God, the All-Seeing One
A Sermon
(No. 177)
Delivered on Sabbath Morning, February 14, 1858, by the
REV. C.H. SPURGEON
at the Music Hall, Royal Surrey Gardens.
"Hell and destruction are before the Lord: how much more then the
hearts of the children of men?"–Proverbs 15:11.
YOU HAVE OFTEN smiled at the ignorance of heathens who bow themselves
before gods of wood and stone. You have quoted the words of Scripture,
and you have said, "Eyes have they but they see not; ears have they,
but they hear not." You have therefore argued that they could not be
gods at all, because they could neither see nor hear, and you have
smiled contemptuously at the men who could so debase their
understandings as to make such things objects of adoration. May I ask
you one question–but one? Your God can both see and hear: would your
conduct be in any respect different, if you had a god such as those
that the heathen worship? Suppose for one minute, that Jehovah, who is
nominally adored in this land, could be (though it is almost blasphemy
to suppose it) smitten with such a blindness, that he could not see the
works and know the thoughts of man: would you then become more careless
concerning him than you are now? I trow not. In nine cases out of ten,
and perhaps in a far larger and sadder proportion, the doctrine of
Divine Omniscience, although it is received and believed, has no
practical effect upon our lives at all. The mass of mankind forget God:
whole nations who know his existence and believe that he beholds them,
live as if they had no God at all. Merchants, farmers, men in their
shops, and in their fields, husbands in their families, and wives in
the midst of their households, live as if there were no God; no eye
inspecting them; no ear listening to the voice of their lips, and no
eternal mind always treasuring up the recollection of their acts. Ah!
we are practical Atheists, the mass of us; yea, all but those that have
been born again, and have passed from death unto life, be their creeds
what they may, are Atheists, after all, in life; for if there were no
God, and no hereafter, multitudes of men would never be affected by the
change; they would live the same as they do now–their lives being so
full of disregard of God and his ways, that the absence of a God could
not affect them in any great degree. Permit me, then, this morning, as
God shall help me, to stir up your hearts; and may God grant that
something I may say, may drive some of your practical Atheism out of
you. I would endeavor to set before you, God, the all-seeing one, and
press upon your solemn consideration the tremendous fact, that in all
our acts, in all our ways, and in all our thoughts, we are continually
under his observing eye.
We have in our text, first of all, a great fact declared,–"Hell and
destruction are before the Lord ;" we have, secondly, a great fact
inferred,–"How much more then the hearts of the children of men?"
I. We will begin with THE GREAT FACT WHICH IS DECLARED–a fact which
furnishes us with premises from which we deduce the practical
conclusion of the second sentence–"How much more then the hearts of
the children of men?" The best interpretation that you can give of
those two words, "hell" and "destruction," is, I think, comprehended in
a sentence something like this,–"Death and hell are before the Lord."
The separate state of departed spirits, and destruction, Abaddon, as
the Hebrew has it, the place of torment, are both of them, although
solemnly mysterious to us, manifest enough to God.
1. First, then, the word here translated "hell," might just as well be
translated "death," or the state of departed spirits. Now, death, with
all its solemn consequences, is visible before the Lord. Between us and
the hereafter of departed spirits a great black cloud is hanging. Here
and there, the Holy Spirit hath made chinks, as it were, in the black
wall of separation, through which, by faith we can see; for he hath
"revealed unto us by the Spirit" the things which "eye hath not seen
nor ear heard," and which the human intellect could never compass. Yet,
what we know is but very little. When men die, they pass beyond the
realm of our knowledge: both in body and in soul, they go beyond our
understandings. But God understands all the secrets of death. Let us
divide these into several heads, and enumerate them.
God knows the burial-places of all his people. He notes as well the
resting-place of the man who is buried tombless and alone, as the man
over whom a mighty mausoleum has been raised. The traveler who fell in
the barren desert, whose body became the prey of the vulture, and whose
bones were bleached in the sun–the mariner, who was wrecked far out at
sea, and over whose corpse no dirge was ever wailed, except the howling
of the winds, and the murmuring of the wild waves–the thousands who
have perished in battle, unnumbered and unnoticed–the many who have
died alone, amid dreary forests, frozen seas, and devouring
snow-storms–all these, and the places of their sepulchre, are known to
God. That silent grot within the sea, where pearls lie deep, where now
the shipwrecked one is sleeping, is marked by God as the death-place of
one of his redeemed; that place upon the mountain-side, the deep ravine
into which the traveler fell and was buried in a snow-drift, is marked
in the memory of God as the tomb of one of the human race. No body of
man, however it may have been interred or uninterred, has passed beyond
the range of God's knowledge. Blessed be his name, if I shall die, and
lie where the rude forefathers of the hamlet sleep, in some neglected
corner of the churchyard, I shall be known as well, and rise as well
recognized by my glorious Father, as if interred in the cathedral,
where forests of gothic pillars proudly stand erect, and where the
songs of myriads perpetually salute high heaven. I shall be known as
well as if I had been buried there in solemn pomp, and had been
interred with music and with dread solemnities, and I shall be
recognized as well as if the marble trophy and the famous pillar had
been raised to my remembrance; for God knoweth no such thing as
forgetfulness of the burying-places of his children. Moses sleeps in
some spot that eye hath not seen. God kissed away his soul, and he
buried him where Israel could never find him, though they may have
searched for him. But God knoweth where Moses sleeps; and if he knows
that, he understands where all his children are hidden. Ye cannot bell
me where is the tomb of Adam; ye could not point out to me the sleeping
place of Abel. Is any man able to discover the tomb of Methuselah and
those long-lived dwellers in the time before the flood? Who shall tell
where the once-treasured body of Joseph now sleeps in faith? Can any of
you discover the tombs of the kings, and mark the exact spot where
David and Solomon rest in solitary grandeur? No, those things have
passed from human recollection, and we know not where the great and
mighty of the past are buried; but God knoweth, for death and Hades are
open before the Lord.
And again, further, not only does he know the place where they were
buried, but he is cognizant of the history of all their bodies after
sepulture or after death. It has often been asked by the infidel, "How
can the body of man be restored, when it may have been eaten by the
cannibal, or devoured by wild beasts?" Our simple reply is, that God
can track every atom of it if he pleases. We do not think it necessary
to resurrection that he should do so, but if he so willed it, he could
bring every atom of every body that hath ever died: although it hath
passed through the most complicated machinery of nature, and become
entangled in its passage with plants and beasts, yea, and with the
bodies of other men, God hath it still within the range of his
knowledge to know where every atom is, and it is within the might of
his Omnipotence to call every atom from its wandering, and restore it
to its proper sphere, and rebuild the body of which it was a part. It
is true, we could not track the dust that long since has moldered.
Buried with exactest care, preserved with the most scrupulous
reverence, years passed away, and the body of the monarch, which had
long slept well guarded and protected, was at last reached by the
careless hand. The coffin had moldered, and the metal was broken for
the sake of its own value; a handful of dust was discovered, the last
relics of one who was master of many nations. That dust by sacrilegious
hand was cast in the aisle of the church, or thrown into the churchyard
and blown by the winds into the neighboring field. It was impossible
for ever to preserve it; the greatest care was defeated; and at last
the monarch was on a level with his slave, "alike unknowing and
unknown." But God knows where every particle of the handful of dust has
gone: he has marked in his book the wandering of every one of its
atoms. He hath death so open before his view, that he can bring all
these together, bone to bone, and clothe them with the very flesh that
robed them in the days of yore, and make them live again. Death is open
before the Lord.
And as the body, so the soul when separated from the body, is before
the Lord. We look upon the countenance of our dying friend, and on a
sudden a mysterious change passes over his frame. "His soul has fled,"
we say. But have we any idea of what his soul is? Can we form even a
conjecture of what the flying of that soul may be, and what the august
presence into which it is ushered when it is disentangled from its
earthly coil? Is it possible for us to guess what is that state where
Spirits without bodies, perpetually blest, behold their God? It is
possible for us to compass some imagination of what heaven is to be,
when bodies and souls, reunited, shall before God's throne enjoy the
highest bliss; but I do think, that so gross are our conceptions,
whilst we are in our bodies, that it is almost, if not quite,
impossible for any of us to form any idea whatever as to the position
of souls, whilst in the disembodied state, between the hour of death
and the time of resurrection.
"This much, and this is all, we know;
They are supremely blest:
Have done with sin, and care, and woe,
And with their Saviour rest."
But the best of the saints can tell us nothing more than this. They are
blest, and in paradise they are reigning with their Lord. Brethren,
these things are known to God. The separate state of the dead, the
heaven of disembodied spirits, is within the gaze of the Most High, and
at this hour, if so he pleased, he could reveal to us the condition of
every man that is dead–whether he has mounted to Elysian fields, to
dwell for ever in the sunlight of his Master's countenance, or has been
plunged into hell, dragged down by iron chains, to wait in dreary woe
the result of the awful trial, when "Depart ye cursed," must be the
re-affirmation of a sentence once pronounced, and already in part
endured. God understands the separate doom of every man's spirit before
the great tribunal day–before the last sentence shall have been
pronounced, death is open before the Lord.
2. The next word, "destruction," signifies hell, or the place of the
damned. That also is open before the Lord. Where hell is, and what its
miseries, we know not; except "through a glass darkly," we have never
seen the invisible things of horror. That land of terror is a land
unknown. We have much reason to thank God that he has put it so far off
from the habitations of living mortals, that the pains, the groans, the
shrieks, the yells, are not to be heard here, or else earth itself
would have become a hell, the solemn prelude and the ante-past of
unutterable torment. God has put somewhere, far on the edge of his
dominions, a tearful lake that burneth with fire and brimstone; into
that he cast the rebel angels, who (though by a license they are now
allowed to walk the earth) do carry a hell within their bosoms, and are
by-and-by to be bound with chains, reserved in blackness and darkness
for ever for them that kept not their first estate, but lifted the arm
of their rebellion against God. Into that place we dare not look.
Perhaps it would not be possible for any man to get a fair idea of the
torments of the lost, without at once becoming mad. Reason would reel
at such a sight of horror. One moment of listening to the shrill
screams of spirits tortured, might forever drive us into the depths of
despair, and make us only fit to be bound in chains whilst we lived on
earth. Raving lunatics surely we must become. But whilst God has
mercifully covered all these things from us, they are all known to him;
he looks upon them; yea, it is his look that makes hell what it is. His
eyes, full of fury, flash the lightnings that scathe his enemies; his
lips, full of dreadful thunders, make the thunders that now Upright the
wicked. O, could they escape the eye of God, could they shut out that
dreary vision of the face of the incensed Majesty of heaven, then might
hell be quenched; then might the wheels of Ixion stand still; then
might doomed Tantalus quench his thirst and eat to his very full. But
there, whilst they lie in their chains, they look upward, and they see
ever that fearful vision of the Most High; the dreadful hands that
grasp the thunderbolts, the dreadful lips that speak the thunders, and
the fearful eyes that flash the flames that burn their souls, with
horrors deeper than despair. Yes, hell, horrible as it is, and veiled
in many clouds, and covered over with darkness, is naked before the
vision of the Most High.
There is the grand fact stated–"Hell and destruction are before the
Lord." After this the inference seems to be easy–"How much more then
the hearts of the children of men?"
II. We now come to the GRAND FACT INFERRED.
In briefly entering upon this second part I will discuss the subject
thus: You notice there an argument–"How much more then the hearts of
the children of men?" I will therefore begin by asking, why does it
follow that the hearts of men are seen by God?
Why–how–what–when–shall be four questions into which we shall
divide what we have now to say.
1. Why is it so clear, that "if hell and destruction are open before
the Lord," the hearts of men must be very plainly viewed by him?
We answer, because the hearts of men are not so extensive as the realms
of death and torment. What is man's heart? what is man's self? Is he
not in Scripture compared to a grasshopper? Does not God declare that
he "takes up the isles"–whole islands full of men–"as a very little
thing; And the nations before him are but as the drop of a bucket?" If,
then, the all-seeing eye of God takes in at one glance the wide regions
of death–and wide they are, wide enough to startle any man who shall
try to range them through–if, I say, with one glance God seeth death
and seeth hell through, with all its bottomless depths, with all its
boundlessness of misery, surely, then, he is quite able to behold all
the actions of the little thing called man's heart. Suppose a man so
wise is to be able to know the wants of a nation and to remember the
feelings of myriads of men, you can not suppose it difficult for him to
know the actions of his own family and to understand the emotions of
his oven household. If the man is able to stretch his arm over a great
sphere, and to say, "I am monarch of all this," surely he shall be able
to control the less. He who in his wisdom can walk through centuries
shall not say that he is ignorant of the history of a year; he who can
dive into the depths of science, and understand the history of the
whole world from its creation, is not to be alarmed by some small
riddle that happens at his own door. No, the God who seeth death and
hell seeth our hearth for they are far less extensive.
Reflect again, that they are far less aged too. Death is an ancient
monarch; he is the only king whose dynasty stands fast. Ever since the
days of Adam he has never been succeeded by another, and has never had
an interregnum in his reign. His black ebon sceptre hath swept away
generation after generation; his scythe hath mowed the fair fields of
this earth a hundred times, and is sharp to mow us down, and when
another crop shall succeed us he is still ready to devour the
multitudes, and sweep the earth clean again. The regions of death are
old domains; his pillars of black granite are ancient as the eternal
hills. Death made his prey on earth long ere Adam was here. Those
mighty creatures that made the deep hoary with their strength, and
stirred the earth with their tramplings–those elder born of natures
sons, the mighty creatures that lived here long ere Adam walked in
Eden–death made them his prey: like a mighty hunter he speared the
mighty lizard and laid it low, and now we dig it from the stony tomb,
and wonder at it. He is our ancient monarch; but ancient as he is, his
whole monarchy is in the records of God, and until death itself is
dead, and swallowed up in victory, death shall be open before the Lord.
How old, too, is death–old as the first sin. In that day when Satan
tempted the angels, and led astray the third part of the stars of
heaven, then hell was digger; then was that bottomless pit first struck
out of solid rocks of vengeance, that it might stand a marvelous record
of what God's wrath can do. The fires of hell are not the kindlings of
yesterday: they are ancient flames that burned long ere Vesuvius cast
forth its lurid flame. Long ere the first charred ashes tell upon the
plain from earth's red volcanoes, hell's flames we're burning; for
"Tophet is prepared of old, the pile thereof is wood and much smoke;
the breath of the Lord like a stream of brimstone, doth kindle it. If,
then, the ancient things, these old ones, death and hell, have been
observed by God, and if their total history is known to him, how much
more then shall he know the history of those mere animalculae, those
ephemera of an hour, that we call men! You are here to-day, and gone
to-morrow; born yesterday–the next hour shall see our tomb prepared,
and another minute shall hear, "ashes to ashes, dust to dust," and the
falling of the clod upon the coffin lid. We are the creatures of a day,
and know nothing. We are scarcely here; we are only living and dead.
"Gone!" is the greatest part of our history. Scarcely have we time
enough to tell the story, ere it comes to its finis. Surely, then, God
may easily understand the history of a beast, when he knows the history
of the monarchies of death and hell.
This is the why. I need not give further arguments, though there be
abundance deducible from the text. "How much more then the hearts of
the children of men?"
2. But now, how does God know the heart? I mean to what degree and to
what extent does he understand and know that which is in man? I answer,
Holy Scripture in divers places gives us most precise information. God
knows the heart so well that he is said to "search" it. We all
understand the figure of a search. There is a search-warrant out
against some man who is supposed to be harboring a traitor in his
house. The officer goes into the lower room, opens the door of every
cupboard, looks into every closet, peers into every cranny, takes the
key, descends into the cellar, turns over the coals, disturbs the wood,
lest any one should be hidden there. Up stairs he goes: there is an old
room that has not been open for years,–it is opened. There is a huge
chest: the lock is forced, and it is broken open. The very top of the
house is searched, lest upon the slates or upon the tiles some one
should be concealed. At last, when the search has been complete, the
officer says, "It is impossible that there can be anybody here, for,
from the tiles to the foundation, I have searched the house thoroughly
through; I know the very spiders well, for I have seen the house
completely." Now, it is just so that God knows our heart. He searches
it–searches into every nook, corner, crevice, and secret part; and the
figure of the Lord is pushed further still. "The candle of the Lord,"
we are told, "searches the secret parts of the belly." As when we wish
to find something, we take a candle, and look down upon the ground with
great care, and turn up the dust. If it is some little piece of money
we desire to find, we light a candle and sweep the house, and search
diligently till we find it. Even so it is with God. He searches
Jerusalem with candles, and pulls every thing to day-light. No partial
search, like that of Laban, when he went into Rachel's tent to look for
his idols. She put them in the camel's furniture, and sat upon them;
but God looks into the camel's furniture, and all. "Can any hide
himself in secret places, that I shall not see him? saith the Lord."
His eye searches the heart, and looks into every part of it.
In another passage we are told that God tries the reins. That is even
more than searching. The goldsmith when he takes gold, looks at it, and
examines it carefully. "Ah!" says he, "but I don't understand this gold
yet: I must try it." He thrusts it into the furnace; there coals are
heaped upon it, and it is fused and melted, till he knows what there is
of dross, and what there is of gold. Now, God knows to the very carat
how much there is of sound gold in us, and how much of dross. There is
no deceiving him. He has put our hearts into the furnace of his
Omniscience; the furnace–his knowledge–tries us as completely as the
goldsmith's crucible doth try the gold–how much there is of hypocrisy,
how much of truth–how much of steam, how much of real–how much of
ignorance, how much of knowledge–how much of devotion, how much of
blasphemy–how much of carefulness, how much of carelessness. God knows
the ingredients of the heart; he reduces the soul to its pristine
metals; he divides it asunder–so much of quartz, so much of gold, so
much of dung, of dross, of wood, of hay, of stubble, so much of gold,
silver, and precious stones. "The Lord trieth the hearts and searcheth
the reins of the children of men."
Here is another description of God's knowledge of the heart. In one
place of Sacred Writ–(it will be well if you set your children to find
out these places at home)–God is said to ponder the heart. Now, you
know, the Latin word ponder means weigh. The Lord weighs the heart. Old
Master Quarles has got a picture of a great one putting a heart into
one scale, and then putting the law, the Bible, into the other scale,
to weigh it. This is what God does with men's hearts. They are often
great, puffed-up, blown-out things, and people say, "What a
great-hearted man that is!" But God does not judge by the appearance of
a man's great heart nor the outside appearance of a good heart; but he
puts it in the scales and weighs it–puts his own Word in one scale and
the heart in the other. He knows the exact weight–knows whether we
have grace in the heart, which makes us good weight, or only pretence
in the heart, which makes us weigh light weight when put into the
scale. He searches the heart in every possible way, he puts it into the
fire, and then thrusts it into the balances. Oh, might not God say of
many of you, "I have searched your heart, and I have found vanity
therein? Reprobate silver shall men call you; for God has put you in
the furnace and rejected you." And then he might conclude his verdict
by saying, "Mene, mene, tekel–thou art weighed in the balances and
found wanting." This, then, is the answer to the question, How?
The next question was, What? What is it that God sees in man's heart?
God sees in man's heart a great deal more than we think of God sees,
and has seen in out hearts, lust, and blasphemy, and murder, and
adultery, and malice and wrath, and all uncharitableness. The heart
never can be painted too black, unless you daub it with something
blacker than the devil himself. It is as base as it can be. You have
never committed murder, but yet you have had murder in your heart; you
may never have stained your hands with lusts and the aspersions of
uncleanness, but still it is in the heart. Have you never imagined an
evil thing? Has your soul never for a moment doted on a pleasure which
you were too chaste to indulge in, but which for a moment you surveyed
with at least some little complacency and delight? Has not imagination
often pictured, even to the solitary monk in his cell, greater vice
than men in public life have ever dreamed of? And may not even the
divine in his closet be conscious that blasphemies, and murders, and
lusts of the vilest class, can find a ready harbor even in the heart
which he hopes is dedicated to God? Oh! beloved, it is a sight that no
human eye could endure: the sight of a heart really laid bare before
one's own inspection would startle us almost into insanity: but God
sees the heart in all its bestial sensuousness, in all its wanderings
and rebellions, in all its high mindedness and pride; God has searched
and knows it altogether.
God sees all the heart's imaginations, and what they are let us not
presume to tell. O children of God, these have made you cry and groan
full many a time, and though the worldling groans not over them, yet he
hath them. Oh, what a filthy stye of Stygian imaginations is the heart;
all full of every thing that is hideous, when it once begins to dance
and make carnival and revelry concerning sin. But God sees the heart's
imaginations.
Again, God sees the heart's devices. You, perhaps, O sinner, have
determined to curse God; you have not done so, but you intend to do it.
He knows your devices–reads them all. You perhaps will not be
permitted to run into the excess of riotousness into which you purpose
to go; but your very purpose is now undergoing the inspection of the
Most High. There is never a design forged in the fires of the heart,
before it is beaten on the anvil of resolve, that is not known, and
seen, and noted by Jehovah our God.
He knows, next, the resolves of the heart. He knows, O sinner, how many
times you have resolved to repent, and have resolved and re-resolved,
and then have continued the same. He knows, O thou that hast been sick,
how thou didst resolve to seek God, but how thou didst despise thine
own resolution, when good health had put thee beyond the temporary
danger. Thy resolves have been filed in heaven, and thy broken
promises, and thy vows despised, shall be brought out in their order as
swift witnesses for thy condemnation. All these things are known of
God. We have often had very clear proof of God's knowing what is in
man's heart, even in the ministry. Some months ago, whilst standing
here preaching, I deliberately pointed to a man in the midst of the
crowd, and said these words–"There is a man sitting there that is a
shoemaker, keeps his shop open on Sunday, had his shop open last
Sabbath morning, took ninepence, and -there was fourpence profit out of
it. His soul is sold to Satan for fourpence." A City Missionary, when
going round the West end of the town, met with a poor man, of whom he
asked this question: "Do you know Mr. Spurgeon?" He found him reading a
sermon. "Yes," he said, "I have every reason to know him; I have been
to hear him, and under God's grace I have become a new man. "But," said
he, "shall I tell you how it was? I went to the Music Hall, and took my
seat in the middle of the place, and the man looked at me as if he knew
me, and deliberately told the congregation that I was a shoemaker, and
that I sold shoes on a Sunday; and I did, sir. But, sir, I should not
have minded that; but he said I took ninepence the Sunday before, and
that there was fourpence profit; and so I did take ninepence, and
fourpence was just the profit, and how he should know that I'm sure I
can not tell. It struck me it was God had spoken to my soul through
him; and I shut my shop last Sunday, and was afraid to open it and go
there, lest he should split about me again." I could tell as many as a
dozen authentic stories of cases that have happened in this Hall, where
I have deliberately pointed at some body, without the slightest
knowledge of the person, or ever having in the least degree any inkling
or idea that what I said was right, except that I believed I was moved
thereto by the Spirit; and so striking has been the description, that
the persons have gone away and said, "Come, see a man that told me all
things that ever I did: he was sent of God to my soul, beyond a doubt,
or else he could not have painted my case so clearly."
And not only so, but we have known cases in which the thoughts of men
have been revealed from the pulpit. I have sometimes seen persons nudge
with their elbows, because they have got a smart hit, and I have heard
them say, when they went out, "That is just what I said to you when I
went in at the door." "Ah!" says the other, "I was thinking of the very
thing he said, and he told me of it." Now, if God thus proves his own
Omniscience by helping his poor, ignorant servant, to state the very
thing, thought and done, when he did not know it, then it must remain
decisively proved that God does know everything that is secret, because
we see he tells it to men, and enables them to tell it to others. Oh,
ye may endeavor as much as ye can to hide your faults from God, but
beyond a doubt he shall discover you. He discovers you this day. His
Word is "a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart," and
"pierces to the dividing asunder of the joints and of the marrow;" and
in that last day, when the book shall be opened, and he shall give to
every man his sentence, then shall it be seen how exact, how careful,
how precious, how personal was God's knowledge of the heart of every
man whom he had made.
4. And now the last question: When? When does God see us? The answer
is, he sees us everywhere and in every place. O foolish man, who thinks
to hide himself from the Most High! It is night! no human eye sees
thee; the curtain is drawn, and thou art hidden. There are his eyes
lowering at thee through the gloom. It is a far-off country; no one
knows thee; parents and friends have been left behind, restraints are
cast off. There is a Father near thee, who looks upon thee even now. It
is a lone spot, and if the deed be done, no tongue shall tell it. There
is a tongue in heaven that shall tell it; yea, the beam out of the
wall, and the stones in the field, shall raise up themselves as
witnesses against thee. Canst thou hide thyself anywhere where God
shall not detect thee? Is not this whole world like a glass hive,
wherein we put our bees? and does not God stand and see all our motions
when we think we are hidden? Ah, it is but a glass hiding-place. He
looketh from heaven, and through stone walls and rocks; yea, to the
very centre itself, does his eye pierce, and in the thickest darkness
he beholds our deeds.
Come, then, let me make a personal application of the matter, and I
have done. If this be true, hypocrite, what a fool thou art! If God can
read the heart, O man, what a sorry, sorry thing thy fair pretense must
be! Ah! ah! ah! what a change will come over some of you! This world is
a masquerade, and ye, many of you, wear the mask of religion. Ye dance
your giddy hours, and men think you to be the saints of God. How
changed will you be, when, at the door of eternity, you must drop the
visor, and must announce the theatricals in which you live! How you
will blush when the paint is washed from off your cheek–when you stand
before God naked to your own shame, a hypocrite, unclean, diseased,
covered up before with the gew-gaws and the trickery of pretended
formality in religion, but now standing there, base, vile, and hideous!
There is many a man that bears about him a cancer that would make one
sick to see. Oh, how shall hypocrites look when their cancerous hearts
are laid bare! Deacon! how you will tremble when your old heart is torn
open, and your vile pretences rent away! Minister! how black you will
look when your surplice is off, and when your grand pretensions are
cast to the dogs! How will you tremble! There will be no sermonizing
others then. You yourself will be preached to, and the sermon shall be
from that text, "Depart ye cursed." O brethren, above all things shun
hypocrisy. If ye mean to be damned, make up your minds to it, and be
damned like honest men; but do not, I beseech you, pretend to go to
heaven while all the time you are going to hell. If ye mean to make
your abodes in torment forever, then serve the devil, and do not be
ashamed of it; stand it right out, and let the world know what you are.
But oh! never put on the cloak of religion. I beseech you, do not add
to your eternal misery being a wolf in sheep's clothing. Show the
cloven foot; do not hide it. If you mean to go to hell, say so. "If God
be God, serve him. If Baal be God, serve him." Do not serve Baal and
then pretend to be serving God.
One other practical conclusion. If God sees and knows everything, how
this ought to make you tremble–you that have lived in sin for many
years! I have known a man who was once stopped from an act of sin by
the fact of there being a cat in the room. He could not bear even the
eyes of that poor creature to see him. Oh, I would ye could carry about
with you the recollection of those eyes that are always on you.
Swearer! could you swear if you could see God's eye looking at you?
Thief! drunkard! harlot! could ye indulge in your sins, if ye saw his
eyes on you? Oh, methinks they would startle you and bid you pause,
before ye did in God's own sight rebel against his law. There is a
story told of the American War, that one of the prisoners taken by the
Americans was subjected to a torture of the most refined character. He
says, "I was put into a narrow dungeon; I was comfortably provided for
with all I needed; but there was a round slit in the wall, and through
that, both night and day, a soldier always looked at me." He says, "I
could not rest, I could not eat nor drink, nor do anything in comfort,
because there was always that eye–an eye that seemed never to be
turned away, and never shut–always following me round that little
apartment. Nothing ever hidden from it." Now take home that figure.
Recollect that is your position; you are shut in by the narrow walls of
time, when ye eat, and when ye drink, when ye rise, and when ye lie
upon your beds; when ye walk the streets, or when ye sit at home, that
eye is always fixed upon you. Go home now and sin against God, if ye
dare; go home now and break his laws to his face, and despise him, and
set him at nought! Rush on your own destruction; dash yourselves
against the buckler of Jehovah, and destroy your selves upon his own
sword! Nay, rather, "turn ye, turn ye." Turn ye, ye that have followed
the ways of sin, turn ye to Christ, and live; and then the same
Omniscience which is now your horror, shall be your pleasure. Sinner!
if thou now dost pray, he seeth thee; if thou now dost weep he seeth
thee. "When he was yet a great way off his father saw him, and ran, and
fell on his neck and kissed him." It shall be even so with thee, if now
thou turnest to God and dost believe in his Son Jesus Christ.
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