Preach, Preach, Preach Everywhere!
A sermon
(No. 900)
Delivered by
C.H.SPURGEON,
At the Metropolitan Tabernacle, Newington
"And He said unto them, Go you into all the world and preach the Gospel
to every creature. He that believes and is baptized shall be saved; but
he that believes not shall be damned."- Mark 16:15,16.
BEFORE our Lord gave His disciples this commission He addressed them in
tones of serious rebuke. You will observe that appearing unto the
Eleven as they ate meat, "He upbraided them with their unbelief and
hardness of heart because they believed not them which had seen Him
after He was risen." So honorable an estimation did He set upon
testimony–so marked a censure did He pronounce upon those who
neglected it! The reprimand they received on such an occasion may well
serve as a caution to us for unbelief unfits the Christian for service.
It is in proportion to our personal faith in the Gospel that we become
competent witnesses for the teaching of it to others. Each one of us
who would get credit for sincerity must say with David, "I believed,
therefore have I spoken," or else a need of faith of ourselves will
effectually deprive our speech of all its power over our fellow men.
There can be little doubt that one reason why Christianity is not so
aggressive now as it once was and exerts not everywhere the influence
it had in Apostolic times is the feebleness of our faith in Christ as
compared with the full assurance of faith exercised by the men of those
days. In vain you hide a timid heart behind a modest face, when the
attitude we should show and the living force that should constrain us
is a bold reliance upon the power of the Holy Spirit and a deep
conviction of the might of the Truth of God which we are taught to
deliver. Brethren, if there is to be a revival of religion it must
begin at home! Our own souls must first of all be filled with holy
faith and burning enthusiasm and then shall we be strong to do exploits
and to win provinces for the scepter of King Jesus.
Having thus made a note upon the context, I want you to refer to a
parallel passage in Matthew. There we learn that in delivering this
commission our Lord assigned a remarkable reason for it and one that
intimately concerned Himself. "Allpower," He said, "is given unto ME in
Heaven and in earth, go YOU, therefore, and teach all nations." These
words were adapted to strengthen the faith of His disciples, of whom it
had just been observed that "some doubted." Do you not see the point of
this announcement? Jesus of Nazareth, being raised from the dead, tells
His Apostles that He is now invested with universal supremacy as the
Son of Man. Therefore He issues a decree of Divine Grace, calling on
all people of every nation and kindred to believe the Gospel with a
promise of personal salvation to each and every one that believes.
With such authority is this mandate clothed and so imperative the duty
of all men everywhere to repent, that they who do not believe are
threatened with a certain penalty of damnation! This royal ordinance He
will have published throughout the whole world–but He enjoins it on
all the messengers that those who bear the tidings should be thoroughly
impressed with the Sovereignty of Him that sends them. Let the words,
then, ring in your ears, "Go you, therefore." They sound like the music
of that glad acclaim which hails the Redeemer installed with power,
holding the insignia of power in His possession, exercising the full
rights of legitimate power, and entrusting His disciples with a
commission founded on that power, "Go you into all the world."
Yet another remark before we proceed to the text. The commission we are
about to deal with was the last which the Lord gave to His disciples
before He was taken away from them. We prize greatly the last words of
His departing servants–how shall we sufficiently value the parting
words of our ascending Master? Injunctions that are left us by those
who have gone to Glory have great weight upon our spirits. Let obedient
lovers of Christ see to it that they act according to the last will and
testament, the last desire expressed by their risen Lord! I claim for
my text peculiar attention from every disciple of Jesus, not, indeed,
as if it were a mournful entreaty, but rather as a solemn charge.
You remember Christ's own parable, "The kingdom of Heaven is as a man
traveling into a far country, who called his own servants and delivered
unto them his goods." Look at this as the last direction which Jesus
gives to His stewards before "He went into a far country to receive for
Himself a kingdom and to return." It seems to me that as when the
mantle of Elijah fell upon Elisha, Elisha would have been much to blame
if he had not caught it up. So when these words fell from our ascending
Savior before the clouds concealed Him from the disciples' sight, we
ought to take them up with holy reverence. Since He has left them as
His parting mantle they ought to be lovingly cherished and scrupulously
obeyed.
Come we, then, to invite your earnest heed to the command which the
Savior here gives–"Go you into all the world and preach the Gospel to
every creature." It was given to the Apostles representatively. They
represent the whole body of the faithful. To every converted man and
woman this commission is given. I grant you there is a specialty to
those gifted and called to surrender themselves wholly to the work of
the ministry, but their office in the visible Church offers no excuse
for the discharge of those functions that pertain to every member of
the body of Christ in particular. It is the universal command of Christ
to every Believer: "Go you into all the world and preach the Gospel to
every creature."
I. In thinking over this command, let us first consider WHAT IT IS THAT
WE HAVE TO CARRY TO EVERY CREATURE–THE GOSPEL. There may be no need,
my Brethren, for me to tell you what the Gospel is, but to complete our
subject we must declare it. The "Gospel," which is to be told to "every
creature," it seems to me, is the great Truth of God that "God was in
Christ reconciling the world unto Himself, not imputing their
trespasses unto them." And that He "has committed unto us the word of
reconciliation."
God has looked in pity upon sinful man. He has sent His Son to take
upon Himself the nature of man. His Son has come in the flesh. He has
worked out a perfect righteousness by His obedient life. He has died
upon the tree, the Just for the unjust, that whoever trusts in Him
might be forgiven. Then come the Gospel's point and barb–believe in
Him and be baptized and you shall be saved. Reject Him and your peril
is imminent, for God declares it–you must be damned. When we preach
the Gospel, then, we must declare to the sons of men that they are
fallen, they are sinful, they are lost– but Christ has come to seek
and to save that which was lost–that there is in Christ Jesus, who is
now in Heaven, sufficient Grace to meet each sinner's need.
When we preach the Gospel, then, we must declare that whoever believes
in Him shall be forgiven all his sins and shall receive the Holy
Spirit, by which he shall be helped to lead a new life, shall be
preserved in holiness and shall be brought safely to Heaven. To preach
the Gospel is to preach up Christ. It is not, as I believe, to preach
any form of Church government, or any special creed, although both of
these may be necessary to those who have heard and received the Gospel.
The first message we have to preach to every creature is that there is
a Savior–"Receive, for a look at the Crucified One, life at this
moment," for all who look to Him. This is the Gospel which we have to
preach.
Now, what is meant by the word "preach"? I take its meaning in this
place to be very extensive. Some can literally preach–that is, act as
heralds, proclaiming the Gospel as the town crier proclaims in the
street the message which he is bid to cry aloud. The town crier is, in
fact, the world's preacher and the preacher of the Gospel is to be a
crier, crying aloud and sparing not the Truth of Christ. I do not
believe that Christ tells us to go and play the orator to every
creature. Such a command would be impracticable to most of us and
useless to any of us. Of all the things that desecrate the Sabbath and
grieve the Spirit, attempt at high-flown oratory and gorgeous eloquence
in preaching, I believe, are about the worst. Our business is just to
speak out the Gospel simply and plainly to every creature.
We do not actually preach the Gospel to a man if we do not make him
understand what we are talking about. If our language does not come
down to his level, it may be the Gospel, but it is not the Gospel to
him. The preacher should adopt language which shall be suitable to all
his congregation. In preaching he should strive to instruct, to
enforce, to explain, to expound, to plead and to bring home to every
man's heart and conscience, as in the sight of God, as far as his
ability goes, the Truths of God which beyond all argument or quibble,
have the seal and stamp of Divine Revelation. Though all the members of
a Church cannot literally preach in this ordinary acceptation of the
term, yet if this command is for all, then must all bear that testimony
to the world in some other outspoken manner.
Their preaching may be in various ways. Some must preach by their holy
lives. Others must preach by their talking to the ones and twos, like
the Master at the well, who was as much preaching when He conversed
with the woman of Samaria as when He addressed the multitude on the
banks of the lake of Gennesaret and uttered doctrine as sublime in that
little village of Sychar as He proclaimed at the beautiful gate of the
Temple. Others must preach by distributing the
Truth printed for circulation–and a right noble service this
is–especially when the pure Word of Life, the Bible itself, is sown
broadcast in this and other lands. If we cannot speak with our own
tongue, we must borrow other men's tongues. And if we cannot write with
our own pens, we must borrow other men's pens–but we must do it in
some way or other.
The gist of this command is that we must make the Gospel known to every
creature by some means or other–throw it in his way, make him know
that there is a Gospel and challenge his very curiosity to learn what
it means. You cannot make him accept it, or believe it–that is God's
work–but you can and must make him know of it and plead with him to
receive it and do not let it be your fault if he does not welcome it.
Do all, as much as lies within you, to make every creature know what
the Gospel is, so that if he will not accept it, yet he shall have had
the kingdom of God brought near to him. The responsibility of his
accepting or rejecting it shall then be his business and none of yours.
This, then, is the commission of Jesus Christ to His disciples–"Go you
into all the world and preach the Gospel to every creature."
Lest we should make a mistake about what I just now called the point
and barb of the arrow, the force and pith of the Gospel, Christ has put
it in plain words, "He that believes and is baptized shall be saved."
That is to say, if a man would participate in the bounteous salvation
which Christ has worked, he must believe in Christ. He must trust
Christ. He must believe Christ to be God's appointed Savior and to be
able to save him. He must act on that belief and trust himself in the
hands of Jesus and if he does that he shall be saved. Further, the text
says he must be baptized. Not that there is any virtue whatever in
Baptism, but it is a small thing for Christ to expect that the man or
woman trusting to be saved by Him should own and avow their attachment
to Him.
He that wishes to have Christ as his Savior should be prepared openly
to acknowledge that he is on Christ's side. Baptism thus becomes the
badge of discipleship, the outward token of faith by which a man says
to all who look on, "I confess myself dead to the world. I confess
myself buried with Christ. I declare myself risen to newness of life in
Him." Make what you will of it and laugh at it as much as you like, yet
in the faith of Jesus as my Lord, I have taken leave of all else to
follow Him. It is a point of obedience. Sometimes one has said in his
heart, "What a pity it is that Baptism should have been introduced into
this place. It makes a block of wood into which men may drive their
ritualistic hook." But then the Son of God Himself has put it here and
we cannot alter it. If it were not here in His Word I would not have
put it here. But it is here and being here, it is at your soul's hazard
to leave it out.
I believe with all my heart that if you believe in Jesus Christ you
will be saved, whether you are baptized or not, but I would not like to
run the risk, mark you, for I have not got that in my text. It is, "He
that believes and is baptized shall be saved," and I would take the two
commands together and obey my Master's will throughout and not leave
out that which did not suit my inclination and accept only that which
did. I am bound to leave out neither of them, but to take the two
together. With your heart you must believe and with your mouth make
confession–and if you do these sincerely you shall be saved.
II. Having, then, clearly before us what our work is–to publish and
make plain to every creature the Gospel of Jesus Christ–let us
solemnly consider (for it is a very solemn business, being incumbent
upon every professor of Christ here) WHAT THE EXTENT OF THIS COMMISSION
IS. Judging from the fact that there is no mention made of time, I
gather that as long as there is a Church in the world the obligation to
preach the Gospel will remain and if that Church should ever come to
consist of but one or two, it must still, with all its might, go on
promulgating the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
Preaching is to be for all time. And until Jesus Christ Himself shall
come and the dispensation shall close, the mission of the Church is to
go into all the world–all of you–and preach the Gospel to every
creature. I will not, however, dwell upon that, because it is not so
much a practical point, but just notice that there is no limit to be
put as to where this Gospel is to be preached. It is to be preached in
"all the world"–in Labrador, in Africa–where the Southern Cross
shines high, or where Arcturus with his suns leads on the night.
Everywhere, in every place. No nation is to be left out because too
degraded. No race is to be forgotten because too far remote. The
mission of the Church deals with the center of Africa, with men who
have never yet looked a pale man in the face. It deals with learned
nations, as the acute and skeptical Hindu and with the degraded tribes,
as the Hottentot in his kraal, the Bechuana and the Bushman. There is
to be no omission anywhere.
Our great Commander's marching orders to His troops are–"Go you into
all the world and preach the Gospel to every creature." Even this is
not so practical a point as the one I want to insist upon. It is the
duty of the Church,
according to this command, to make known the Gospel to every creature.
Any one of you individually, of course, cannot make it known to every
creature, but each one, at home and abroad, according to his sphere of
action and his capacity, is to be striving at that. As soon as ever
they can understand, you are to be ready with this Gospel of Jesus
Christ for them. The Sunday school does not need a direct text for its
institution or foundation. It is a marvel that it was not instituted
long before it was, for the very spirit of Sunday school work lies in
the words here–"every creature."
You are not, in looking after the children, to include only some
privileged classes and exclude the ragged and the depraved–the City
Arab is at least a "creature," and you are as much bound to preach the
Gospel to him as to your own dear child who is the object of your most
tender love. It is to every creature. Then the Christian Church ought
to aim at the rich. The rich need the Gospel, perhaps, more than any
other class in the community. They seldom hear it and what they do hear
of the Gospel is poor diluted stuff. Their sins are not often told them
to their face, neither are they rebuked as the poor are. They are to be
sought for by the Church, and though it is difficult to get at them,
yet we have not done our duty till we have done what we can for them.
And the poor are to be looked after. Their poverty must never make us
say that it is not worthwhile to teach them. It is the Glory of the
Gospel that the poor should have the Gospel preached to them. Rich and
poor are both creatures and therefore the Church has its duty
concerning both. The Gospel ought to be preached to those who
habitually assemble on the Sabbath. It is a pleasure to remember that
there are so many who are willing to come and listen to the Gospel, but
the responsibility of the minister and the Church does not end with
those who voluntarily congregate within four walls. We are to preach
the Gospel to every creature–therefore to those who lie in bed on
Sunday mornings, to those who read Sunday newspapers, to those who take
their walks in the evening with listless indifference–to those who do
not know, perhaps, what Christian worship means.
You have not done what your Master has told you to do till you have
reached them and made them know–forced them to know–what the Gospel
is. He would be a poor sportsman who should sit in his house and expect
the game to come to him. He that would have it must go abroad for it
and he that would serve the Master must go out into the highways and
hedges and compel them to come in! I need not say here, Brethren, that
I hope the Christian Church is now alive to looking after every class
of society, but what I want to bring home personally to ourselves is
just this–that we, as a Church here, with so many advantages, so many
in numbers–have at least a part in this commandment, and must extend
our efforts to as many of "every creature" as we can.
Oh, we cannot discharge the work for which God has put us here until we
have looked into these alleys, these lanes, these courts, these dark
places, and have tried our best to take Jesus Christ's Gospel to every
dweller in it! I know you have your Sunday schools and I am thankful
you are doing your work there, but do not confine your aspirations to
that class. I know I have with this congregation work enough. Still I
am not bound to limit myself to any parish or to any locality, but if I
can, I must, as much as lies in me go in all directions and in all
manner of places to make known the Gospel to every creature! Have you
been the means of the conversion of fifty? That is not "every
creature," press on! Were there a 100 added to this Church the other
day? That is not "every creature"! There are millions yet to whom
Christ is not known! Preach the Gospel everywhere, then.
The majesty of this command overwhelms me! Such a commission was never
given before or since. O Church of God! Your Lord has given you a work
almost as immense as the creation of a world! No! It is a greater work
than that! It is to re-create a world! What can you do in this? You can
do nothing effectively, unless the Holy Spirit shall bless what you
attempt to do. But that He will do, and if you gird up your loins and
your heart is warm in this endeavor, you shall yet be able to preach
Jesus Christ to every creature under Heaven! I must not enlarge, for
time flies too quickly. It will suffice if I have put the thought into
your hearts, that to the servant girl and the duchess, the
chimney-sweep and the peer, the man in the poor house or in the palace,
we must account ourselves debtors for Christ's sake to present the
Gospel to them according to our ability, never limiting the sphere of
our enterprise where an opportunity can be found to carry the Gospel to
every creature!
III. But now, thirdly, some of you will be asking the INDUCEMENTS TO
ENLIST IN THIS SERVICE AND OBEY THIS COMMAND. It shall be sufficient
answer to many of you to say that the reason for preaching the Gospel
to every creature is that God has said it.
Oh, it was a grand shout–if it had been for a better purpose–when the
hundreds of thousands gathered together listening to the burning
eloquence of the hermit, when he bade them charge home against the
Saracens and deliver the holy sepulcher and the sacred places from the
infidel! Then the shout went up, "Deus vult," "God wills it," and in
the strength of that belief, that God willed it, "a forest huge of
spears was couched," and ten thousand swords were unsheathed and men
dashed on to battle and to death.
Oh, if the Christian Church could but feel "Deus vult," "God wills it,"
that now, even in this year of Grace, 1869, every creature should hear
the Gospel! I believe we have enough Christians here in London to make
London hear the Gospel. I mean, we have enough converted men and women,
if all bestirred themselves, to make London ring from end to end, as
once did Nineveh. One man awoke Nineveh with his monotonous cry, "Yet
40 days and Nineveh shall be destroyed." Surely the thousands might yet
be as firebrands in the midst of corn, if we were but in earnest about
this great command. "Deus vult," Believer! God demands this of you, is
not this enough?
But, if we seek arguments, let us remember that the preaching of the
Gospel is everywhere a delight to God. Papists tell us that the
offering up of what they call a "sacrament," is an acceptable oblation
to God. They miss their mark. The preaching of Christ–that is the true
oblation. God smells a sweet savor wherever the name of Jesus is
rightly proclaimed. Listen unto these words, "We are unto God a sweet
savor of Christ as well in them that perish as in them that are saved."
Wherever Christ is preached, God is glad. He is honored and Christ is
honored. Even if no result should come, (impossible supposition!) yet
still, the mere preaching of Christ is like the smell of evening
incense which goes up unto God and He accepts it.
Moreover, remember that you are bid to preach to every creature, each
of you, as far as you can, because it is by this means that the elect
are to be gathered out from among the sons of men. You know not who
they are, therefore tell of Christ to everyone. You know not who will
accept it. You know not whose heart will be broken by the Divine
hammer. It is yours to try the hammer of Truth on the hard heart. You
are not the discoverer of God's chosen, but the Gospel is, and as the
Gospel is preached it will attract to itself, by its own power, through
the Holy Spirit, such as God has ordained unto Eternal Life.
Brothers and Sisters, I pray you preach the Gospel of Jesus Christ, for
your own sakes, if there were no other reason. Depend upon it, your own
spiritual vigor will be very much enhanced by your labors of love and
your zeal for the service of Christ. I have remarked it is an
invariable thermometer by which to gauge the spirituality of a man's
heart. Whether he is either doing or not doing something for Christ
will tell upon his life and conversation. The tree is not only known by
its fruit, as to what kind of tree it is, but also as to what its
degree of life is. "If you keep His commandments and bring forth much
fruit, you are disciples, indeed," but if there is only a little fruit
shriveled there on the topmost bough, scarcely worth the gathering,
why, then, you are His disciples, but you can scarcely say that you are
His disciples, indeed!
Did you ever feel the joy of winning a soul for Christ? If so, you will
need no better argument for attempting to spread the knowledge of His
name among every creature! I tell you, there is no joy out of Heaven
which excels it–the grasp of the hand of one who says, "By your means
I was turned from darkness to light, rescued from drunkenness, or
reclaimed, perhaps, from the grossest vices, to love and serve my
Savior!" To see your spiritual children around you and to say, "Here am
I and these whom You have given me." Oh, the trials and griefs of life
sit lightly upon a heart where the triumphs of Divine Grace are
present! A man might well endure to stand and preach upon a bonfire, if
he could be sure that the burning of his body would secure the
salvation of his congregation! Do, for your own happiness' sake, seek
to teach to others what the Lord has first taught you.
I might multiply these reasons, but it will, perhaps, be best to come
back to the first one of all–your Master wills it and therefore preach
His Gospel to every creature. The day is coming when His Gospel shall
be known throughout the world. Many things have hindered it. Nights of
darkness, years of oppression have lasted long and the minds of men
have been sitting in the valley of the shadow of death. But, as surely
as God is God, better days are coming. "The light that shines from
Zion's hill" shall gild the top of every mountain. Every land shall yet
behold the feet of them that bring glad tidings and that publish
salvation. In spite of the prophecies of certain men in these days, I
still cling to the old faith of the Church that there shall be a
universal triumph of our holy faith before yet the world is given up to
the dissolving element.
The gods of the heathen shall be shaken from their pedestals. The
dispensation shall not end till those things which men have worshipped
shall be thrown to the moles and to the bats. God will yet drag the
harlot of the Seven Hills from her bloodstained throne and make the
kings of the earth burn her as with fire. The day of the vengeance of
our God for martyrs' blood shall yet come and Christ will not end this
conflict till He has brought down the two-edged sword upon the very
head of His adversary and has laid him prone in the dust. Have
patience, Brothers and Sisters, have patience! Things are progressing
well enough just now. Our hearts may well be encouraged. We have seen
what God's right hand has done for freedom in this, our land. Even now
the great pulse of time beats heartily and soundly and by God's good
Grace and His gracious, overruling Providence, it shall, by-and-by, be
seen that–
"The day of freedom dawns at length, The Lord's appointed day."
But, if it is ever to come, according to the past, it must come through
the efforts of God's children, for He ever works by means and will do
so, still. Up, you servants of God and do your duty diligently,
perseveringly, continuing to preach the Gospel to every creature, for
you are workers together with God! You are God's husbandry, His friends
and fellow helpers. Oh, if you would wish to share the joy of those
brighter ages! If you would, with blissful eyes, look down the vista of
time and foresee the swords beaten into plowshares, all prescient of
the day when the oppressors' thrones shall crumble in the dust–you
cannot look with hopeful eyes, with a strong nerve, on all this unless
you stretch forth your hands and say, "I will have a share in that! I
will have a share in it today! I will put my little ounce of power into
the Church! I will throw my little bit of might into her mission and
seek to tell every creature of the Gospel of Jesus Christ!"
IV. But now, closing up this address, we have our work before us and
our God to help us and we accept the challenge. Brothers and Sisters, I
call you together just as a master workman, when he has a work to do,
calls together his comrades and says, "Now, this is what we have to do.
WHAT POWERS HAVE WE TO WORK WITH, AND HOW CAN WE DO IT?" Those of us
who are specially called to preach the Gospel must take our part and go
on preaching it with all our might. Oh, it is blessed employment and
angels might well envy us, that we have such an office committed to us
as to preach the Gospel!
But, Brethren, you must not lay all the labor or all the responsibility
on one man. A one-man ministry is, indeed, a curse to any Church, if
that is the only ministry of the Church. All ministries must be used.
Are there not many of you who could preach? Let me earnestly entreat
you, if you can, to do so. Let no man who has gifts keep them back.
There are the streets, if you can find no other places, and let me say
that there is no better work done in London than that which is done in
the streets by the open air services. There are some who hear the
Gospel there who never would have heard it if the 12 Apostles had been
preaching in any of our places of worship! Use your ability in other
places if you can, but let every tongue that can speak, do so.
But all have not the ability to preach. We have some who can teach the
young. Are all who can teach the young engaged in that work? Any night
there are schools all around here where there will be twice as many
children as the teachers there present can instruct. It is not so with
any institution of ours, but there are dozens of schools around that
are inefficient simply for need of teachers. Our people are always
engaged in their schools. I have always said, "Never mind what sect it
is. If you can, go and teach there." But I must repeat that over and
over again, for I do not like to see these schools empty for lack of
teachers. It is a very happy thing to hear a sermon, but if you can
teach children, it is not your duty to prefer your pleasure to your
class.
Could not some of you do good in your own houses? Cottage meetings,
parlor meetings, drawing room meetings– these are all means of
usefulness. Have you tried them? "How many loaves have you?" So said my
Master. I want to count the loaves and tell my Master, and I am of an
opinion that there are some loaves never brought out of the baker's
basket, yet–some opportunities that have never yet been put to His
service. Search and see. How much good could some of you do by writing
letters to others concerning Christ? How many of you might do good by
circulating the printed word– Bibles and Gospel tracts and such
sermons as will be most likely to profit certain people if they read
them. To some of you, it, may be, there is committed the talent of
money. If you have not the golden tongue, be thankful that you have the
golden purse. Speak with that! You are as much bound to speak with that
as others with the golden mouth.
Whatever gift you may have, put it out at interest, like a good
steward, for your Master. Some of you may not be able to speak or to
give, but let your holiness and every power you have, according to your
ability and opportunity,
contribute to the great result of the Gospel being preached to every
creature. My joy and crown, my hope and my delight before God, are you
in the Lord, when I can perceive an earnest heart in you, O you, the
people of my charge! There are some here of whom I am not ashamed to
speak, whose piety is Apostolic, whose generosity and zeal are like
those of the early Church. But there are others of whom we may well
speak with hesitation, for if they are consecrated to Christ at all,
the consecration seems to have taken but small effect.
They are diligent enough in business, but as for fervency of spirit,
where is that? In what respects can they be said to serve the Lord? Let
each one begin to question himself, "What have I done to carry out the
Master's command?" And if you make up a sorrowful total, do not sit
down and waste the time in vain regrets, but be humbled and pray God
that no man's blood may be laid at your door. I do urge you–oh, how I
would do it if my tongue had language such as I desire to possess! But
let me urge you, every one of you–in the future be putting out the
fullness of your strength for Him whose bloody sweat and Cross and
passion have made you debtors to Him for your very lives! By Him who
died on yonder tree, accursed for you–by Him who went away to prepare
a place for you, and who stands pleading, still, at God's right hand
with never-ceasing zeal for you–I come in His name and at His command
to entreat and to exhort you to spend and be spent to glorify His name
among the sons of men!
Search out and see what you can do, and whatever your hands find to do,
do with all your might, for the grave will soon open for you and there
is no work nor service in the grave where you are hastening. "Up,
guards, and at them!" was said in the day of battle and I may still say
it to every Christian. In these days, when popery gathers her might and
infidelity shoots forth her poisoned arrows, let none of us be lacking
in the day of battle, lest the angels should say, as said the Angel of
the Lord, "Curse you, Meroz, curse you bitterly the inhabitants
thereof; because they came not to the help of the Lord, to the help of
the Lord against the mighty."
The best thing to do for truth and righteousness is to promote personal
piety and it will bring forth the outgrowth of personal effort. We
shall not bless the world by big schemes, mighty theories, gigantic
plans. Little by little grows the coral reef on which afterwards
gardens are to be planted. Little by little must the kingdom come, each
man bringing his mite and laying it down at Jesus' feet. So breaks the
light! Beam by beam it comes. One by one come the arrows from the bow
of the sun and at last darkness flies. So must break the everlasting
work. But let us be glad. If the work is slow it is sure. God will see
the work accomplished and when the morning comes the night shall not
succeed it, but it shall scatter the darkness forever. The Sun of
Righteousness goes no more down. The day of the world's morning shall
not tarry. The time of her halcyon days shall come, when the light of
the sun shall be as the light of seven days and the Lord God shall
dwell among men and manifest His Glory to the sons of men!
This last moment shall be just used for us to say that there are some
here whom we cannot tell to go and preach the Gospel, for they do not
know it themselves. And unto the wicked God says, "What have you to do
to declare My statutes?" To such we say, incline your ear and listen.
Jesus Christ has suffered that sinners might not suffer. He is God's
Son. He took the sins of Believers. He was punished in their place and
if you will trust Him you shall be saved. Trust Him, Sinner, trust Him!
May the Holy Spirit persuade you and give you faith and unto the Lord
Jesus shall be the glory, forever and ever. Amen.
PORTION OF SCRIPTURE READ BEFORE SERMON–Romans 10.