Delivered on Thursday Evening, April 21st, 1870 by
C. H. SPURGEON,
At the Metropolitan Tabernacle, Newington.
In aid of the Baptist Young Men's Missionary Association.
"I have preached righteousness in the great congregation: lo, I have
not refrained my lips, O Lord, thou knowest. I have not hid thy
righteousness within my heart, I have declared thy faithfulness and thy
salvation: I have not concealed thy lovingkindness and thy truth from
the great congregation."–Psalm 40:9,10.
WHO IS THE SPEAKER that gives utterance to these marvellous words? In
the first instance they must be understood to proceed from our Lord
Jesus Christ. By the Spirit of prophecy in the Old Testament they were
spoken of him, and by the Spirit of interpretation in the New Testament
they have been applied to him. Mark, then, how vehemently he here
declares that he has fully discharged the work which he was sent to
accomplish. When, in the days of his flesh, he was crying to his Father
for preservation in a season of dire distress, he might well ask that
he should then be helped, since all the previous strength he possessed
had been laid out in his Father's service. But because this profession
emphatically belongs to our Savior we need not suppose that it
exclusively belongs to him. On the other hand, Christ being our
forerunner and our example, we are encouraged to emulate the high
calling and the dutiful obedience he so perfectly exhibited.
I. UNDOUBTEDLY OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST, AS WE READ HIS HISTORY IN THE
FOUR EVANGELISTS, MOST GLORIOUSLY FULFILLED HIS LIFE-MISSION.
He was constantly testifying to the gospel of God, the gospel of his
righteousness and of his grace. From the first moment when he, being
full of the Holy Ghost, began to preach the gospel, until the day when
he was taken up into heaven, while he blessed his disciples, he was
instant in season and out of season. There were no waste moments of
time, no neglected opportunities, no talents held in reserve. "I must
work," was his motto. The zeal of God's house consumed him. It was his
meat and his drink to do the will of him that sent him. A marvellous
study is this life of Christ on earth; and as one looks at it thought
begets thought, for–
"Kindred objects kindred thoughts inspire,
As summer clouds flash forth electric fire."
Mark ye not how he concentrated every attribute of his nature, ever
faculty of his mind, and every power of his body in the one work he had
undertaken–to do his Father's will? He seems all his life through to
have challenged the enquiry, "Wist ye not that I must be about my
Father's business?" He was continually preaching the gospel. "Never man
spake as this man," may apply to the quantity as well as the quality of
his utterances. All places seemed to be alike suitable to his ministry.
Your gowns and your pulpits, your chancels and naves, your aisles and
transepts were of no account with him. He wanted no toga or rostrum,
nor did he need a preconcerted arrangement of the assembly to lend
grace to his discourses when he made known the word of God to the
people and astonished them with his doctrine. He could speak
anywhere–even along the crowded thoroughfare, where the multitudes
thronged him. He went down the lowest streets, and from the poorest
beggars he didn't turn aside. He was not thwarted by the sneers, and
sarcasms, and subtle questioning of the Pharisees and Sadducees. One
thought possessed him, and he persistently wrought it out. His
life-sermon as so thorough that nothing of earthly splendor could
allure or distract him, or break the thread. He was always and
everywhere either pleading with God for men, or else pleading with men
for God. The reiterated expressions of these two verses are
emphatically the truth: the asseverations are vehement, yet the effect
is a noble vindication of integrity. "I have preached righteousness in
the great congregation: lo, I have not refrained my lips, O Lord, thou
knowest. I have not hid thy righteousness within my heart; I have
declared thy faithfulness and thy salvation: I have not concealed thy
lovingkindness, and thy truth from the great congregation." He was the
great Witness for God, the great Testifier, who went proclaiming
everywhere the kingdom of God, and the good tidings of salvation to
man.
Do not these words likewise suggest to you the thought that Christ
testified frequently to the greatest crowds? "I have preached
righteousness in the great congregation. . . . I have not concealed thy
lovingkindness and thy truth from the great congregation." On the
hill-top, where his disciples came unto him and he began with his
benediction of "Blessed," the multitude that gathered together, when he
sat down and taught them, was doubtless imposing. The people sometimes
thronged to hear him in such numbers that the historian describes them
as innumerable, and tells us that they trod one upon another. From the
statement given us, that there were at one time five thousand and at
another time four thousand men, besides women and children, collected
together in the desert place and the wilderness, when he fed them, we
might reasonably infer that in populous places the crowds assembled on
a yet vaster scale. Of course, the whole population off Judea,
scattered all over the land, was scarcely equal to the population of
this city, and therefore greater crowds may be collected in London than
could have been gathered in Jerusalem; yet the concourse there must at
times have been exceedingly great and the spectacle unusually grand,
especially when at the great feast our Lord stood up before the people,
and rang out, in words clear and distinct–"If any man thirst, let him
come unto me and drink." Why, for years afterwards, the very tones of
his voice must have haunted the memories of those who stood and
listened to him, if they rejected the message. It is not easy to stand
up before a crowded assembly; let those who think so come and try.
Oftentimes it tests a man's valor. It brings him many trials to his
spirit to be prepared for the work. But our Lord Jesus Christ was fully
equipped for his blessed ministry. He was a great preacher, with a
great message, full of a great love, with a great Father by whom he was
commissioned, sustained, cheered. All the qualities of his character
and conduct were congruous. With a great assembly he was at home; for
his sympathy was mighty in its aggregate and minute in its detail. At
the same time, Christ did not want a great congregation to enable him
to preach. The first verse of our text, if I catch the heart of its
meaning, seems to me to intimate that he could speak personally to one
or to two: "Lo, I have not refrained my lips, O Lord, thou knowest."
From the court of human conscience to the court of divine omniscience
the appeal is carried. Fame hath not heard of this private fidelity.
Howbeit he that dwelleth in the heavens takes cognisance of it. "O
Lord, thou knowest, and canst bear witness to it. When there was but
one woman at the well's brink, I refrained not my lips." When there
were but two–his disciples, as he was going to Emmaus–he opened his
mouth. Whether they were those whom he had made or would make his
disciples, he had a word for all at all times and at all seasons. In
this we ought to imitate the Master. Be ready to tell of Christ not
only when your heart is prepared for it at a set time, but at all
times, whether you have prepared for it or not. Your spirit should be
always on the alert; you should always be on the watch for souls. Fain
would I be like the eagle that is on its way to the eyrie, and looks
for it long before it comes in sight, and no sooner discerns it than,
like a lightning-flash, it darts off and alights upon it. O for a heart
that is set on winning souls, that is set on glorifying God, that is
set on coming nearer to the model and being more conformed in this
matter unto Christ our Head! Our Lord could truly assert that he had
not kept back the gospel; he had preached it publicly to the crowds,
and he had declared it privately, as opportunity allowed. That he never
did seal his lips or stifle his testimony, he could call God to
witness.
Does not the tenth verse, in its first clause, intimate that Christ's
preaching was never heartless preaching? "I have not hid thy
righteousness within my heart." As if he had said, "It is in my heart,
but I have never concealed it there. What I have received of thee, O my
Father, I have made known unto the people: forsooth, thy will, which I
have observed in heaven, and engaged to fulfill on earth; thy
righteousness, as it appears in the justice of thy throne and the
benevolence of thy laws; thy faithfulness, as it is verified in the
stability of thy covenant and the perpetuity of thine ordinances; thy
salvation, as it was prepared in thy counsels of old, and is displayed
when thou makes bare thy right hand and thy holy arm; thy
lovingkindness which flows in one perpetual stream of mercy; and thy
truth, which sets the final seal to thy testimonies;–all these have I
treasured in my heart, not to hide them from the children of men, but
to manifest them for the glory of thy name and the welfare of thy
people." Is it so? Then this solemn protest before God is of vital
interest to us. Henceforth every word, every statute, every precept of
the gospel, comes to us distilled through the heart of Christ. I like
the idea of pouring our sermons out of our own hearts. They must gone
from our hearts, or they will not go to our hearers' hearts. But, oh,
how full of gracious secrets our hearts ought to be, priceless secrets,
which though hidden from the wise and prudent, are revealed unto babes!
Jesus, we thank thee for this, that thou hast not concealed thy
Father's lovingkindness and truth from us.
See, too, our Master kept always to vital matters. We notice here how
he uses words which show that his teaching had a distinct reference to
God. "I have not hid thy righteousness; I have declared thy
faithfulness and thy salvation; I have not concealed thy lovingkindness
and thy truth from the great congregation." Our Lord in his teaching
never seems to have diverged from the great central truth. We are too
apt to be taken up with the mere externals, and if we do not become
mere sectarians, it is just possible that points of our creed of the
least importance occupy the most prominent place in our thought and
conversation. Our Lord, with eagle eye, descries what is most important
for men to know, and upon that he dwells. Sinners must know of God's
righteousness; they will never know their sinfulness else, or knowing
it they will think it to be a little thing. The righteousness of God
comes like a stream of light into the soul, and reveals its corruption.
God's salvation, again, must be shown in its true colors. It does not
owe its origin, its accomplishment, or its application to our works or
our merits, but it proceeds from God's grace, and redounds to his
glory. I hold that this should be the cherished motive of the gospel
preacher, to glorify God! While it should be the chief end and aim of
Christians ordinarily, it is to be the chief end and aim of the
preacher extraordinarily. Beyond everyone else, he is concerned with
that which, beyond everything else, brings glory to him who is first,
last, midst, and without end. Jesus Christ preached God's
righteousness, and showed God's righteousness even in salvation, and
then he preached that salvation fully.
Nor, dear friends, did he withhold his testimony of the other
attributes of God. Think for an instant of God's faithfulness. Oh, what
a delightful theme! As immutability is a glory that belongs to all his
attributes, so faithfulness pertains to all his purposes and promises.
Well may his people everywhere rely upon his fidelity. Well may we tell
that we serve no mutable God. "He is not a man that he should lie;
neither the Soul of Man that he should repent. Hath he said, and shall
he not do it? Or hath he spoken, and shall he not make it good?"
Moreover he will rest in his love, "for the Lord will not forsake his
people for his great name's sake." He is "the Father of lights, with
whom is, no variableness, neither shadow of turning." His promises and
his threatenings abide steadfast. Side by side with the faithfulness of
God there is witness of his lovingkindness. Oh, what a glorious
revelation! the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ is the God of
pity and of pardon, the God of love. Not of love as with us, in a mere
effeminate sense, as though it were only an impulse of human admiration
that would wink at iniquities. He is Love, love in the essence, love
essentially divine; love consistent with holiness, that hums like
flames of fire. In justice deep and terrible is God; in majesty he doth
ride on the wings of the wind. This God of tempest, is the God of God,
and this is the God whom Jesus preached; and while he did not conceal
the sterner attributes of the Almighty, yet he did not forget to depict
the heart of mercy and the hand that is ready to help. The God whom he
preached is full of gentleness and tenderness. May we learn to believe
in the God and Father whom his only begotten Son Jesus Christ delighted
to make known, and if called to testify of Him may we testify fully and
heartily as Jesus did.
To sum up all, we may say that our Lord's three years' ministry was
matchless in its perfection, such as he could look back upon without a
single regret, but with unsullied complacency. It was matchless as to
its doctrines, and as to its completeness it was unsurpassed. More
might be said of his manner, which was full of tenderness to the men
among whom he walked, and of his majestic oratory, which we may admire
and seek to imitate, but which we can reach only at a distance, for it
is peerless beyond all competition, it stands alone; "Never yet man
spake like this man," shall be true of him to the world's end. All his
life long there is no flaw, there is no excess. "I have finished the
work which thou gavest me to do," he could truly say, as he laid down
his earthly ministry, and ascended to exercise his ministrations before
the throne. In the retrospect of his labors there was no occasion for
self-reproach, no cause for a fault to be found, even by the accuser of
the brethren. All was to be joy and rejoicing when he had completed his
life-work.
Thus much concerning our Lord. I have only opened the door for you to
enter. I wonder whether it will ever be given to us to be able to say,
as Christians, in our humbler measure, what he said, as the very Christ
in such exalted strains?
II. Let us now use the text IN REFERENCE TO OURSELVES.
It ought to be the ambition of every believer here, in a sense more or
less extensive, to be able to say, "I have preached righteousness; I
have not refrained my lips; I have not hid thy righteousness within my
heart; I have declared thy faithfulness and thy salvation; I have not
concealed thy and thy truth."
It is quite certain that many careless Christians will never be able to
lay this unction to their heart. In all our churches there is a very
large proportion of idle people. I hope they are saved; the Lord knows
whether they are or not, but whatever else they are saved from,
certainly they are not saved from laziness. We have in the visible
church a large proportion of flesh that is not living, or if it is
alive it gives very little indication of life. Now, I do like as pastor
to be in fellowship with a living church, all alive, and everybody
active. Though it may be our happy lot to have a goodly preponderance
in this church of living men and women, I know there is a considerable
portion of added flesh about it. Albeit, there are some portions of the
body which may be said to be ornamental, it is equally true that they
also have some distinct service; there is not one of them put there to
do nothing. Some Christians seem to think themselves "a thing of beauty
and a joy for ever" to the church, and that they have nothing to do in
it for the common weal. They must imagine that they are ornaments, for
certainly they are of no use, so far as any good offices are concerned.
It used to be almost thought that the whole duty of man consisted in
taking your sitting, paving your quarter's rent, filling up your place,
and listening with more or less attention to the sermons that were
preached. As to the idea of everybody doing something for Christ, and
the exhortation to them as good soldiers of the cross not to shirk
their duty, these people said that it was sheer madness. To do or dare,
to labor or suffer in the cause of the Captain of our salvation, was no
article of their creed. Sleepy souls, they presently become victims of
their own infatuation. As men who habituate themselves to take opium,
they grow soporific. Then their Christianity becomes like a dream. It
may be they are filled with flattering illusions, but in full many a
case they are scared with strange spectres that issue in the short
sighs, weak cries, and dismal groans of doubt and fear. Alas for them!
they will not be able to say, "I have preached righteousness; lo, I
have not refrained my lips, O Lord, thou knowest. I have not hid thy
righteousness within my heart; I have declared thy faithfulness and thy
salvation; I have not concealed thy lovingkindness and thy truth." Nay,
nay; when their conscience is awakened, they shall have poignant
regrets that they have neglected so many glorious opportunities of
bringing crowns to Christ.
Nor will cowardly people be able to make this protest. Many Christians
are of a retiring disposition, and their retiring disposition is
exemplified somewhat in the same way as that of the soldier who felt
himself unworthy to stand in the front ranks. He felt that it would be
too presumptuous a thing for him to be in front, where the cannon balls
were mowing down men on the right hand and on the left, and therefore
he would rather be in the van-guard. I always look upon those very
retiring and modest people as arrant cowards, and I shall venture to
call them so. I ask not every man and woman to rush into the front
ranks of service, but I do ask every converted man and woman to take
some place in the ranks, and to be prepared to make some sacrifice in
that position they choose or think themselves fit to occupy. But ah!
there are some who shrink back from any post that demands toil or
vigilance. When they were young their ardor was never kindled, the
spirit of enterprise was never stirred within them. Had they shown any
mettle then, they might have been lion-hearted now; had they done
Nothing then, their career of usefulness might have been in full vigor
now. But alas for the man upon whom there is the rust of wasted years;
he waits, he doubts, he parleys still, and shelters himself under a
fictitious humility. Would God I had more courage myself, but I will
tell you one thing, I dare not fold my arms, nor dare I hold my tongue;
it seems to me so awful a thing not to be doing good, and it seems to
me so dastardly a thing to shrink back when opportunities lie in one's
path. I do wish that some of you would learn to imitate the character
of the godly man–
"Who holds no parley with unmanly fears; Where duty bids, he
confidently steers,
Faces a thousand dangers at her call
And, trusting in his God, surmounts them all."
The cowards will not be able to say, "I have preached righteousness:
lo, I have not refrained my lips, O Lord, thou knowest. I have not hid
thy righteousness within my heart; I have declared thy faithfulness and
thy salvation: I have not concealed thy lovingkindness and thy truth."
Nor, again, will spasmodic people be able to adopt this language. There
are some people who, if there is a revival, are so marvellously zealous
and earnest that we are ready to clap our hands, but all on a sudden
they stop. That Sunday-school class they were just getting into right
order, but before there was an opportunity to reap the fruit they felt
it was not precisely what they were called to. That Young Men's Bible
Class–yes, that was a happy thought, the pastor was delighted; but,
unfortunately, some little difficulty occurred that you had not
foreseen, and that also has fallen through. So it has been in other
cases. Know therefore that those who cannot, like the Master, look back
upon a continuous and persevering testimony, will not be able to speak
with a clear conscience as he did.
But although so many classes of those who profess and call themselves
Christians will not be able to take a happy retrospect of their lives,
yet there are not wanting those who could do so. I have known men of
one talent who without any self-righteousness could say, "I have
preached righteousness; I have not regained my lips, O Lord, thou
knowest. I have not hid thy righteousness within my heart; I have
declared thy faithfulness and thy salvation; I have not concealed thy
lovingkindness and thy truth." Dear good men in many a country village
whose Dames will never be known to fame have gathered just a few people
together and have preached on, on, on for years, and when they come to
die in the Lord and rest from their labors, their works will follow
them, and their life-service will be as acceptable as the services of,
many men with ten times the talents and ten times the scope for their
exercise. Perhaps the Master will say to them, "Well done!" with a
stronger emphasis than to some who were better known. That poor girl
whose only work she could do for Christ was to teach those two little
children who were entrusted to her, and that nursery maid with but one
gift, and one only, may be able to say, "I have preached righteousness;
lo! I have not refrained my lips: I have declared thy faithfulness and
thy salvation; I have not concealed thy lovingkindness and thy truth."
You one-talent servants, you have this within your reach.
And those, too, with an extremely narrow sphere may be able to say
this. It is not, perhaps, the man who can stand and talk to thousands,
but it may be you in the family–the housewife, the kitchen maid, the
serving-man, or the woman who has been bed-ridden for years, whose only
audience will be a few poor neighbors, or perhaps, now and then, a
generous friend–it is you within these narrow spheres who may yet be
able to say, "I have preached righteousness; I have not refrained my
lips, O Lord, thou knowest; I have not hid thy righteousness within my
heart; I have declared thy faithfulness and thy salvation; I have not
concealed thy lovingkindness and thy truth." I have sat by a bedside
where I have envied the poor woman despite the agonies and pains of
body she suffered, because she yet could praise and magnify the
lovingkindness revealed to her there.
But, brethren, we may be, able to quote these words, some of us to whom
greater talents have been committed. Though we may feel that we have
not preached as earnestly as we could have wished; that we have not
done our utmost towards those whom we have taught; that in our
house-to-house visitation we have not been so earnest with poor souls
as we might have been in this respect, for alas! alas! we are all
unprofitable servants; yet we can say, "I have preached righteousness;
I have not refrained my lips, O Lord, thou knowest. I have not hid thy
righteousness within my heart; I have declared thy faithfulness and thy
salvation; I have not concealed thy lovingkindness and thy truth."
Fervently do I hope that those of you with the largest opportunities
may yet be privileged to make this good profession with all sincerity.
I am not afraid for those friends who have but narrow
spheres–sometimes I wish that mine were such–I am not afraid for
those in humbler fields, but oh, if with such spheres, and such
churches as God here and there allots to some of his servants, they can
thus give account of their stewardship, it will be grace indeed, and to
grace alone will the honor be due. Yet let us hope that we too may be
able to say, "I have preached righteousness in the great congregation;
lo, I have not refrained my lips, O Lord, thou knowest. I have not hid
thy righteousness within my heart; I have declared thy faithfulness and
thy salvation; I have not concealed thy lovingkindness and thy truth
from the great congregation."
III. It is with an overwhelming sense of the importance as well as the
moral grandeur of this profession that I repeat it to you again and
again; for when we are able to feel this, and to say it humbly and
confidently, with good faith and without guile, IT CASTS MUCH
COMFORTABLE LIGHT ON MANY SOLEMN subjects.
How awful to remember that every hour there are hundreds of men and
women who are dying without Christ. Turn to the bills of mortality of
this one city. Be our sentiments ever so charitable, let us judge with
the utmost liberality, the dreadful fact fills our mind, and every
knell speaks it to our heart, "They go out of this world unforgiven;
they go before their Maker's bar without a hope!" I think our hearts
would break with the dread recollection of this if we could not say, "I
have preached righteousness in the great congregation; lo, I have not
refrained my lips, O Lord, thou knowest. I have not hid thy
righteousness within my heart; I have declared thy faithfulness and thy
salvation: I have not concealed thy lovingkindness and thy truth from
the great congregation."
And how many deaths there always are among our hearers! What comfort
can any Christian who knows you have, if you die unsaved, unless he is
able to appeal to God, and say, "My Father, I did all I could to teach
that soul the way of salvation; I did all I could to persuade him to
accept the Christ of God"?
Dear friends, whenever you see any of your neighbors, your relatives,
your acquaintance die, can you forbear to ask yourselves, shall their
blood be required at my hands? Are your skirts stained? Are there no
blood drops there? Come, look them down, and say if you can ponder with
a clear conscience the fact of a sinner dying in a Christless state
without your being able to say, "I have done all I could to bring that
soul to Christ"?
And as for that dreadful outlook–the hereafter of the lost–would that
we could believe the softer theories which some so eagerly embrace! We
would, but dare not. We believe that those who die in their sins when
they pass from this life into the next, shall find that second death to
be no extinction of existence, but an eternity of sin and of misery,
Ah! how can any of us bear to think of this if we feel that we are
morally responsible for any one soul that is damned? Yet are we so, I
speak but the bare truth, until we have delivered ourselves from that
responsibility by faithful earnestness. Is there a Cain here who says,
"Am I my brother's keeper?" I shall not appeal to your most sympathetic
soul, but leave you to your Judge. But to the Christian I say, "No man
liveth to himself." When you think of a spirit in despair, cast out for
ever from the presence of his God and from the glory of his power, may
you, friends, be able to say, "Great God, though I understand not thy
ways, for thy judgments are a great deep; yet I warned the sinner, I
admonished him to lay hold on Christ, and if he perished it was not for
want of preaching to or for praying over; my warnings and tears were
never spared. I did what was in me to prevent his ruin." Put in that
light, we may look at least with some degree of serenity upon the
doctrine of divine sovereignty. I must confess that the sovereignty of
God is a great mountain whose top we cannot scale. I often marvel at
the coldness with which some men talk of the sovereignty of God, as
though it were of small concern whether men were lost or saved. They
seem to take these things as easily as if they were only talking of
blocks of wood, or fields filled with tares. I do not think that we can
equitably plead the divine sovereignty as a counterpart to our futile
efforts, till we can say, "I have done all that was possible to bring
that soul to God, I have prayed over him and wept over him, and now if
he perish I must believe that this man wilfully rejected Christ, that
his iniquities are upon his own head, and that in him, as a vessel of
wrath, God will get glory as well as in vessels of mercy.
The doom of the heathen is a subject in like manner of which it were
too painful for any of us to speak unless we can say, "I have, as far
as lieth in me, sought to do something for them." This is a thing about
which we ought not to think with any ease, unless we feel that we would
fain save them, and give them the knowledge of the gospel of Jesus
Christ; and to carry out this, our cherished purpose, we will do the
best we can.
The uprisings of error often cause us dismay. Every now and then we see
some old form of error spring up that was stamped out, as we supposed,
in the days of our ancestors. Not unfrequently a foul old heresy is
brought out as a brand new discovery, and all the world admires it, and
wonders whence it came. Now, whenever these old heresies crop up, and
are brought out as new, and lead men astray, it is a great comfort when
you and I are able to say, "I have preached righteousness in the great
congregation; lo, I have not refrained my lips, O Lord, thou knowest. I
have not hid thy righteousness within my heart; I have declared thy
faithfulness and thy salvation; I have not concealed thy lovingkindness
and thy truth from the great congregation." Let men propagate whatever
errors they choose, if we have no share in misleading the people, and
are continually engaged in instructing them, we may wrap ourselves in
our integrity, and lay the matter before our God to vindicate our
righteous cause.
The apathy of the church, which has lasted so long, is truly
disheartening. With many a deep-drawn sigh do we bewail it. O that we
could get the church to awake! You might sound the trump of the
archangel before you could rouse full many to the appalling destitution
by reason of which the people perish for lack of knowledge. Even the
cries of lost souls, and the shrieks of the sinners in this Metropolis,
rushing headlong to the pit that is bottomless, do not startle some of
us. Yes, but if we can say, "I have preached righteousness; I have not
refrained my lips, O Lord, thou knowest. I have declared thy
faithfulness and thy salvation," then we may take courage to work nobly
and to persevere under terrible difficulties. Though for awhile we
should see no conversions; and though for a season the ploughshare
should break against the rock, or against even the very adamant itself,
yet still if we can say, "I have preached righteousness, I have not
refrained my lips, O Lord, thou knowest. I have not hid thy
righteousness within my heart; I have declared thy faithfulness and thy
salvation; I have not concealed thy lovingkindness and thy truth"–we
are exonerated from blame; nay, more, we are unto God a sweet savor of
Christ in the testimony we have delivered. Yes, brethren, I apprehend
that amongst the sweetest dying-bed recollections, and amongst the
minor comforts, in taking our farewell of the world as it is, not the
least will be that of having been constant and faithful all our lives
to the gospel of Jesus Christ.
Give me a few minutes longer while I turn this sermon into the special
direction which it was intended to take. I do not know that there are
many more "young men" present to-night than there are usually at our
week-day lecture. I generally find when I preach a sermon for any of
our societies it so happens that everybody connected with the society
seems to stay away. They would be willing enough to come if it were for
the Primitive Methodist, or any other denomination. They are in love
with everybody else except their own relations. I do not say this by
way of censure, but surely if there be a people under heaven without a
grain of clannishness it is that denomination to which we belong. If it
had been a sermon for Jews or Turks the building would have been
crowded; but as it is for ourselves it does not signify. However, if
they are not present for whom it was intended, they may probably read
the sermon; so I will add a few words expressly for them.
Young man, it may be that you are one of those who ought to become a
missionary; it may be that you ought to dedicate your life to some work
for God either at home or abroad. Well, if it be so, do not mistake
your path in life. We do not urge you to rush into the ministry, much
less into the foreign ministry, unless you are called to it, for that
is the very last place for a man to be in who is not called to the
work. Act as a Christian young man for once in your life by asking
whether it may not be your vocation to bear the cross of Christ into
lands where as yet it is unknown. Surely, whatever answer you may feel
called upon to give you will be ready for it. You will at least be
willing to give yourself up to the very hardest form of service to
which you maybe called. I should like you, then, to be sure about this
on the outset lest you should in the turn of the road miss the path and
so not be able to say at the last: "I have preached righteousness; lo,
I have not refrained my lips, O Lord, thou knowest. I have not hid thy
righteousness within my heart; I have declared thy faithfulness and thy
salvation; I have not concealed thy lovingkindness and thy truth from
the great congregation." I should not like you, if meant by the gifts
of God for a great missionary, to die a millionaire. I should not like
it, were you fitted to be a missionary, that you should drivel down
into a king; for what are all your kings, what are all your nobles,
what are all your stars, what are all your garters, what are all your
diadems and your tiaras, when you put them all together, compared with
the dignity of winning souls for Christ, with the special honor of
building for Christ, not on another man's foundation, but preaching
Christ's gospel in regions yet far beyond? I reckon him to be a man
honored of men who can do a foreign work for Christ, but he who shall
go farthest in self-annihilation and in the furtherance of the glory of
Christ, he shall be a king among men, though he wear no crown that
carnal eyes can see. Ask yourselves the question then, Christian young
men, whether that is your vocation.
Should it happen that you feel convinced this is not your calling,
remember you may still in your daily business be able to say these
words. Some of my friends here never will be able to say them. They
have been church members for twenty years, and during all those twenty
years they have not preached righteousness, they have refrained their
lips, they have hidden his righteousness, they have not declared his
faithfulness and his salvation, they have concealed his lovingkindness
and his truth. You, young men and women, have an opportunity of doing
what is gone from them. Though they might publish Christ abroad from
now till they die, there are twenty years they must ever regret and
look back upon as waste land for which they will have to give an
account at the last. You have, it may be, those twenty years before
you, and it is a noble thing to begin working young, and so long as
ever you live to go on building on that work. I have heard it said that
you should not put young converts to work for which they are not
qualified. Ah! say I, put the youngsters in; they will never learn to
swim if they are not put in at once. Why should you, young men and
women, be received as church members at all unless you are prepared to
do something for Christ? Work becomes you as well as worship. I mean,
of course, if not disqualified by sickness, and even then there is a
sphere for testimony. You can make a sick bed a pulpit to preach
Christ, while by patience and resignation you show forth his praise. No
one should join a church without seeking out something to do for the
glory of Jesus Christ. Do start your lives, young men, with high
purpose, that you may close them with holy cheer.
In order to do this, you will need much more zeal than you are likely
to possess by making resolutions, and much more grace than you will
ordinarily get without much self-denial and devout consecration. You
have need to be baptised into the Holy Ghost and in fire. I do like
those converts who are thoroughly purged from the corruptions of the
world, and thoroughly converted to God, every faculty of the mind and
every member of the body being surrendered to Christ, all of them as
instruments of righteousness. We seem to get some people who are not
half converted. I hope their hearts are converted, but the effect is
not to drain their pockets or to set their hands to work.
You need, dear friends, to go much to Jesus Christ, to live much in
communion with him, for this life-service has many expenses, and you
have no ready money. You must go to the great exchequer of the King of
kings and draw from its inexhaustible treasury. Do so. Do resolve to
live lavishly in the service of Christ, and the divine storehouse will
supply all that you need, be your ambition as large as it may.
There are habits, it is true, to be acquired which must be the result
of growth, for they cannot be matured without the manifold experience
of sunshine and shower, summer and winter, heat and cold; to all of
these you will be exposed. But when once you have yielded ourselves to
those divine influences which foster life, you will prove that by all
these things men live. To this I can bear you witness. Drudgery ceases
to be irksome when the ruling passion of laboring for the Lord has
begun to ferment in your breasts, and the sweet assurance that your
labor is not in vain in the Lord has quickened a sacred enthusiasm in
your spirit. It may be that in your apprenticeship you have to
encounter many hardships, but it shall be that in the full discharge of
your vocation you will reap a harvest of joy.
God help you never to refrain from preaching the truth, never to
withhold any part of it; may you be clear in all these matters as
before the living God.
Oh! yours will be cheerful dying if you familiarise yourselves with
such noble living as this. You will have a welcome entrance into heaven
if such has been your life on earth. The pastor, when he can preach no
more the gospel, will say, "I preached when there was time, and now I
will sing when sermons all are o'er." You Sunday-school teachers cannot
teach any longer, but your Sabbath recreations below will prove the
sweet prelude to your Sabbatic felicities above. Tract distributors,
now that all your work is over, you will say, "I did but distribute the
leaves of the tree of life for the healing of the people, but now I
feed myself on all its luscious fruits."
I do not say that rewards are given as mere rewards of merit, but this
I do assuredly know, there are rewards given in respect of service
through the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, and I pray you seek the
prize. So run that you may obtain it. May you be able to say, "While I
was down below where service could be done for my Master–
"In works which perfect saints above,
And holy angels cannot do,"
with all my might I labored to excel, and now I enter into the bliss of
him who helped and strengthened me, who revealed his grace in me, and
counted me worthy to put me into some part of the ministry of his
church."
God bless you, dear friends, and make you earnest to tell to others
those things he has made known unto you, for our Lord Jesus Christ's
sake. Amen.
PORTION OF SCRIPTURE READ BEFORE SERMON–Psalm 40.