Distinguishing Grace
A Sermon
(No. 262)
Delivered on Sabbath Evening, February 6th, 1859, by the
REV. C.H. SPURGEON
at the Music Hall, Royal Surrey Gardens.
"For who maketh thee to differ from another?"–1 Corinthians 4:7.
OR, AS IT IS in the Greek: "For who distinguisheth thee?" "Who giveth
thee distinguishing and discriminating mercy?" "Who maketh thee to
differ from another?" Pride is the inherent sin of man, and yet it is
of all sins the most foolish. A thousand arguments might be used to
show its absurdity; but none of these would be sufficient to quench its
vitality. Alive it is in the heart, and there it will be, till we die
to this world and rise again without spot or blemish. Yet many are the
arrows which may be shot at the heart of our boasting. Take for
instance the argument of creation; how strongly that thrusts at our
pride. There is a vessel upon the potter's wheel, would it not be
preposterous for that clay which the potter fashioneth to boast itself
and say, "How well am I fashioned! how beautifully am I proportioned; I
deserve much praise!" Why, O lump of clay, whateverthou art, the potter
made thee; however elegant thy proportions, however matchless thy
symmetry, the glory is due to him that made thee, not to thyself; thou
art but the work of his hands. And so let us speak unto ourselves. We
are the thing formed; shall we say of ourselves that we deserve honor
because God hath formed us excellently and wondrously? No, the fact of
our creation should extinguish the sparks of our pride. What are we,
after all, but as grasshoppers in his sight, as drops of the bucket, as
lumps of animated dust; we are but the infants of a day when we are
most old; we are but the insects of an hour when we are most strong; we
are but the wild ass's colt when we are most wise, we are but as folly
and vanity when we are most excellent–let that tend to humble us. But
surely if these prevail not to clip the pinions of our high soaring
pride, the Christian man may at least bind its wings with arguments
derived from the distinguishing love and peculiar mercies of God. "Who
maketh thee to differ from another?"–This question should be like a
dagger put to the throat of our boasting;–"and what trust thou that
thou didst not receive;"–it would be like a sword thrust through the
heart of our self-exaltation and pride.
We shall now for a moment or two endeavor to put down our pride by
observing wherein God hath distinguished us and made us to differ, and
then by noticing that all this cometh of him, and should be a reason
for humiliation, and not for boasting.
1. Many of us differ from others in God's providential dealings towards
us. Let us think a moment how many there are of God's precious and
dearly beloved children, who at this moment are in the depths of
poverty. They are not walking about in sheepskins and goatskins,
persecuted, afflicted, and tormented; but still they are hungry, and no
man gives them to eat; they are thirsty, and no man furnishes them with
drink, their fires are wasted in poverty and their years in distress.
Some there are of God's children who were once in affluence but have
been suddenly plunged into the lowest depths of penury; they knew what
it was to be respected among the sons of men, but now they are among
the dogs of the flock, and no man careth for them. There are some of us
who are here present who have all that heart can wish: God hath given
us food and raiment, the lines have fallen unto us in pleasant places,
and we have a goodly heritage. Let us gratefully ask–"Who maketh us to
differ? "Let us recollect that all we have is the gift of his
providence. Not to you, O my hands, do I sacrifice because ye have
toiled for bread; not to you, O ye brains, will I offer incense,
because ye have thought for my daily livelihood; not to you, O my lips,
will I offer my adulation, because ye have been the means of furnishing
me with words. No; unto God, who giveth power to get, and to have, and
to enjoy; unto him be all the praise for what he hath done for us.
Never let our songs cease, for his goodness is an ever flowing stream.
Perhaps none of us can ever know, until the great day shall reveal it,
how much some of God's servants are tried. To this day they have
"perils by land, and perils by sea, and perils by false brethren;" to
this hour they are pinched by want, they are deserted by friends, they
know what despondency means, and all the ill which dejection and
disappointment can bring to them; they have dived into the lowest
depths of the sea of trouble, and have walked for many a league over
the hot sand of the desert of affliction. And if God hath delivered us
from these things, and hath made our path more pleasant, and hath led
us beside the still waters, and into the green pastures,–if he hath
distinguished us by the common gifts of his providence above many
others of his children who are far better and far more holy than we,
what shall we say? It is owing only to his grace towards us, and we
will not exalt ourselves above our fellows, we will not be high-minded,
but condescend to men of low estate; we will not lift our necks with
the proud, but we will bow down our brows with the humble; every man
shall be called our brother, not merely those who are arrayed in goodly
raiment, but those who are clothed in the habiliments of toil, they
shall be confessed to be our kindred, sprung from the same stock; for
what have we that we have not received, and what maketh us to differ
from another? I wish that some of the stiff-necked gentry of our
churches would at times recollect this. Their condition is smooth as
oil, and as soft as young down, but their hearts are as high as
poplars, and their manners as stiff as hedge-stakes. There have been
many who would do well if they would learn that they have nothing
beyond what God has given them. And the more God has given them, the
more they are in debt. Why should a man boast because he is deeper in
debt than another? Do the debtors in the Queen's Bench say to one
another, "You are only a hundred pounds in debt, and I a thousand,
therefore I am a greater gentleman than you?" I think not. But,
nevertheless, if they did so, they would be as wise as men who boast
beyond their fellow-creatures because they happen to have more of rank,
wealth, honor, and position, in this world. "Who maketh thee to differ
from another? and what hast thou that thou didst not receive?"
But the best way for you to feel this part of the discourse is, to go
to-morrow into the hospital, and walk along the wards, and see how poor
men's bodies suffer, and then go into the operating-room and see what
flesh and blood may have to endure. Then when you have done, go round
the neighborhood to see the sick who have lain for ten, or twelve, or
fifteen years upon the same bed, and after that go and visit some of
God's poverty-stricken children who just exist in this world, and it is
but a bare existence, maintained on bread and butter and a little tea,
and but too little of even such things as those. Go and see their poor,
miserable, unfurnished rooms, their cellars and their attics, and that
will be a better sermon to you than anything I can utter. You will come
home and say, "Oh my God, I bless thee for thy kindness towards me.
These temporal mercies which I once thought so little of, I must
heartily blest thee for. I must thank thee for what thou hast given to
me, and I will ascribe it all to thy love, for thou makest me to
differ. I have nothing that I have not received."
2. But this is not the most important point for us to observe. We are
now going to look at, not matters of providence, but the things of
God's grace. Here it is that we who are now assembled as a church have
most reason to bless God, and to say, "Who maketh us to differ from
others?" Take, my dear friends, in your mind's eye the cases of the
careless, the hardened, and the thoughtless, of even this present
congregation. Side-by-side with you, my brother, there may sit a man, a
woman, who is dead in trespasses and sins. To such the music of the
gospel is like singing to a dead ear, and the dropping of the word is
as dew upon a rock. There are many in this congregation whose position
in society, and whose moral character are extremely excellent, and yet
before God their state is awful. They attend the house of God as
regularly as we do. They sing as we sing, sit as we sit, and come and
go as we do, and yet are they without God and without hope in the
world–strangers from the commonwealth of Israel, and aliens from the
covenant of promise. Yet what maketh us to differ? Why is it that I
this day am not sitting down a callous hearer, hardened under the
gospel? Why am I not at this very hour hearing the Word with my outward
ear but rejecting it in my inward heart? Why is it that I have not been
suffered to reject the invitation of Christ to despise his grace–to go
on, Sunday after Sunday, hearing the Word and yet being like the deaf
adder to it. Oh, have I made myself to differ? God forbid that such a
proud, blaspheming thought should defile our hearts. No, beloved;
"Twas the same love which spread the feast,
That sweetly forced us in;
Else we had still refused to taste,
And perished in our sin."
The only reason, my brother, why thou art at this time an heir of God,
a joint-heir with Christ, a partaker of sweet fellowship with Jesus, an
inheritor of the kingdom of heaven, is because HE hath made thee to
differ. Thou wast an heir of wrath, even as others, born in sin and
shapen in iniquity. Therefore must thou give all the glory to his holy
name, and cry–"Not unto us, not unto us, but unto thy name be all the
praise." Even this one thought when fully masticated and digested might
feed up our gratitude and make us humbly bow before the footstool of
God's throne with joyful thanksgiving.
3. Will you please, however, to think of other cases? Who maketh thee
to differ from others of this assembly who are more hardened than those
to whom we have alluded? There are some men and women of whose
salvation, if it were to be wrought by man, we must indeed utterly
despair; for their hearts are harder than the most stubborn steel. The
hammer of the Word makes no impression on such souls. The thunders of
the law roll over their heads, but they can sleep in the midst of the
tumult–the lightnings of Sinai flash against their hearts, but even
those mighty flames seem as if they recoiled from the attack, Do you
not know such? they are your own children, your husband, your wife,
some of your own family, and as you look upon them, though you have
longed, prayed, and wept, and sighed for their souls, you are compelled
to say in your heart, "I half fear that I shall never see them
converted." You say with sorrow, "Oh, if they are saved it will be a
wonder of divine grace indeed. Surely they will never yield their souls
to God. They seem as callous as if their conscience were seared with a
hot iron; they appear to have the stamp of condemnation upon their
brow, as if they were marked and sealed, and had the earnest of the pit
upon their hearts before they came there. Ay, but stop–"Who maketh
thee to differ?" Why am I not at this day among the most hardened of
men? How is it that my heart is melted so that I can weep at the
recollection of the Redeemer's suffering? Why is it that my conscience
is tender, and that I am led to self-examination by a searching sermon?
How is it that I know how to pray and to groan before God on account of
sin? What has brought the water from these eyes, but the selfsame power
which brought the water from the rock? And whathath put life into my
heart but the self-same Omnipotence which scattered manna in a hungry
desert? Our hearts had still been like the wild beasts of the forest,
if it had not been for Divine grace. Oh! I beseech you, my dear friend,
every time you see a hardened sinner, just say within yourself,"There
is the picture of what I should have been, what I must have been, if
all-subduing, all-conquering love had not melted and sanctified my
heart." Take these two cases then, and you have, heaven knows, reason
enough to sing to the praise of sovereign grace.
4. But now another, the lowest class of sinners do not mingle with our
congregations, but are to be seen in our back streets and lanes, and
sometimes in our highways. How frightful is the sin of drunkenness,
which degrades a man into a beast, which sinks him lower than the
brutes themselves! How shameful is the iniquity of blasphemy, which
without any object or any chance of profit brings a curse upon its own
head! How awful are the ways of the lascivious wretch who ruins both
body and soul at once, and not content with his own destruction ruins
others with him. Cases that come under our observation in the daily
newspapers, and that assail us in our daily observation and hearing are
too vile to be told. How often is our blood chilled with the sound of
an imprecation, and how frequently our heart is made to palpitate with
the daring impieties of the blasphemous. Now let us stop; "Who maketh
thee to differ?" Let us recollect that if we live very near to Christ,
we should have lived quite as near to hell if it had not been for
saving grace. Some of you here present are special witnesses of this
grace, for you have yourself experienced redemption from these
iniquities. Look back some four years with some of you and recollect
how different were your surroundings then to what they are now. Mayhap
four years ago you were in the tap-room singing the song of the
drunkard as readily as any; but a little while ago you cursed that
Saviour whom now you love. Only a few months have flitted over your
head since you ran with the multitude to do evil; but now,"Who maketh
thee to differ?" "Who hath brought this miracle of grace. Who has led
you to the stool of the penitent and the table of communion, who hath
done it? Beloved, you are not slow to answer, for the verdict of your
heart is undivided; you do not give the glory in part to man and in
part to God. No, you cry loudly in your hearts, "Blessed be the God and
Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, which according to his abundant mercy
hath begotten us again unto a lively hope by the resurrection of Jesus
Christ from the dead." Ye are washed, ye are sanctified, and ye have
been washed in the Redeemer's blood, and sanctified with the Spirit. Ye
have been made to differ, and ye will confess it; ye have been made to
differ by distinguishing grace, and distinguishing grace alone. And
what upholds the rest of us from being what these my reclaimed brethren
once were, and what they will become again unless saving grace keeps
them? What preserves the preacher this day from being a lecturer to
Infidels, dishonoring the grace of God which now he glories to magnify?
What prevents the deacon from being an assistant in the courts of
Satan? What forbids those who open the doors at the house of our God,
and who serve him on the Sabbath-day, from being door-keepers in the
tents of the sons of Belial? Why nothing; they had been there unless
grace had prevented them. Grace hath done it, and nothing else. When we
pass a prostitute in the street, we say, "O poor creature! I can pity
you. I have not a harsh word for you, for I had been as you are had not
God preserved me." And when you see the reeling drunkard, be not too
hasty to condemn, recollect you had been as a beast before God unless
the Lord had kept you, and when ye hear the oath and shudder at it,
imagine not that you are superior in yourself to the man who curses
God, for perhaps you once cursed him too; and certainly you would have
done had not the Holy Spirit sanctified you and implanted in you a
hatred of that which the wicked so greedily follow. Have you seen a man
hanged for murder? Have you seen another transported for the most
infamous of crimes? If you hear of one who sins against society so
foully that mankind excommunicate him, pause, and say, "Oh! but I
should have gone as low as that, I should have been as black as he,
unless restraining grace had kept me back in my unregeneracy, and
unless constraining grace had pushed me forward in the heavenly race,
ever since I have known the will of Jesus."
5. And now we will pause again, and think over another evil which
stares us in the face in connection with every church. There are most
melancholy cases of backsliding in so large a church as this. We are
compelled often to discover the character of men and women who once
seemed fair for heaven, but who manifested that they never had the root
of the matter in them. Oh! well did the poet say,–
"When any turn from Zion's way,
Alas! what numbers do!"
No trial is greater to the true minister than the apostacy of his
flock. All the rage of men is quite unable to bring tears to our eyes,
but this has done it. Alas! when those whom I have loved have turned
aside from the way of God, when those who have sat with us at the same
table, and have joined with us in church communion, have gone out from
us, and have brought dishonor upon the Church, and upon the name of
Christ, there has been woe in my inmost spirit. Sometimes there are
cases as glaring as they are painful, and as vile as they are grievous.
Some of those, who were once in the midst of God's sanctuary, have
become drunkards and whoremongers–and God in heaven only knows what.
They have sinned against everything that is seemly, as well as
everything that is holy. At the recollection of these our eyes are
filled with tears. "Oh that our head were waters, and our eyes
fountains of tears, that we might weep day and night for the slain of
the daughter of our people." No mischief-makers are so powerful as
deserters. None cause so much agony as those who have nestled beneath
our wings, and then have flown away to feed with carrion vultures on
the putrid carcases of lust and sin.
But now let us pause. How is it that the minister has not forsaken his
profession, and gone back like a dog to his vomit, and like the sow
that was washed to her wallowing in the mire? How is it that the
deacons of this church have not turned aside unto crooked ways, and
denied the faith, and become worse than infidels? How is it that so
many members of this church have been kept so that the wicked one
toucheth them not? O beloved! I can say for myself, I am a continual
miracle of divine grace. If thou leave me, Lord, for a moment, I am
utterly undone.
"Leave, O leave me not alone!
Still support and comfort me"
Let Abraham be deserted by his God, he equivocates and denies his wife.
Let Noah be deserted, he becomes a drunkard, and is naked to his shame.
Let Lot be left awhile, and, filled with wine, he revels in incestuous
embraces, and the fruit of his body becomes a testimony to his
disgrace. Nay, let David, the man after God's own heart, be left, and
Uriah's wife shall soon show the world that the man after God's own
heart hath still an evil heart of unbelief in departing from the living
God. Oh! well doth the poet put it–
"Methinks I hear the Saviour say,
Wilt thou forsake me too?"
And now let our conscience answer:–
"Ah, Lord! with such a heart as mine,
Unless thou hold me fast,
I feel I must, I shall decline
And prove like them at last."
Oh be not rashly self-confident, Christian man. Be as confident as you
can in your God, but be distrustful of yourself. Ye may yet become all
that is vile and vicious, unless sovereign grace prevent and keep you
to the end. But remember if you have been preserved, the crown of your
keeping belongs to the Shepherd of lsrael, and ye know who that is. For
he hath said "I the Lord do keep it. I will water it every moment: lest
any hurt it, I will keep it night and day." "Ye know who is able to
keep you from falling, and to present you faultless before his presence
with exceeding great joy." Then give all glory to the King immortal,
invisible, the only wise God your Saviour, who has kept you thus.
6. Allow me one more contrast; once again let your gratitude go with me
since you and I have joined the church how many who were once our
companions have been damned whilst we have been saved, how many who
were no worse than we were by nature have sunk into the lowest pit of
hell. Conceive their unutterable torments; imagine their inconceivable
woes; depict before the eye of your fancy their indescribable agonies.
Descend in spirit for a moment to the gates of fire; enter into the
abode of despair where justice reigns supreme on her iron throne; pass
by the dreary cell of those who are everlastingly damned. Behold the
twisting of that worm that never dies, and the bleeding hearts that are
crushed within its coils. Look ye at that flame unquenchable and behold
the souls that are sweltering there in torments to us unknown, and look
if ye can look, but ye cannot look, for your eyes would be stricken
with blindness if ye could see their torments. Your hair should be
blanched withbut a moment of that horrible exhibition. Ah! while you
stand then and think on that region of death, despair, and damnation,
recollect that you would have been there if it had not been for
sovereign grace. You have a harp prepared for you in heaven, a crown
laid up for you when you have finished your course. You have a mansion,
a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. Oh, why is it you
are not already a fiend; who is it that has given you a good hope
through grace that you shall never come into that place of torment. Oh!
tell it the wide world over. Tell it in time and in eternity, free
grace hath done it. Free grace hath done it from the first to the last.
I was a brand in the fire, but he plucked me from the burning, quenched
me in his blood, and now he declares I shall be with him for ever in
heaven. But oh! pause brethren and think that some of your former
pot-companions, some of the companions of your revere and debaucheries
are now in hell, and you are not there, and by the grace of God never
will be there. Oh! why this, why this? Blessed be the Lord my God from
this time forth and for ever. Praise ye his name. Grace has done it.
Grace has done it all.
No, I never shall wear the chain, I ne'er shall be stretched upon that
rack, nor feel that fire–
"But I shall see his face,
And never, never sin,
But from the rivers of his grace
Drink endless pleasures in."
But I most confidently proclaim that the reason why I shall escape and
shall be glorified, is not to be found in me, but in him. He hath made
me to differ. I have nothing but what I have received.
Now what shall we say to these things. If God has made you to differ,
the first prayer we should now utter should be, "Lord, humble us. Take
away pride out of us. O God forgive us, that such beasts as we are
should ever be proud." We might have been with our father the devil at
this very hour, if it had not been for Divine love. And if we are now
in the house of our Father which is in heaven shall we be proud? Avaunt
thou monster! Go and dwell with the Pharisee. Pride agreeth well enough
with the man who has in his own esteem been always virtuous. Go thou
away and live with him who has had good works from the first day until
now; but away from me.
"I the chief of sinners am,"
and saved by sovereign grace shall I be proud. It is not fit that thou
shouldest live in my heart, thou monster! Begone! Begonel Find a fitter
habitation than my soul. Should I be proud after such mercy, after such
ill-deserving, but such God-receiving. Begone, pride! Begone!
Another lesson: if God alone hath made us to differ, why may he not
make others to differ too? "After the Lord saved me," said one, "I
never despaired of anybody;" and let us each say so too. If you were
brought in why not another? Will you ever give up praying for anybody
now that you are saved? I once heard one say concerning his child, "I
think I must give her up, I can scarcely think she ever will be
converted." Why you have been pardoned yourself; and if the Lord can do
that, he can do anything. I am sure if the Lord has brought me to his
feet there does not remain in the world a case that can ever equal
mine; if he has brought me to receive his free grace, his sovereign
love, his precious blood, and hath made me to love him, then there can
be nothing too hard for him. O Lord, if thou hast melted this metal
heart, and dissolved this stony soul, thou canst break anything. If
thou hast broken the northern iron and the steel, then what remains
beyond thy power? Go back then, Christian, armed with this fact, that
God who hath made thee to differ can make anybody to differ. There can
be no case beyond his strength; if he brought you in he can bring all
in. If he doth but stretch out his hand, no man need despair.
Therefore, "In the morning sow thy seed, and in the evening withhold
not thine hand: for thou knowest not whither shall prosper, either this
or that, or whether they both shall be alike good."
Again, who hath made me to differ? Hath my Lord done it?–then let me
serve him more than others. There was a question asked once by our
Saviour, "What do ye more than others?" That question might well be put
to each child of God here present. My dear friends, we must not be
content with doing as much as other people do; in fact, we must never
be contented with our doings at all, but always be trying to do more
for him who hath done so much for us. Should I give my body to be
burned, my flesh piecemeal to the knife, my nerves to the rack, and my
heart to the spear, yet should I not give him all that he deserveth.
No, if I should pass through the horrors of martyrdom, it were but a
poor tribute to love so amazing, so divine. What are you doing my
friends, what are you doing my brothers and sisters for Christ? But I
will not name you, I censure myself if I censure you; but I will
confess my own iniquities and leave you to confess yours. I do try to
serve my Master, but I do not serve him as I would. Each act that I
perform is marred, either by want of prayer for a blessing upon it, by
want of faith in my Lord, or by pride in looking back upon it. I find
too continually a tendency to serve myself instead of serving Christ, a
constant longing rather to get through the work than to do it
accceptably. And oh! when I think upon all, I must say I am an
unprofitable servant. Have mercy O gracious Lord on my good works as
well as on my bad ones, for my good works are but bad in the best and
cannot be acceptable in themselves. I am certain some of you have a
little more need to say that than I have. Let us cease boasting any
more. I know there are some here who are not serving Christ; some
members in this church are doing nothing. You have not thought of doing
anything for Christ, have you? You pay your regular subscriptions, you
do what you are told to do, but do you give to Christ secretly? do you
devote your substance unto him when no one knows it? do you spend your
time for him? have you chosen a sphere, and have you said, "This is my
work, and by the grace of God I will do it." Oh! ye cannot tell how
much there is to do, and how few, there are to do it. I would I could
have a church all alive, all active, so that there never could be a
want but those who have would be ready to supply, and never a work but
those who are qualified would be ready to fulfll. Never fear but we
should find too many rather than too few to aid its accomplishment. Oh
that we had the good spirit of the ancient church, the spirit to
propagate our Christianity everywhere. There needs to be in many of the
suburbs of London fresh gospel churches springing up. I can point to
many places in my own vicinity, seven or eight, nine or ten in a row,
where there is a chapel needed. In each place there are believers
living, who do not think about uniting to establish a fresh cause; but
as long as their peculiar wants are satisfied, by journeying a long way
off perhaps, they forget the hundreds and thousands who are pressing
around them. Oh! there is much to be done, and very little time to do
it in. A very few weeks, and those of us who have been loved more than
others, those of us who have thought we could wash Christ's feet with
our tears, and wipe them with the hair of our heads, will hare no more
opportunities for spreading the name and fame of our glorious Redeemer.
Let us give of our substance to his cause, give of our time to his
service and have our hearts in his love, and so shall we be blessed,
for in returning Christ's love we shall feel that his love is shed
abroad more fully in our hearts and more fully in our understandings.
May the Holy Spirit add his blessing upon these broken words–they have
been broken because they have broken my heart, and therefore I could
not help their coming out in a broken way. God accept them; and dear
brothers and sisters, may he bless them to you by helping you to love
him more, who is my hope, my joy, my consolation, and my all.