhere, are some of
you who know yourselves to be lost. I am not talking to these other
people, but you and I will have a little conversation between
ourselves.
And, first, I ask you to think what an interest is excited about you.
You are lost and it seems that earth and Heaven, too, are concerned
about your being lost, for the Son of Man who is also the Son of God
blends Heaven and earth in one in being concerned about you! God's
Church is interested in your salvation. Many Christians are praying for
you and I am trying to speak out the common love of Christians to you.
Because you are lost, we long that you may be saved! Suppose there is a
little child in the family–not a very pretty child, not always quite
clean, nothing very much to look at in anybody's eyes except her
mother's. They are seven or eight in the family and the parents have
not much time to waste in admiration of any one of them when they have
to earn bread for so many. But, just now, little Mary is the principal
object of thought in the family. Everybody's heart is taken up with
Mary. There is nobody in the house who is not thinking of Mary–what is
the reason? Why, Mary went out this morning, to go on an errand, and it
is now evening and she has not come home! And they have been round to
the police station, but they cannot find her. Mary is lost, so there is
more thought of her than about Jane, or Hannah, or John, or Thomas,
though, it may be, they are older and better children. But Mary, just
now, is uppermost with everybody because Mary is lost!
It is so with regard to you, my dear Friend. You are in the uppermost
thought of Christ just now, and you are in our uppermost thoughts, too,
because you are lost. I do not want you to feel at all elated at being
the subject of this interest, because it is not so much you, you know,
or anything about you except the one fact that you are lost, which
makes us so much interested in you!
Presently there is such joy, such kissing and hugging, such delight,
such singing because Mary is found. Perhaps you step in and look at
Mary–she is just as commonplace a little baby as ever sat on a
mother's knee, but still, you see, she had been lost and she has been
found and, therefore, they are rejoicing over her with great joy. All
the prominence that Mary gets is not due to her goodness, but to the
fact of the love that cannot bear that she should be lost. And it is so
with you, my dear Friend. We would move Heaven and earth about you if
we could! We would suspend the angels' songs and bid them lean upon
their harps and look on, while all Heaven and earth, in the Person of
the Well-Beloved, are seeking and saving that which is lost! So I bid
you remember what interest is excited about you!
Next, notice what power and what wisdom are engaged concerning you–you
poor lost body over there! The Son of Man has come to seek and to save
you! It is not that the preacher is laboring to save the lost, but, you
see, the pearly gates are swinging back on their golden hinges–the
King's Palace gates are opening and there is One passing through whose
coming to the earth astounds cherubim and seraphim! It is He who
descends, disrobing Himself as He comes down, hanging up His royal
rings like new stars, doffing His azure mantle and stretching it across
the sky, for, as George Herbert quaintly says, He has new clothes
a-making down below! He comes here, to this poor earth, and you see Him
as a babe at Bethlehem and a boy at Nazareth. Being here, He stoops
continually lower and lower till He reaches the deepest depths of all
upon the Cross of Calvary. And, all the while He goes about His daily
task hunting for such as you! And what He literally did when He was
here, He is still doing by the Divine Spirit–He is stall watching,
still waiting, still seeking, still going round the earth hunting after
the los!
It ought to greatly encourage you who are lost when you remember that
there is such an One as the Lord Jesus Christ who has come after you. A
child, lost in the woods, sits down and cries. The night is coming on,
she is very weary and her sad little heart has only one comfort.
"Father will begin to hunt after me, directly. He comes home and when
mother tells him that his little girl is lost, he will search for me
all night long. Father knows the forest trails and knows where I have
been known to stray. Father will find me before the morning, so I will
lay me down and sleep." And, dear lost one, you may have even more
confidence that the Savior will search for you! Do not give up in
despair because Jesus seems so long in coming to find you. He has
piercing eyes to see you and swift feet to leap o'er mountains after
you–and a ready hand to grasp you and strong shoulders on which to
bear His wandering sheep home to the fold above. There is hope for you,
lost one, for the Son of Man has come, bringing all His Godhead with
Him and, in the Infinity of His power, and wisdom and love, He is
seeking to save just such sinners as you!
I want you, however, to notice another thing–you lost one, I mean, for
you and I are supposed to be talking together tonight. Do you see what
trouble you have caused?The little child is troubled at being lost, but
think what trouble there is at home on her account! Last Wednesday
morning there came into my study a Brother-minister and I saw at once
that he was in terrible trouble, He had come to see me about something
else, but I could not help saying to him, "You have some great sorrow
on your heart, have you not?" He answered, "Yes, I have. I lost my wife
a year and a half ago, and that was a great grief to me, but I have a
trial now which seems to cut me to the heart almost more than that
bereavement did." "What is that?" I asked, and he replied, "Last
Sabbath morning, when I went to preach, I thought my boy had come into
the Chapel with me, but, after the service, I could not find him. I
went home, but he did not come in to dinner, and I could not get any
tidings of him anywhere. I had to preach, in the evening, with a heavy
heart, for I still could not find him, and I spent the greater part of
the night with others searching everywhere for him. "And now," he said,
"it is Wednesday and I have not found him, nor have I heard a word
concerning him."
Oh, you should have seen how sad he looked! "It is my eldest boy," he
said, "and he is lost." Up to this present moment, I believe that he
has not heard anything of him. He would compass the whole land to find
him, I know, but he does not know where to look for him. The boy is
lost and, possibly, he does not know what trouble he is giving his
father and all his friends. If he did, he would very soon be home. Ah,
and sinners give great trouble because they are lost. You have heard
what trouble sinners gave to the Lord Jesus Christ. That death of His
upon the Cross was part of the trouble that fell upon His great heart
because we will sin–because we will be lost–because we will not turn
to Him and live. What trouble many of you sinners give to your friends
on earth–and what trouble you gave to the Lord Jesus Christ! It threw
Him into a bloody sweat even to think of you as lost and to take your
place and bear the penalty of your guilt.
There is one other reflection, which will not, I hope, wipe out this
one. That is, what joy you would give if you were found! Oh, what
clapping of hands there would be and what singing of songs of
thanksgiving in your home, if you have a
pious mother or a godly father! Sometimes, members of this Church come
to speak with me and I know, by their manner, that there is something
very joyful that they have to tell me. They do not laugh–they seem
very quiet about their joy but there is a deep undercurrent of
gladness. One said to me, lately, "God has been very gracious to me,
for both my son and my daughter have just found the Savior." You know
that fathers and mothers, when they are right-hearted, are much more
glad about such good news as this than they are when they say, "My son
has gained a fortune," or, "My daughter has married into a rich
family." Oh, yes, to be able to say they are saved is the best thing
that can possibly be said about them! I feel such gladness as I can
never express when I think of my own dear sons, whom God has brought to
the feet of Jesus and called to preach the Gospel which their father
loves! O you poor sad sinners, you would be the cause of great joy on
earth if you came to Christ–and you would make Christ Himself glad,
too! That is the greatest wonder of all– that He who sits upon the
Throne of God in ineffable bliss, can have an increase to His joy if
you are saved! Yet we know that it is so, for "there is joy"–not only
among the angels–but Christ said, "there is joy in the Presenceof the
angels of God over one sinner that repents." That is to say, it is God
Himself who has the joy, and Christ who rejoices over one sinner that
repents!
That is my special word with you, poor lost sinners. May God bless it
to you and may you speedily be found by the seeking Savior!
III. Now I come to the closing portion of my discourse which is to be a
WORD TO OURSELVES.
My dear Brothers and Sisters, the workers in this Church, I want to
speak to you and to myself. And what I want to say is just this–if
Jesus Christ, the Son of Man, has come to seek and to save that which
was lost, what honorable work is yours and mine when we try to be the
means of saving souls! The Grand Worthy Chief Master of the
Confraternity of Soul-Sinners is our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ!
Those who belong to that blessed company have Jesus Christ as their
Head. I always feel that it is a high honor to be a minister of the
Gospel when I remember what the old Puritan said. He said that the Lord
God had only one Son, and He made a Minister of Him–what could He do
better with Him? So, today there is no higher rank on earth than that
of a winner of souls! Be you in whatever position in life you may, if
you are seeking to bring eternal salvation to men, you have far higher
employment than falls to the lot of the mightiest of earth's kings and
princes!
Next, think how thorough your efforts ought to be in this work You
ought to go after souls, to seek them, as the Son of Man came to seek
them. If they will not come into the place where you usually speak, go
and speak to them where they are. If you have not got the children you
want to have in your class in the Sunday school, go and seek to bring
them in and then, when you have sought them and gathered them around
you, do not be satisfied till they are saved! It is a great mercy to
have the House of Prayer filled with people listening to the Gospel. I
am always glad to see such a sight, but oh, if you hearers are not
saved, what is the good of your coming here? If my Master will not give
me your souls for my hire, I can scarcely thank Him for allowing me to
preach to you, for I am doing you harm rather than good, being "the
savor of death unto death," rather than "of life unto life," if you
hear the Word, but are not saved by it! O dear unsaved souls, we can
never be satisfied concerning you until you are truly converted to God!
Dear Christian workers, do not rest until those who listen to the
Gospel message believe it and so find eternal salvation!
Notice next how naturally some of you ought to take to the work of
soul-winning. When a child is lost, who should seek it? Why, its mother
and father, of course! They are sure to do so. Well, do you seek the
souls of your own children? Do you pray for them? Do you try, by your
teaching, and by your example, to bring them to Christ? If you do not,
shame on you that you bear the Christian name! I hope all of you who
are Christian parents are seeking the salvation of your own children.
The next person to go in search of a lost child, after its parents, I
should think, is its brother. A lad hears that his dear little sister
is lost. I see the hot tears in the boy's eyes as he says, "Mother, I
will go anywhere, I will go everywhere if I can but find her." Well,
now, you who are brothers, you who are related to one another–and you
are all brothers of the one great human family–you all ought, for that
very reason, to be concerned about finding these lost ones! But if
there is one member of the family who is affected the most by the loss
of the child, it is, probably, the older sister who was especially
charged to take care of it. Or if the big brother is responsible,
because the child was entrusted to his charge, he will not be able to
bear himself! He will cry, "Oh, that I should have lost her!–that I
should be the cause of her wandering away!" He will not rest at night,
I am sure, unless he has found her.
Some of us are very specially put in charge of souls. You are teachers.
You are evangelists. You are ministers and I am, as I know full well.
What if I should ever be the cause of the loss of any one of you? I
would not have it so. God grant that it may never be, that any word of
mine, spoken in a thoughtless manner, or anything that I might say too
coldly, or with too much levity, should ever lead an immortal spirit to
turn away from hope and from the Lord Jesus Christ! It would be a
dreadful thing if that were to happen–and if it ever has, let us
henceforth be among the first to seek to find those who have gone
astray.
I will tell you, too, who would be sure to look after a lost child, and
that is a child who was once lost and who has been found. It may have
happened years ago, but the lad says to his mother, "I know what it is
to be lost, for I was once lost in the woods. Let me go and find the
little one, as somebody came and found me." You who know the smart of
sin, the sorrow that sin brings, will be among the very first to try to
find the lost ones. I am sure you will, so I scarcely need say a word
to urge you to this holy service.
Then there are those who are acquainted with the ground where the lost
ones are–they are sure to go seek them. A child lost in our London
streets will probably be found again, but a child lost in the backwoods
of America may never be discovered until its bones are found. We who
know the dangers of the road–that roaring lion, those pitfalls and
traps–we cannot but feel that we must be among the first to go to seek
the lost!–
"Oh, come, let as go and find them! In the paths ofdeath they roam. At
the close of the day 'twill be sweet to say, 'I have brought some lost
one home.
And we may, with great hopefulness, go about the work of seeking the
lost because there is One with us, in the seeking party, who is sure to
find them. "Come," we say to one another, "let us gather together, and
let us go and search the woods to find the lost one." But we know so
little about the work and we are so weak and feeble that we soon become
dispirited. But here comes the One who is going to lead the search
party! You know Him! Look at His pierced hands and feet and brow. Mark
that ensign of the Son of Man, the spear gash in His side. Look at His
dear face! Was there ever on any other countenance, such beauty of
compassionate love? He comes forward, girt with His golden belt, with
His eyes brighter than flames of fire, and He says, "I will lead the
search. You take your orders from Me. I will tell you where to go and I
will go with you. And so My lost ones shall all be found."
Dear Master, we are only too glad to go on such an errand! You shall
not have to tell us twice and if any of us are inclined to linger, we
think we see You lift Your pierced hand and say, "Who will go for Me?
And whom shall I send?" And many of us, rising in our seats, would
gladly raise our hand and dedicate ourselves from this very moment to
this blessed service, each one of us saying, "Here am I Lord! Send me."
Go thus, Brothers and Sisters, in the Holy Spirit's might, and in your
Savior's name! And may He enable you to bring home, with rejoicing,
many of the lost ones–and to Him shall be all the glory forever and
ever! Amen.
EXPOSITION BY C. H. SPURGEON: MATTHEW21:23-46.
Verse 23. And when He was come into the temple, the chief priests and
the elders of the people came unto Him as He was teaching and said, By
what authority are You doing these things? And who gave You this
authority?fesus knew that these men came to Him for no good purpose,
and that they were only trying to trip Him up in His speech. He was
always willing to teach when men were willing to learn, but He did not
care to cast His pearls before swine. Therefore, mark the holy caution,
the sacred ingenuity with which our Lord replied to these men.
24-27. And Jesus answered and said unto them, I also will ask you one
thing, which if you tell Me, Ilikewise will tell you by what authority
I do these things. The baptism of John, where was it from? From Heaven,
or of men? And they reasoned with themselves, saying, If we say, From
Heaven, He will say unto us, Why did you not, then, believe him? But if
we say, Of men; we fear the people; for all hold John as a Prophet. And
they answered Jesus, and said, We cannot tell And He said unto them,
Neither will I tell you by what authority I do these things. He carried
the war into the enemy's camp. He answered His accusers by asking them
a question which they could not answer in either way without condemning
themselves!
28-32. But what do you think? A certain man had two sons; and he came
to the first, and said, Son, go work today in my vineyard. He answered
and said, I will not: but afterward he repented and went. And he came
to the second, and said likewise. And he answered and said, I go, Sir:
and went not. Which of the two did the will of his father? They said
unto Him, The first. Jesus said unto them, Verily I say unto you that
the publicans and the harlots go into the kingdom of God before you.
For John came unto you in the way of righteousness, and you believed
him not: but the publicans and the harlots believed him: and you, when
you had seen it, repented not afterward, that you might believe him.
Those poor fallen women and degraded tax gatherers practically said, by
their conduct, "We will not serve the Lord." Their past evil life had
been a deliberate rejection of the authority of God and yet, when John
the Baptist came, they repented and they believed! Each of them had
said, like the elder son, "I will not," yet they did! But as for these
chief priests and elders, who all their lives had been outwardly
serving the Lord and saying, "We will go and work in God's vineyard,"
when John came and pointed them to God's own Son, they would not accept
Him.
They had, just now, by refusing to tell whether the Lord's messenger
was from Heaven or of men, again rejected Him and proved that they had
not repented. They did not believe John–they had themselves confessed
that it was so–and, therefore, out of their own mouths they were
condemned! I wonder whether there is any lesson in this parable to some
who are here. I should not be surprised if there is. I hope that there
are some among you who up to now have said, "I will not go," who will
repent and go and serve your God! And, on the other hand, it is to be
feared that there may be some here who have always been saying, "I go,
Sir," who nevertheless have not gone and, perhaps, never will go–but
will remain to the last, disobedient to the command of God. The Lord
grant that it may not be so!
33-41. Hear another parable. There was a certain householder which
planted a vineyard, and hedged it round about, and dug a winepress in
it, and built a tower, and let it out to husbandmen, and went into a
far country: and when the time of the fruit drew near, he sent his
servants to the husbandmen, that they might receive the fruits of it.
And the husbandmen took his servants, and beat one, and killed another,
and stoned another. Again, he sent other servants more than the first:
and they did unto them likewise. But last of all he sent unto them his
son, saying, They will reverence my son. But when the husbandmen saw
the son, they said among themselves, This is the heir; come, let us
kill him, and let us seize his inheritance. And they caught him, and
cast him out of the vineyard, and slew him. When the lord therefore of
the vineyard comes, what will he do unto those husbandmen? They said
unto Him, he will miserably destroy those wicked men, and will let out
his vineyard unto other husbandmen which shall reader him the fruits in
their seasons. You see at once how this parable related to the leaders
of the Jewish people! From generation to generation, they scorned the
Prophets of God, persecuted them and put them to death. And when our
Lord Himself appeared, though His Glory might easily have been seen by
them, yet they cast Him out from among them and put Him to death!
Yet, beloved Friends, we must never regard the Scriptures as referring
only to strangers and people of past ages! We must also look to see
what bearing they have upon ourselves. The rejection of God's Prophets
is the sin of our common humanity. And the murder of the Son of God was
the crime, not of the Jews only, but of the whole human race. We, too,
have a share in it, for we have rejected the Son of the Highest. "But
we were not there," you say. No, and yet we may have repeated that
terrible tragedy in our own lives. God has sent you many messengers and
if you remain, at this moment, unconverted, you have not treated them
well, otherwise you would have yielded your heart to God. Some of them
you have rejected by your neglect and others have been the subject of
your ridicule and contempt. Against some you have reacted violently,
for your conscience has been touched and you have had to do violence to
conscience in order to reject their message!
Last of all, the Son of God Himself has come to you in the preaching of
the Gospel. You have heard of His death and of His atoning Sacrifice,
but you have rejected them and, in acting thus, you have done, as far
as you could, the same as they did who crucified the Savior! You still
refuse to have Him for your Savior. You disown Him as your King. You
strive against His righteous sway. You tell me that you do not. Well,
then, you have yielded to Him and you are saved. But if that is not the
case, you still remain such an adversary of God that you reject His
Son! Take care lest of you, also, that prophecy should become true–He
will miserably destroy those wicked men and will let out his vineyard
unto other husbandmen, which shall render him the fruits in their
seasons."
42. Jesus said unto hem, Did you never read in the Scriptures?What a
question this was for our Lord to put to men who professed to have the
whole of the Scriptures at their fingertips and to be the only
qualified interpreters of them! "Did you never read in the Scriptures?"
42, 43. The stone which the builders rejected, the same is become the
chief cornerstone: this is the Lord's doing, and it is marvelous in our
eyes? Therefore say I unto you, The Kingdom of God shall be taken from
you and given to a nation bringing forth the fruits thereof. And, at
this day, we Gentiles enjoy the privileges of the Gospel, while poor
Israel is scattered to the four winds of Heaven! But He that spared not
the natural olive, will not spare the engrafted branches if we are
found unfruitful. God takes the Gospel away from one nation and gives
it to another. But if it is not accepted by the other one and if He has
not all the Glory of it ascribed to Him, He will take it away from that
nation, too! He may deal thus with us–if England becomes and remains a
drunken nation, a cruel nation, a proud nation, an unbelieving nation,
a superstitious nation and brings forth the evil fruits of the vine of
Sodom–we may not expect that God will always continue His Kingdom
among us! He will say to us, as Christ said to these chief priests and
elders, "The Kingdom of God shall be taken from you, and given to a
nation bringing forth the fruits thereof."
44. And whoever shall fall on this stone shall be broken. If you
stumble over Christ, the chief Cornerstone of God's building, you will
be broken in pieces! If you reject Him, you shall suffer serious loss!
44. But on whomever it shall fall, it will grind him to powder. If you
arouse the wrath of Christ and the Rock of Ages falls on you–a huge
cliff comes toppling from its lofty height upon the traveler and
crushes him past all recognition–you will be ground to powder.
46, 46. And when the chief priests and Pharisees had heard His
parables, they perceived that Hie spoke of them. But when they sought
to lay hands on Him, they feared the multitude, because they took Him
for a Prophet. Unhappy people, to reject Him who alone could bless
them–and yet to stand in fear of Him whom they tried to despise! Let
it not be so with any of us, but may Jesus become our Teacher, our
Friend and our Savior forever, by His abounding Grace! Amen.