Corn in Egypt

Corn in Egypt

A Sermon

(No. 234)

Delivered on Sabbath Morning, January 16th, 1859, by the

REV. C.H. SPURGEON

At the Music Hall, Royal Surrey Gardens.

"Now when Jacob saw that there was corn in Egypt, Jacob said unto his
sons,Why do ye look one upon another? And he said, Behold, I have heard
that there is corn in Egypt: get you down thither, and buy for us from
thence; that we may live, and not die."–Genesis 42:1, 2.

GOD in his wisdom hath so made the outward world, that it is a strange
and wonderful picture of the inner world. Nature has an analogy with
grace. The wonders that God does in the heart of man, each of them
finds a parallel, a picture, a metaphor, an illustration, in the
wonders which God performs in providence. It is the duty of the
minister always to look for these analogies. Our Saviour did so. He is
the model preacher: his preaching was made up of parables, pictures
from the outer world, accommodated to teach great and mighty truths.
And so is man's mind constituted that we can always see a thing better
through a picture than anyhow else. If you tell a man a simple truth,
he does not see it nearly so well as if you told it to him in an
illustration. If I should attempt to describe the flight of a soul from
sin to Christ, you would not see it one half so readily as if I should
picture John Bunyan's pilgrim running out of the city of destruction,
with his fingers in his ears, and hastening with all his might to the
wicket gate. There is something tangible in a picture, a something
which our poor flesh and blood can lay hold of; and therefore the mind,
grasping through the flesh and the blood, is able to understand the
idea, and to appropriate it. Hence the necessity and usefulness of the
minister always endeavonring to illustrate his sermon, and to make his
discourse as much as possible like the parables of Jesus Christ.

Now, there are very few minds that can make parables. The fact is, I do
not know of but one good allegory in the English language, and that is,
the "Pilgrim's Progress in Parables, pictures, and analogies are not so
easy as some think; most men can understand them, but few can create
them. Happy for us who are ministers of Christ, we have no great
trouble about this matter; we have not to make parables; they are made
for us. I believe that Old Testament history has for one of its designs
the furnishing of the Christian minister with illustrations; so that a
truth which I find in the New Testament in its naked form taught me as
a doctrine, I find in the Old Testament cast into a parable. And so
would we use this most excellent ancient book, the Old Testament, as an
illustration of the New, and as a means of explaining to our minds the
truth that is taught to us in a more doctrinal form in the New
Testament.

What, then, do we see in these two verses of the forty-second chapter
of Genesis? We have here a picture of man's lost estate, he is in a
sore soul-devouring famine. We discover here man's hope. His hope lies
in that Joseph whom he knows not, who has gone before him and provided
all things necessary, that his wants may be supplied. And we have here
practical advice, which was preeminently wise on the part of Jacob to
his sons in his case, and which, being interpreted, is also the wisest
advice to you and to me. Seeing that there is mercy for sinners, and
that Jesus our brother has gone before us to provide for us an
all-sufficient redemption, "why sit we here and look one upon another?"
There is mercy in the breast of God, there is salvation in Christ; "get
you down thither, and buy for us from thence; that we may live, and not
die."

Three things, then, this morning: first, a pitiful plight; secondly,
good news; and thirdly, excellent advice.

I. First, A PITIFUL PLIGHT. These sons of Jacob were overtaken by a
famine. We may talk of famines, friends, but none of us know what they
are. We have heard of a famine in Ireland, and some dreadful stories
have been related to us that have harrowed our hearts and almost made
our hair stand up on end; but even there the full fury of famine was
not known. We have heard too, to our great grief, that there are still
in this city, dark and hideous spots, where men and women are
absolutely perishing from hunger, who have sold from off their backs
the last rags that covered them, and are now unable to leave the house,
and positively perishing of famine. Such cases we have seen in our
daily journals, and our hearts have been sick to think that such things
should now occur. But we cannot any of us guess what is the terror of
an universal famine, when all men are poor, because all men lack bread,
when gold and silver are as valueless as the stones of the street,
because mountains of silver and gold would scarce suffice to buy a
single sheaf of wheat. Read the history of the famine of Samaria, and
see the dreadful shifts to which women were driven, when they did even
eat their own offspring. Famines are hells on earth. The famine which
had overtaken Jacob was one which, if it had not at the moment of which
this passage speaks, exactly arrived at that dreadful pitch, was sure
to come to it; for the famine was to last for seven years; and if,
through the spendthrift character of Eastern nations, they had not
saved in the seven years of plenty enough even for one year, what would
become of them during the sixth or seventh year of famine? This was the
state of Jacob's family. They were cast into a waste, howling
wilderness of famine with but one oasis, and that oasis they did not
hear of till just at the time to which our text refers, when they
learned to their joy that there was corn in Egypt. Permit me now to
illustrate the condition of the sinner by the position of these sons of
Jacob.

First, the sons of Jacob had a very great need of bread. There was a
family of sixty-six of them. We are apt, when we read these names of
the sons of Jacob, to think they were all lads. Are you aware, that
Benjamin, the youngest of them, was the father of ten children, at the
time he went into Egypt, so that he was not so very small a lad at any
rate, and all the rest had large families, so that there were sixty-six
to be provided for. Well, a famine is frightful enough when there is
one man who is starving–when there is one brought down to a skeleton
through leanness and hunger: but when sixty-six mouths are craving for
bread, that is indeed a horrible plight to be in. But what is this
compared with the sinner's needs! His necessities are such that only
Infinity can supply them; he has a demand before which the demands of
sixty-six mouths are as nothing. He has before him the dreadful
anticipation of a hell, from which there is no escape; he has upon him
the heavy hand of God, who has condemned him on account of his sins.
What needs he? Why, all the manna that came down from heaven in the
wilderness would not supply a sinner's necessities, and all the water
that gushed from the rock in the desert would not be sufficient to
quench his thirst. Such is the need of the sinner, that all the
handsfull of Egypt's seven years would be lost upon him. He needs great
mercy; the greatest of mercy, nay, he needs an infinity of mercy, and
unless this be given him from above, he is worse than starved, for he
dies the second death, and lives in eternal death, without the hope of
annihilation or escape. The demands of a hungry man are great; but the
demands of a hungry soul are greater still; until that soul gets the
love and mercy of God manifested to it, it will always hunger and
always thirst, though it had worlds given it for mouthfulls, its hungry
stomach would be still unsatisfied, for nothing but the Trinity can
fill the heart of man; nothing but an assurance of the everlasting,
immutable love of God, and an application of the most precious blood of
Jesus, can ever stay the terrible hunger of the sinner's soul.

Mark, again: what these people wanted was an essential thing. They did
not lack clothes, that were a want, but nothing like the lack of bread;
for a man might exist with but scanty covering. They did not need
luxuries,–these they might want, and our pity would not be so much
excited; they did not need tents,–without these they might be able to
satisfy the cravings of nature: but they lacked bread–that without the
fire of life would dwindle to a spark, which at last must die out in
the darkness of death. "Bread! bread!" what a cry is that, when men
gather together, and in the days of scarcity make that their war-cry.
"Bread! bread!" what is a more dreadful sound than that? "Fire! fire!"
may be more alarming, but "Bread! bread!" is more piercing to the
heart. The cry of "Fire!" rolls like thunder; but the cry of "Bread!"
flashes like lightning, and withers one's soul. O that men should cry
for bread,–the absolute necessary for the sustenance of the body! But
what is the sinner's want? Is it not exactly this?–he wants that
without which the soul must perish. Oh! sinner, if it were health, if
it were wealth, if it were comfort, which thou wert seeking, then thou
mightest sit down content, and say, "I can do without these," but in
this matter it is thy soul, thy never-dying soul, that is hungering,
and it is its salvation, its rescue from the flames of hell, which now
demands thy attention. Oh! what a need is that,–the need of the soul's
salvation! Talk we of bread and of skeleton bodies? These are frightful
things to look upon; but when we speak of a lack of bread, and of dying
perishing souls, there is something more frightful here. See, then,
your case, ye who are without the grace of God; ye have great
necessity,–necessity for essential things.

Yet again; the necessity of the sons of Jacob was a total one. They had
no bread; there was none to be procured. So long as they had some of
their own, they could stint themselves, and diminish their rations, and
so, by moderation, maintain themselves. But they looked into the
future, and saw their children dying with hunger, and not one crust
with which to palliate their pangs. They saw their wives sickening
before them, and their babes at their breasts, unable to obtain
nourishment from those dry fountains. They saw themselves at length,
solitary, miserable men, with their hands on their loins, bundles of
bones, crawling about the tents where their children lay dead, and
themselves without strength enough to bury them. They had a total lack
of bread. They might have borne with scarceness: but a total lack of
bread was horrible in the extreme. Such is the sinner's case. It is not
that he has a little grace, and lacks more; but he has none at all. Of
himself he has no grace. It is not that he has a little goodness, and
needs to be made better, but he has no goodness at all, no merits, no
righteousness–nothing to bring to God, nothing to offer for his
acceptance; he is penniless, povertystricken; everything is gone
whereon his soul might feed. He may gnaw the dry bones of his own good
works; but if the Lord hath sent conviction into his heart, he will
gnaw them in vain; he may try to break the bones of ceremonies, but he
shall find that instead of marrow they contain gall and bitterness. He
may hunger and hunger, because he has positively nothing with which he
could stay his stomach. Such is your case, then. How abject is such a
necessity as this: a total lack of an essential thing for which you
have an immense need.

But yet worse; with the exception of Egypt, the sons of Jacob were
convinced that there was no food anywhere. I believe the reason why
they looked one upon another was this. At first one looked at the other
as much as to say, "Haven't you some to spare? Couldn't you give me
some for my family?" Perhaps Dan appealed to Simeon, "Haven't you some?
my child is starving this day; cannot you help me?" Another might look
at Judah; and perhaps they might fancy that Benjamin the favourite
would surely have some morsel stored up. So they looked one to another.
But soon alas! the look of hope changed into the look of despair. They
were quite certain that the necessities of each house had been so
great, that no one could help the other. They had all come to poverty;
and how can beggars help each other, when all are penniless? And then
they began to look upon one another in despair. In speechless silence
they resigned themselves to the woe which threatened to overwhelm them.
Such is the sinner's condition, when first he begins to feel a
hungering and thirsting after righteousness, he looks to others. He
thinks, "Surely the minister can help me, the priest may assist me."
"Give us of your oil, for our lamps are gone out." But after awhile he
discovers that the state of all men is the same, that all are without
grace, that "none can save his brother, or give to God a ransom for
him." And apart from Christ we, my dear friends, this morning might
look one on another, aghast and in despair–might try the wide world
over, and say "Where is salvation to be found!" Oh! if it lay in the
very center of the earth we could dig through the rocks and into the
very bowels of the earth to find it. If it were in heaven, we would
seek to scale it with some Babel-tower, that we might reach the boon.
If we had to walk through fire to gain it, we should gladly accept the
burning pilgrimage. Or if we had to walk through the depths of the sea,
we should be content to let all its billows roll over us, if we might
find it. But if every man had to say to his fellow "there is no hope
for us; we have all been condemned, we have all been guilty, we can do
nothing to appease the Most High;" what a wretched world were ours, if
we were equally convinced of sin, and equally convinced that there was
no hope of mercy! This, then, was the condition of Jacob's sons
temporally, and it is our condition by nature spiritually. We are in a
land of famine; we have nothing of our own; we are hungering, we are
dying of hunger, and our case seems totally hopeless, for on earth
there is nothing to be found to satisfy the raving hunger of the soul.

II. Now we come, in the second place, to the GOOD NEWS. Jacob had
faith, and the ears of faith are always quiet; faith can hear the tread
of mercy, though the footfall be as light as that of the angel among
the flowers. Though mercy should be a thousand leagues away, and its
journey should occupy ten thousand years, yet faith could hear its
footsteps, for it is quick of ear and quick of eye. Nay, more, if God
should give a promise which should never be fulfilled till the old
rolling skies were dissolved, faith would look through all the
generations, along the vista of the centuries, and see the spirit of
promise afar off, and rejoice therein. Jacob had the ears of faith. He
had been at prayer, I doubt not, asking God to deliver his family in
the time of famine; and by-and-bye he hears, first of his household,
that there is corn in Egypt. Do you see the gathering? The venerable
patriarch sits in the tent. his sons come to pay him their morning
obeisance; there is despair in their faces, they bring their little
children with them. All that the patriarch has he gives; but this
morning he adds good news to his benediction, he says to them, "There
is corn in Egypt." Can you conceive how their hearts leaped? He
scarcely needs to add, "Get you down thither, and buy for us from
thence; that we may live and not die." Jacob heard the good news, and
communicated it as speedily as possible to his descendants.

Now, we also have heard the good news. Good news has been sent to us in
the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. "There is corn in Egypt." We need
not die. There is salvation with God. We need not perish–there is
mercy in the Most High. We need not think that we must necessarily be
lost; there is a way of salvation; there is a hope of escape–do we not
receive the tidings in joy? Do not our hearts rejoice within us at the
thought that we are not hopelessly condemned, but that the Lord may yet
have mercy upon us? Now, we have better news than even Jacob had;
although the news is similar, understanding it in a spiritual sense.

First, we are told to-day by sure and certain witnesses, that there is
corn in Egypt, there is mercy in God. Jacob's messenger might have
deceived him–idle tales are told everywhere, and in days of famine men
are very apt to tell a falsehood, thinking that to be true which they
wish were so. The hungry man is apt to hope that there may be corn
somewhere; and then he thinks there is; and then he says there is; and
then, what begins with a wish comes to be a rumor and a report. But
this day, my friends, it is no idle talk; no dream, no rumor of a
deceiver. There is mercy with God, there is salvation with him, that he
may be feared. The fountain is filled to the brim; the granaries are
full of the good old corn of the kingdom. There is no reason why we
should perish. By sure infallible, and certain witness, we are told
upon the very oath of God himself; that there is salvation for the sons
of men. But Jacob did not know how much corn there was in Egypt. He
said there was corn, but he did not know bow much. Now, today, we are
something like Jacob. There is mercy with God; we do not know, any of
us, how much. "Oh," says one sinner, "I am such a hungry soul, that all
the granaries of Egypt would not be enough for me." Ah, but, poor soul.
God is all that you could want, even though you should want an infinite
supply. The sixty-six in the family of Jacob would make a heavy draw
upon the granaries of any nation; but yet, so abundant were the
storehouses in every city, that we do not read that Joseph missed all
that he gave them. So it is with you. Your necessities are immense, but
nothing equal to the supply. Your soul requires great mercy, but you
will no more exhaust the mercy of God than the taking a cup full of
water out of the sea would exhaust its fullness. High above the summits
of your mountain-sins the stars of grace are shining.

There is another thing in which we have the start of Jacob. Jacob knew
there was corn in Egypt, but did not know who had the keeping of it. If
he had known that, he would have said, "My sons, go down at once to
Egypt, do not be at all afraid, your brother is lord of Egypt, and all
the corn belongs to him." Nay, more I can readily imagine that he would
have gone himself, forthwith. And Simeon and the rest though they might
feel a little abashed, when they thought of the unkirdness that they
had shown to their brother, when they began to feel a little hungry, if
they had known all about Joseph, would have said, "We need not fear to
go and submit ourselves to him, for we know he has a gracious and
loving heart and would never let his poor brethren die of hunger."
Sinner, the mercies of God are under no lock and key except those over
which Christ has the power. The granaries of heaven's mercy have no
steward to keep them save Christ. He is exalted on high to give
repentance and remission of sins. And the keys of grace are swinging at
the girdle of your own brother; he who died for you, he who loved you
so much, that he loved you better than he did himself. He has the keys
of grace, and will you fear to go? Will you tremble to go to these rich
stores of mercy when they are in the hands of a loving, tender, and
ever-gracious Lord? No, this is good news, that all the grace is in the
hands of Jesus.

There is yet another thing which the sons of Jacob knew nothing of.
When they went to Egypt, they went on hap-hazard. If they knew there
was corn, they were not sure they would get it. But when you and I go
to Christ, we are invited guests. Suppose now you should have it in
your heart to invite some of the most ragged people of London to your
house; you give to each of them an invitation, and they come to the
door, perhaps they are half ashamed to come in, and want to steal round
the back way; but if they should meet you, they are not at all abashed,
they say, "Sir, I was not afraid to come, because you sent me an
invitation. If it had not been for that, although I might have known
your generosity, although I might have known you could afford to help
me, I should not have dared to come if you had not sent me an
invitation." Now Joseph sent no invitation to his brethren; but Jesus
has sent an invitation to you. To each of you who are perishing sinners
he has said, "Whosoever will, let him come and take of the water of
life freely." He has said himself, "Him that cometh unto me I will in
no wise cast out." He has sent his messengers and bidden them cry, "Ho,
every one that thirsteth, come ye to the waters, and he that hath no
money; come ye, buy, and eat, yea, come, buy wine and milk without
money and without price." Now, sinner, you need never be afraid to go
where you are invited. Christ Jesus invites; he invites the hungry, he
invites the weary. Such are you–both hungry and weary. He invites the
heavy laden–such are you. Come and welcome, then. You need not go on
hap-hazard, you have the invitation and the promise. Wherefore look ye
then at one another? Arise and come to Christ; arise and come to his
cross. May he now prove in you his power to save!

But one other remark, and I will have done with this second point. The
sons of Jacob were in one respect better off than you are apparently,
for they had money with which to buy. Jacob was not a poor man in
respect of wealth, although he had now become exceedingly poor from
lack of bread. His sons had money to take with them. Glittering bars of
gold they thought must surely attract the notice of the ruler of Egypt.
You have no money, nothing to bring to Christ, nothing to offer him.
You offered him something once, but he rejected all you offered him as
being spurious coin, imitations, counterfeits, and good for nothing.
And now utterly stripped, hopeless, penniless, you say you are afraid
to go to Christ because you have nothing of your own. Let me assure you
that you are never in so fit a condition to go to Christ as when you
have nowhere else to go to, and have nothing of your own. But you
reply, "I should like at least to feel my need more." That would be
something of your own–you must go to Christ with nothing. "But I wish
I could believe more." That would be something of your own. You want to
get your own faith to bring to Christ. No, you must go to Christ just
as you are. "But sir, I must reform myself before I can believe that
Christ will have mercy upon me." Your fancied reformation would unfit
you for grace, rather than prepare you for it. Reformation before grace
is frequently a step backward instead of forward. That reformation may
confirm you in self-righteousness, but it cannot bring you to Christ.
Go as you are. At a hospital, the best recommendation is sickness. He
that is a little sick needs some help to get him there, but let me be
run over in the street, and be near to die, and I need nothing to
recommend me to the hospital–open flies the door, and I am taken in
directly. So a condition of your lost and ruined state is the only
recommendation you need in going to Christ. Just now a lot of people
want to bestow their charity, and they do not know how to get at the
lowest class of the poor; they want to lay hold of those whose beds are
made of straw; they desire to gain knowledge of those low
lodging-places of the very poor, which are worse than the places that
beasts inhabit. These are the men they want to find; and the greater
the poverty the more recommendation. So in your case. Your woes plead
with God. Your wants, your misery, your helplessness, your ill-deserts,
these are the orators that move the heart of God towards you, but
nothing else. Come just as you are, with nothing in your hand, to Jesus
Christ, who is Lord over the land of mercy, and will not send you empty
away.

III. Thus I have noticed the good news as well as the pitiful plight. I
come now to the third part, which is GOOD ADVICE. Jacob asks, "Why do
ye look one upon another? And he said, Behold, I have heard that there
is corn in Egypt: get you down thither, and buy for us from thence;
that we may live, and not die." This is very practical advice. I wish
people would act the same with religion as they do in temporal affairs.
Jacob's sons did not say, "Well, that is very good news; I believe it,"
and then sit still and die. No, they went straightway to the place of
which the good news told them corn was to be had. So should it be in
matters of religion. We should not be content merely to hear the
tidings, but we should never be satisfied until by divine grace we have
availed ourselves of them' and have found mercy in Christ. Some
ministers do in fact tell poor awakened sinners to be inactive; they
say to them something like this–"You must wait, you must wait till
Christ comes to you." They will even dissuade the woman who had an
issue of blood, from pushing through the crowd to lay hold upon the hem
of the Redeemer's garment. They would bid the man who is crying aloud
by the wayside to hold his tongue; to sit still quietly till Christ
should turn and look upon him. They cannot endure that Christ Jesus
should invite men to his feast, much less that the servants of the Lord
should endeavor to compel them to come in. They excuse the sinner and
even dare to teach that the rejection of Christ by the sinner, is no
sin at all. Now, as in the sight of God, I do fear such men are guilty
of the blood of souls. I would not stand in the position of a man who
talks like that for all the stars thrice reckoned up in gold. I cannot
understand that; I cannot understand that when my Master said, "Labour
not for the meat which perisheth, but for that meat which endureth unto
everlasting life, which the Son of man shall give unto you: for him
hath God the Father sealed," that I am to tell a sinner to sit still.
When the angel said, "Escape for thy life; look not behind thee; stay
not in all the plain; but flee to the mountain, lest thou be consumed,"
am I to go to Sodom, and say to Lot, "Stop here till the Lord brings
you out?" Why, we know, of a surety, that salvation is the Lord's work,
and the Lord's work alone; but we equally know of a surety, that when
the Lord works, he sets us to work. When he works in our soul, the Lord
does not believe; he has nothing to believe, he makes us believe. When
the Lord works repentance, he does not repent what has he to repent of?
He makes us repent. The Lord brought Lot out of Sodom, but did not Lot
use his own legs to run to the mountain? And so it must be with us.
Christ does all, but he makes us the instruments. He tells us to
stretch out our own withered hand, and yet we do not stretch forth that
withered hand of ourselves. He tells us to do it, and we do it through
his strength. Tell a sinner to sit still! What does hell desire more
than that? Tell a sinner to wait; would not Satan approve of such a
ministry? And does he not approve of it? Ah, my brethren, he that loves
his Master, he that loves the gospel, he that loves men's souls cannot
preach such untruthful and unchristian doctrine. He feels that the
humanity within him is much more the grace within him, revolts against
a thing so barbarous and so inhuman as that. No, when we preach to the
sinner, we must say to him, "Thou knowest thy need, thou feelest that
thou canst not be saved except through mercy in Christ. Look to him,
believe on him, seek him, and thou shalt find him."

But I have heard it said, that if a sinner seeks Christ without Christ
seeking him he will perish. Now what an absurd thing for anybody to
say. Because, did a sinner, or could a sinner ever seek Christ without
Christ seeking him. I never like to suppose an impossibility, and then
draw an inference from it. "Suppose," said one, I know of–"a sinner
should come to Christ without Christ coming to him, he would be lost."
Well, that is very clear, only it is supposing a thing that cannot
happen; and what is the good of that? Sometimes people have put to me
this question–"Suppose a child of God should live in sin, and die in
sin, would he be saved?" The thing is impossible. If you suppose
yourself into a difficulty, you must suppose yourself out of it. It is
like the old supposition, "Suppose the moon were cream cheese, what
would become of us on a dark night?" So, suppose a sinner should come
to Christ without Christ coming to him, what could be the result? It is
supposing an impossibility, and then drawing an absurdity from it.
Christ said, "No man can come unto me, except the Father which hath
sent me draw him." If a sinner comes, he is drawn, or he would not have
come. It is mine, therefore, to exhort the sinner to come to Christ; it
is the Holy Spirit's work to enforce the exhortation, and draw the
sinner to Christ.

Lastly, let me put this question, "Why do ye look one upon another?"
Why do ye sit still? Fly to Christ, and find mercy. Oh, says one, "I
cannot get what I expect to have." But what do you expect? I believe
some of our hearers expect to feel an electric shock, or something of
that kind, before they are saved. The gospel says simply, "Believer."
That they will not understand. They think there is to be something so
mysterious about it. They can't make out what it is; but they are going
to wait for it and then believe. Well, you will wait till doomsday; for
if you do not believe this simple gospel, "Believe on the Lord Jesus
Christ," God will not work signs and wonders to please your foolish
desires. Your position is this–you are a sinner, lost, ruined; you
cannot help yourself. Scripture says, "Jesus Christ came into the world
to save sinners." Your immediate business, your instantaneous duty is
to cast yourself on that simple promise, and believe on the Lord Jesus
Christ, that as he came into the world to save sinners, he has
therefore come to save you. What you have to do with, is that simple
command–"Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt he saved."
Now take the sons of Jacob as your example. No sooner had their father
told them what they had to do than the first thing they did was, they
went and fetched their empty sacks. Now do the same. "What is the good
of them?" you say; "there is no corn in them." No I know there is not,
still you must take your empty sacks and have them filled. Bring out
your sins; bring out all the aggravation of your sins; cast them all at
the feet of Christ, and make your confession. There is no salvation in
confession, but still you cannot have salvation without it. You must
make a full and free confession of your sins. "What, to you, sir?" I am
extremely obliged to you. I would not hear your sins on any account. No
sum of money would be sufficient compensation for the impurity that
must accrue to any man who shall hear another's sins. I would not tell
you mine; much less hear your's. No, make your confessions to God. Go
to your closet; shut to your door; then pull out your empty seeks–that
is, make a full confession of your sins; tell the Lord that you are a
wretch undone without his sovereign grace. When you have done that, you
say, what next? Then cast away all hope you ever had or have, put away
all trust in your good works and everything else; and what next? Cast
yourself simply on this great truth, that Jesus Christ came to save
sinners, and you shall rise from your knees a happier man. Or if tlmt
is not the case, try it again, and again, and again, and it shall not
fail you. Prayer and faith were never lost. He who confessed his sins
and sought the Saviour never roughs in vain. When I was first convinced
of sin, yet a lad, I did go to God and I cried for mercy with all my
might, but I did not find it. I do not think I knew what the gospel
was. For three year's I persevered in that; and many a day, in every
room of the house in which I lived, as each room became unoccupied,
upon an occasion, have I spent hours in prayer, the tears rolling down
my cheeks, and straining myself in an agony of desire to find Christ
and find salvation. But it never came. It was not until I heard that
simple doctrine, "Look unto me and be ye saved." I then found that my
prayers were a kind of righteousness of my own that I was relying on
them, and consequent was on the wrong road. Then did the Holy Spirit
enable me to look to Christ hanging on the cross. I did not give up my
prayers, but I did put the Lord Jesus, the object of my faith, far
above all prayers, and then when I had looked to him hanging, dying,
bleeding, my soul rejoiced, and I fell upon my knees no more to cry
with agony, but to exclaim with delight, "Lord, I believe; help thou
mine unbelief." But if in that day, instead of simply looking to
Christ, I had said, "No, Lord, I will not wash in Jordan and be clean.
I will wait till Elijah comes out and strikes the leper with his hand;
I will not look to the brazen serpent. That is legal preaching, that is
Arminian doctrine. I will wait till the serpent knocks right against my
eyes," it would have never come. But having looked simply to Christ, I
cast all my other trust away; and how my soul rejoices in the liberty
wherewith Christ makes his people free. So shall it be with you. The
gospel is this day freely preached to you. Jesus Christ, the Son of
God, came down from heaven, was born of the Virgin Mary, suffered under
Pontius Pilate; and was crucified for sin. Turn now your eyes to yonder
cross. Behold a God expiring. Behold the Infinite hanging on the tree
in pangs. Those sufferings must save you; will you rely upon them?
Without any other trust, shall the cross be the unbuttressed pillar of
your hope? If so, you are saved. The moment you believe in Jesus, the
Redeemer, you are saved, your sins are forgiven; God has accepted you
as his child; you are in a state of grace; you are passed from death
unto life. Not only are you not condemned but you never shall be. There
is for you a crown, a harp, a mansion, in the realms of the glorified.
Oh that God may help you now to go down into Egypt for heavenly corn,
and may you return with your sacks full to the brim.

In conclusion, I make this last remark.–Did you notice the argument
Jacob used why the sons should go to Egypt? It was this–"That we may
live, and not die." Sinner, this is my argument with thee this morning.
My dear hearers, the gospel of Christ is a matter of life and death
with you. It is not a matter of little importance, but of all
importance. There is an alternative before you; you will either be
eternally damned, or everlastingly saved. Despise Christ, and neglect
his great salvation, and you will be lost, as sure as you live. Believe
in Christ; put your trust alone in him, and everlasting life is yours.
What argument can be more potent than this to men that love themselves?
Are you prepared for everlasting burnings? Friend, art thou ready to
make thy bed in hell, and to be lost? If so, reject Christ. But if thou
desirest to be blessed for ever, to be accepted of God in the
tremendous day of judgment, and to be crowned by him in the day of the
reward, I beseech thee, hear again the gospel, and obey it. "He that
believeth in the Lord Jesus Christ and is baptized, shall be saved, but
he that believeth not shall be damned." For this is the gospel; it is
yet again preached to you, and this is its solitary mandate–"Believe
in the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved." O Lord, help us now
to believe, if we have not believed before, for Jesus' sake!

<HR

Just published, No. 7 of the New Park street Tracts, entitled, "SO MANY
CALLS," being the Anecdote to referred to in No. 227 of the "New Park
Street Pulpit." Price Is 4d. per 100.

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