The Security of the Church

The Security of the Church

A Sermon

(No. 161)

Delivered on Sabbath Morning, November 1, 1857, by the

REV. C.H. SPURGEON

at the Music Hall, Royal Surrey Gardens.

"As the mountains are round about Jerusalem, so the Lord is round about
his people from henceforth even for ever."–Psalm 125:2.

THE CHANGES of society may well illustrate the immutability of God. In
the days of David, Jerusalem was looked upon as an impregnable
fortress. It is surrounded by a natural rampart of hills; and appears
to lie in the center of an amphitheatre raised purposely for its
defense. By the ancient Jew it was considered to be an impregnable
citadel. How changed now are the manners of war! A small troop could
easily take the city, and it must indeed be a strong army that would be
able to garrison it in its present condition. Yet whilst Jerusalem is
changed, and the figure has become inappropriate, Jerusalem's God
remains, for with him is "no variableness, neither shadow of turning."
We must this morning consider the text, not as we should understand it
in our day, but as we should have understood it in David's time. David
looked upon the city of Jerusalem, and he thought within himself, "No
army can ever be able to surprise this city, and however numerous may
be the invading hosts, my people will always be able to hold their own
in the midst of a city so firmly fortified both by nature and by art."
In his time, indeed, and in the time of his son Solomon, I suppose it
would have been utterly impossible for any enemy, possessed only of the
tactics of ancient warfare, to have scaled those mighty ramparts of
earth which God had piled about the city. And therefore, when David
said in his day, "As the mountains are round about Jerusalem, so the
Lord is round about his people;" he meant this–"As Jerusalem is
fortressed by the mountains, so are God's people castled in the
covenant, fortressed in the Omnipotence of God, and therefore they are
impregnably secure. We shall thus understand the text, and endeavor
this morning to work out the great thought of the security of God's
people in the arms of Jehovah their Lord.

We shall consider the text, first, as relating to the Church as a
whole, and then we shall endeavor to note how it applies to every
individual in particular.

I. FIRST, THE CHURCH AS A WHOLE is secured by God beyond the reach of
harm. She is ably garrisoned by Omnipotence, and she is castled within
the faithful engagements of the covenant. How often has the Church been
attacked; but how often has she been victorious? The number of her
battles is just the number of her victories. Foes have come against
her; they have compassed her about, they have compassed her about like
bees, but in the name of God she has destroyed them. The bull of Bashan
and the dog of Belial, the mighty and the insignificant, have all
conspired to overthrow the Church; but he that sitteth in heaven hath
laughed at them, the Lord hath had them in derision, and his church
hath been as Mount Zion, which cannot be removed, but which abideth for
ever. Turn ye now to the roll of history and read how the Church has
been fortressed by God, when fiercely attacked by men.

1. Persecution has unsheathed its bloody sword, and sought to rend up
the Church by its roots, or fell it with its axe. Tyrants have heated
their furnaces, have prepared their racks, have erected their stakes,
the martyrs of Christ have been dragged by thousands to a terrible
death, the confessors have had to stand forth at the risk of their
lives, protesting the gospel of God against the dominant of the times.
The little flock has been scattered hither and thither, and the dogs of
persecution have worried them in every corner whither they have fled.
Into every nation of the earth have they wandered; in sheepskins and
goatskins have they been clothed; their houses have been in the rocks
and their sleeping places in the caves of the earth. Like the stag
pursued by the hounds, they have not had a moment's space for so much
as to take their breath. But has the Church been subdued? Has she ever
been overcome? O God, thou hast proved the invincibility of thy truth;
thou hast manifested the power of thy Word, for thou hast not only
preserved thy Church in the time of greatest trouble, but, blessed be
thy name thou hast made the hour of her peril the hour of her greatest
triumph. You will find that whenever the Church has been the most
persecuted she has been the most successful. The heathen Pro-consuls
wondered when they saw the many who were prepared to die. They said,
"Surely a madness must have seized upon mankind, that they cannot be
content to commit suicide, but are so fond of death that they must come
to our bar and plead that they are lovers of Christ as if they sought
to compel us to execute them." God gave grace for the moment and in the
day of persecution he braced the nerves of his people, and made them
mighty to do or die, as God would have it. But, surely, had not
Christ's Church been surrounded by the mountains of God's Omnipotence,
she must have fallen a prey to her numerous enemies.

2. But by-and-bye the devil grew wiser. He saw that overt persecution
would not suffice for the putting down of God's Church, and he
therefore adopted another measure not less cruel but more crafty. "I
will not only slay them," said he, "I will malign them." Did you ever
read in history the horrible reports which were set afloat in the early
ages of Christianity concerning the Christians. I dare not tell you
with what vices the early Christians were charged in their private
assemblies. It is certain that they were the purest and most virtuous
of men, but never were men so fearfully belied. The very heathens who
revelled in vice, despised the followers of Jesus on account of crimes
which the voice of the liar had laid to their charge. A few years
elapsed and the mud which had been cast upon the snow-white garments of
Christ's Church fell off from them, leaving them whiter than before,
the clouds that sought to obscure the light of the heaven of the gospel
were blown away, and "fair as the moon and clear as the sun" the
innocence of Christ's Church shone forth again. But the devil has
adopted the same plan in every period. He has always sought to slander
any race of Christians who are the means of revival. I would not
believe any minister to be eminently successful, if I were informed
that everybody praised him. I am certain that such a case would be an
exception, a glaring exception to all the rules of history. You
remember what was said of Whitfield in his day. He was charged with
crimes that Sodom never knew; and yet a more pure and heavenly man God
never sent to tread this wicked earth. And it ever must be so. The
Church struggling with sin and wickedness, must through the enmity of
the evil one find herself bespattered and besmeared with slander. The
wicked when they can do nothing else against the righteous, will spit
falsehood on them. But has the Church suffered through their slander,
or hath ever a solitary Christian lost aught by it? No, the Lord God
who set the mountains round about Jerusalem has so put himself about
his people, that no weapon that is formed against us shall prosper, and
every tongue that riseth against us in judgment we shall condemn. This
is the heritage of the people of the Lord. Fear not, O Church of
Christ, the slimy serpent of slander for even in thy cradle, like
Hercules, when the snakes of slander came against thee thou didst slay
them in thine infantile grasp, more than a conqueror through him that
loved thee. And now that God is with thee, and the shout of a king in
thy midst, fear not, though all men should speak against thee, thy
Master will yet honor thee, and thou wilt come up from the pool of
slander like a sheep from the washing, the fairer for thy black
baptism, the more admired, the more lovely for all the scorn and
ignominy that men have cast upon thee.

3. Again, Satan learned wisdom, and he said, "Now inasmuch as I cannot
destroy this people, neither by sword nor slander, lo, this will I do,
I will send into their midst wolves in sheeps clothing, I will inspire
divers heretics, carried away with their own lusts, who shall in the
midst of the church promulgate lies and prophecy smooth things in the
name of the Lord. And Satan has done all this with a vengeance. In
every era of the church there have been numberless bands of heretics.
Only a small company have in certain times adhered to the truth, whilst
the mass of professing Christians have gone aside and have perished in
the gainsaying of Korah. Look at the earliest days of Christianity.
Scarcely were the apostles in their graves, and their souls in
paradise, than there sprang up men who denied the Lord that bought
them–some who did evil that good might come, whose damnation was just.
Heresies of all kinds began to spring up, even in the first fifty years
after the departure of our Master. Since that time the world has been
very prolific of every shape and form of doctrine except the truth, and
down to these modern times heresies have prevailed. Now behold how
Satan seeks to quench the light of Israel. There is the heresy of Rome,
she that sitteth upon many waters seeketh as far as she can to delude
the Church, and to draw the rest of the world aside from the truth of
God. She, with all the craft of hell, seeketh to proselyte where'er she
may from those who are the professed followers of the truth; she will
change her shape in every land; in her own dominions she will build the
dungeon, and practice intolerance–in a land of freedom she can plead
for liberty, and pretend to be its warmest friend. Base harlot that she
is, her whoredoms have not yet ceased, nor is the cup of her
fornications full. She seeketh still to devour the nations and swallow
them up quick. There is her sister the Puseyism of the Church of
England, I speak nothing now concerning my evangelical brethren. God
Almighty shield them and bless them! My only marvel is, that they do
not come out altogether, and touch not the unclean thing. But, alas,
Puseyism is seeking to eat out the very vitals of our godliness,
telling the masses that the priest is everything–putting down Christ
and exalting the man, putting baptismal water in the place of the
influences of the Divine Spirit, and exalting sacraments into the place
which is only to be held by the Lord our God. Truly this dangerous and
deceptive, beautiful and foolish system of religion is much to be
feared, although we know that the true Church of God must ever be safe,
for against her the gates of hell shall not prevail.

Alas! that we should have to say something else! and this concerning
those who are commonly called evangelical, who have a form of error
more insidious and evil still. Alas that I should have to "cry aloud
and spare not," concerning these matters. These are days when a false
charity would have us hold our tongues against the evils that we hate.
My brethren, in the midst of our dissenting churches especially there
is a system which does not deserve the name of system, except from its
systematic desire to crush every system. There is a system springing up
which takes out of the Gospel every truth that makes it precious plucks
every jewel out of the crown of the Redeemer, and tramples it under the
foot of men. In a large number of our pulpits at this time you will not
hear the Gospel preached by a month together. Anything else you like
you may hear preached: Anti-state Churchism, political affairs–these
are the current staple of the day; Christ and him crucified may go to
the dogs for them. Polities fill up the pulpits, and philosophy stands
in the place of theology. And when there is a little theology, what say
they? Instead of exalting the Holy Spirit as the first and prime agent,
they are ever exhorting men to do what only God's Spirit can do for
them, and not reminding them that the effectual grace of God is
necessary; the covenant, the "everlasting covenant, ordered in all
things and sure" is sneered at the banner once held so manfully by
Calvin, who took it from the hand of Augustine leaping over centuries
to grasp it, who again received it from the hand of the apostle
Paul–the banner of the old fashioned truth is to a great degree
furled, and we are told that these old doctrines are effete and out of
date. Puritanical divinity, they say, is not the divinity for these
times; we must have a new gospel for a go-a-head era. We must have
sermons preached which, if they be not absolute denial of every
doctrine of the gospel, are at least sneers at them all. The man
effects to be so supremely wise, that he in his own brain can devise a
gospel better, fairer than the ancient gospel of the blessed God, Now,
this is one of the attempts of the enemy to put down the truth, but he
will never be able to do it, for "As the mountains are round about
Jerusalem, so the Lord is round about his people from henceforth even
for ever."

I will not be hard, but I must say a word to many of my brethren of the
denomination to which I belong. There are many of you call yourselves
Particular Baptists, by which you mean that you are Calvinists, and
yet, gentlemen, your consciences are easy, and some of you have never
preached upon election since you were ordained. The peculiarities of
"the five points" are concealed. These things, you say, are offensive.
And so, gentlemen, you would rather offend God than you would offend
man. But you reply, "These things, you know, are high doctrines; they
had better not be preached: they will not be practical." I do think
that the climax of all man's blasphemy is centred in that utterance.
Will you dare to say, "There are some parts of God's truth that we do
not want to preach to the people." Tell me that God put a thing in the
Bible that I am not to preach! You are finding fault with my God. But
you say, "It will be dangerous." What! God's truth dangerous? I should
not like to stand in your shoes when you have to face your Maker on the
day of judgment after such an utterance as that. If it be not God's
truth, let it alone; but if you believe the thing, out with it. The
world will like you just as well for being honest, and if the world
does not your Master will. Keep back nothing; tell the whole gospel
out. Tell out man's responsibility: do not stutter at it. Tell out
divine sovereignty: do not refuse to talk of election, use the word,
even if they sneer, tell men that if they believe not the blood is on
their own heads, and then if the high people turn against you, snap
your finger in their face; tell them you do not care–that to you it is
nothing, nothing at all to please man; your Master is in heaven, and
him will you please, come fair, come foul. This done, Satan would be
balked and defeated; but at the present moment, he is mightily striving
thus to overthrow the church by ill doctrine.

4. The craftiest invention of the devil, with which he seeks, in the
last place to put out the church, is a device which has amazed me above
every other. "Now;" says Satan, "If I can quench the church, neither by
persecution, nor slander, nor heresy, I will invent another mode of
destroying her." And I have often marveled at the depths of deceit
which are centred in this last invention of Satan. Satan seeks to
divide the church, to set us apart from one another, and not allow
those who love the same truth to meet with each other and to work
together in love, and peace, and harmony. "Now," says the devil, "I
have it. Here is one body of good men–they are very fond of one part
of God's truth. Now, there are two sets of truths in the Bible. One set
deals with man as responsible creature, the other class of truths deals
with God as the infinite Sovereign, dispensing his mercy as he pleases.
Now these dear brethren are very fond of man's responsibility: they
will preach it, and they will preach it so that if they hear the
brother over the other side of the street preach God's sovereignty,
they will be very wroth with him. And then I will make the brethren who
preach divine sovereignty forget the other part of the truth, and hate
the brethren that preach it." Do you not see the craft of the enemy?
Both of these good men are right; they both preach parts of truth; but
they each so set their part of truth at the top of the other that a
rivalry commences. Why, I have stepped in and heard a godly brother
preach a sermon that sent my blood through my veins at a most rapid
rate, whilst he earnestly preached of sin, of righteousness, and of
judgment to come but he spoilt all his sermon by indirectly
hinting–"Now, take care you don't hear Mr. So-and-so, because he will
contradict all this, and tell you that you are saved by grace, and that
it is not of yourself but it is the gift of God." I went, of course,
and heard the good man, because I was told not to go. Well, he was
preaching that "it is not of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of
man, but of God," and I thought he handled the text very manfully, when
he showed that God was the author of all salvation; only in a
parenthesis he told us not to go to that work-mongering shop on the
other side of the road. Why, they were both right, but they had each
got different parts of the truth; one, that truth which dealt with man
as responsible; the other, that which deals with God as a Sovereign;
and the devil had so perverted their judgment that they could not see
that both things were true, but they must go fighting each other just
to make sport for Satan. Now, I wonder that the church has not been
utterly destroyed by this last device, for it is the craftiest thing, I
believe, that Satan has yet brought under our notice, though without
doubt his depths are too deep for our understanding. But, brethren,
despite all this, let bigotry rave, let intolerance rail till it goes
mad, the church is just as secure, for God hath set himself round about
her, "even as the mountains are round about Jerusalem, from henceforth
even for evermore."

And now just notice, before we leave this point, that as the Church
always has been preserved, the text assures us she always will be,
henceforth even for ever. There is a nervous old woman here. Last
Saturday night she read the newspaper, and she saw something about five
or six clergymen going over to Rome: she laid down her spectacles, and
she began crying, "Oh! the Church is in danger, the Church is in
danger." Ah! put your spectacles on; that is all right; never mind
about the loss of those fellows. Better gone; we did not want them; do
not cry if fifty more follow them, do not be at all alarmed. Some
church may be in danger, but God's Church is not. That is safe enough,
that shall stand secure, even to the end. I remember with what alarm
some of my friends received the tidings of the geological discoveries
of modern times, which did not quite agree with their interpretation of
the Mosaic history of the creation. They thought it an awful thing that
science should discover something which seemed to contradict the
Scriptures. Well, we lived over the geological difficulty, after all.
And since then there have been different sets of philosophic infidels,
who have risen up and made wonderful discoveries, and poor timid
Christians have thought, "What a terrible thing! This surely will be
the end of all true religion; when science can bring facts against us,
how shall we be able to stand?" They just waited about another week,
and on a sudden they found that science was not their enemy, but their
friend, for the Truth though tried in a furnace like silver seven
times, is ever a gainer by the trial. Ah! ye that hate the church, she
shall ever be a thorn in your side! Oh! ye that would batter her walls
to pieces, know this, that she is impregnable, not one of her stakes
shall be removed, not one of her cords shall be broken. God hath fixed
her where she is, and by divine decree established her on a rock. Do
you hate the Church? Hate on: it will never be moved by all your hate.
Do you threaten to crush it? It shall crush you, but you shall never
injure it. Do ye despise and laugh at it? Ah! the day is coming when
the laugh shall be on the other side. Wait a little while, and when her
Master shall suddenly come in his glory, then shall it be seen on whose
side is the victory, and who were the fools that laughed.

Thus we have disposed of the first point; THE CHURCH impregnably
secure, fortressed, and castled by God.

II. What is true of the mass is true of the unit. The fact which
relates to the Church includes in it EVERY MEMBER OF THE CHURCH. God
has fortressed his people; so that every believer is infallibly secure.
There are in the world certain people who teach that Christ gives grace
to men, and tells them, "Now, you shall be saved it you will persevere;
but this must be left to yourself." This reminds me of an old
Puritanical illustration, "The Duke of Alva having given some prisoners
their lives, they afterwards petitioned him for some food. His answer
was, that, he would grant them life but no meat.' And they were
famished to death." The deniers of final perseverance represent the
Deity in a similar view. God promises eternal life to the saints if
they endure to the end,' but he will not secure to them the continuance
of that grace without which eternal life cannot be had! Oh! surely if
that were true, eternal life were not worth a fig to any of us. Unless
our God who first saves us did engage to keep us alive and to provide
for all our necessities, of what use were eternal life at all? But we
bless his name,

"Whom once he loves he never leaves,

But loves them to the end."

Once in Christ, in Christ for ever,

Nothing from his love can sever."

The Christian is fortified and secured from all harm. And yet, O child
of God, there be many that will seek to destroy thee, and thy fears
will often tell thee that thou art in the jaws of the enemy. Providence
will often seem against thee, thine eyes shall be seldom dry; it may be
funeral shall follow funeral. Loss shall follow loss; a burning house
shall be succeeded by a blasted crop. The Christian in this world is
not secured against the perils which happen to manhood. Oh! child of
God, it may seem that all things are against thee; perhaps all God's
waves and billows will go over thee; thou mayest know what hunger, and
nakedness, and thirst do mean; thou mayest be found in this world
houseless, friendless, fatherless, motherless, but oh! remember, that
neither famine, nor hunger, nor poverty, nor sickness, nor weakness,
nor contempt, can separate thee from the love of God, which is in
Christ Jesus thy Lord. Thou mayest sink ever so low, but thou canst
never sink lower than the arm of God can reach. Thy poor ship may be
drifted before the gale, but it shall never go so fast but God can keep
her off the rocks. Be of good cheer, the trials of this mortal life
shall work out for thee "a far more exceeding and eternal weight of
glory."

Again, you may be tempted by the world! traps may be set for you on
every hand, you may be tempted by your flesh, your corruptions may have
great power over you, and often stagger your faith, and make you
tremble, lest you should be utterly overthrown, and the devil may set
upon you with fiery darts, he may pierce you with foul insinuations, he
may almost make you blaspheme, and with terrible suggestions he may
drive you well-nigh to despair. But oh! remember,

"Hell and thy sins obstruct thy course,

But hell and sin are vanquished foes;

Thy Jesus nailed them to his cross

And sang the triumph when he rose."

And thou mayest, too, be overcome by sin. Thou mayest fall God grant
thou mayest not; but though thou be kept eminently consistent and
extremely virtuous, thou wilt sin and sometimes that sin will get such
a head against thee that thou canst scarcely stem the torrent.
Conscience will whisper, "How couldst thou be a child of God, and yet
sin thus?" And Satan will howl in thine ears, "He that sinneth knoweth
not God." And so thou wilt be ready to be destroyed by thy sin. But do
thou then, in the hour of thy dark distress, read this verse–"As the
mountains are round about Jerusalem, so the Lord is round about his
people from henceforth even for ever." Be thou confident in this, that
even sin itself shall not be able to cut the golden link which joins
thee to thy Saviour.

Have you never heard the sermons of those people who believe in the
apostacy of the saints? Have you not heard them very pathetically
enlarge on the dangers of Christians? They say, "Yes, you may serve God
all your life, but perhaps in the last article of death your faith may
faint, sin may prevail, and you may be destroyed." And they illustrate
their very beautiful and comfortable idea by the figure of a ship
foundering just as she reaches the harbour. Now, many wooden ships, I
doubt not, do founder, and many ships built in free-will dockyards
founder too; but the chosen vessels of mercy are insured against
perishing, and were never known to be shipwrecked yet. As an old divine
says, there are no wrecks to be seen on the sea which rolls between
Jerusalem on earth and Jerusalem above. There are many tempests, but
never any shipwrecks. Bishop Hooker sweetly says "Blessed for ever and
ever, be that mother's child whose faith hath made him the child of
God. The earth may shake, the pillars thereof may tremble under us, the
countenance of the heavens may be appalled, the sun may lose his light,
the moon her beauty, the stars their glory, but concerning the man that
trusted in God, if the fire have proclaimed itself unable as much as to
singe a hair of his head; if lions, beasts ravenous by nature and keen
by hunger, being set to devour, have, as it were, religiously adored
the very flesh of a faithful man; what is there in the world that shall
change his heart, overthrow his faith, alter his affections towards
God, or the affection of God to him?" Oh, when we once believe this
doctrine and receive it in our hearts as true, what a tendency it has
to make the spirit buoyant in the deep waters, to enable us to sing in
the midst of the fierce billows. Who need fear, if our salvation is
made secure by the covenant of God?

And now for a few moments, without detaining you too long, I will try
to show some reasons why it is quite certain that the believer cannot
by any possibility perish. I want to do this, because I have a
multitude of letters from this large congregation every week, and I
have to say to the glory of God, there are many of those letters that
make me so glad I can scarcely contain myself, whilst others arouse all
the anxiety of my heart. Among them is one something like this. "Sir, I
know that I was once a child of God; many years ago I had such
delightful feelings, and such ecstacies, that I cannot doubt but what
if I had died then I should have gone to heaven; but now, sir, I am in
such distress that I am quite sure if I were to die now I should be
lost." Now, my brother, I know you are here. You may take it to
yourself. There are only two solutions to your mystery. If you were a
child of God then, you are a child of God now, and if you would have
gone to heaven then you will go to heaven now, be you what you may; if
you ever were regenerated, regeneration is a work that is never done
but once, and if it has been done once for you, it has not lost its
efficacy–you are a child of God yet. But I am inclined to think you
never were a child of God: you had a few fine ecstacies; but you never
knew the plague of your own heart; I am afraid, young man, you were
never taken into God's stripping room, never were tied up to the
halberts, and never had the ten-thonged whip of law on your back. But,
anyhow, do not tell me any more that you were converted once but not
now, because if you were converted to God, God would have kept you.
"The righteous shall hold on his way, and he that hath clean hands
shall wax stronger and stronger."

And now shall I tell you why it is certain a believer cannot perish? In
the first place, how can a believer perish if that Scripture be true,
which saith, that every believer is a member of Christ's body! If you
will only grant me my head afloat above the water I will give you leave
to drown my fingers. Try it: you cannot do it. As long as a man's head
is above the flood you cannot drown him–it is clean impossible–nor
yet drown any part of his body. Now, a Christian is a part of Christ,
the Head. Christ, the head of the body, is in heaven, and until you can
drown the head of the body, you cannot drown the body, and if the head
be in heaven, beyond the reach of harm, then every member of the body
is alive and secure, and shall at last be in heaven too. Dost thou
imagine, O heretic, that Christ will lose a member of his body! Will
Christ dwell in heaven with a mangled frame? God forbid! If Christ hath
taken us into union with himself, though we be the meanest members of
his heavenly body, he will not allow us to be cut away. Will a man lose
a arm, or a leg, or an hand, whilst he can help himself? Ah! no, and
whilst Christ is omnipotent, nought shall pluck his children from his
body, for they are of "his flesh and his bones."

But again: how can a believer perish, and yet God be true? God has said
"When thou passest through the rivers I will be with thee, and the
floods shall not overflow thee." Now, if they should overflow us, how
can God be true? "When thou passest through the fires thou shalt not be
burned, neither shall the flame kindle upon thee." Then if we could
ever find a believer consumed, we could prove God's promise broken. But
we cannot do that. God is with his children, and ever will be. Besides
has he not said, "I give unto my sheep eternal life, and they shall
never perish, neither shall any pluck them out of my hands?" Ay,
beloved, how can God be God, and yet his people plucked out of his
hand? Surely he were no God to us, if he were unfaithful to a promise
so oft repented and so solemnly confirmed. Besides, mark ye this. If
one saint should fall away and perish, God would not only break his
word, but his oath, for he hath sworn by himself, because he could
swear by no greater, "that by two immutable things, in which it was
impossible for God to lie, we might have a strong consolation, who have
fled for refuge to lay hold upon the hope set before us." No, an
oath-breaking God, a promise-despising Jehovah, were an impossibility;
and therefore a perished child of God is alike impossible.

But we need not fear, beloved, that we shall ever perish, if we love
the Saviour for the last reason is all potent. Will Christ lose that
which he has bought with his own blood? Yes, there are men with
judgments so perverted, that they believe Christ died for those that
are damned, and bought with his own blood men that perish. Well, if
they choose to believe that, I do not envy them the elasticity of their
intellects; but this I conceive to be but an axiom, that what Christ
has paid for so dearly with his own heart's blood he will have. If he
loved us well enough to bear the excruciating agonies of the cross, I
know he loves "well enough to keep us to the end." If when we were
enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more
being reconciled we shall be saved by his life." For I am persuaded
that he that spared not his own life, but delivered it up for his
people, will not withhold aught that Omnipotence can "ire.

And now I close by addressing myself for a moment or two to ungodly
persons present. Thinking persons they must be, or else what I say will
not be likely to be noticed by them. When I was a boy I remember having
a meditation something like this: "Now, I should not like to be a thief
or a murderer, or an unclean person." I had such a training that I had
an abhorrence of sin of that sort. "And yet," thought I to myself, "I
may be hung yet; there is no reason why I should not turn out a thief,"
because I recollected there were some of my schoolfellows, older than I
was, who had already become very eminent in dishonesty; and I thought,
"why may not I?" No one can tell the rapture of my spirit, when I
thought I saw in my Bible the doctrine that if I gave my heart to
Christ he would keep me from sin and preserve me as long as I lived. I
was not quite sure of it–not quite certain that was the truth of the
Bible, though I thought so; but I remember when I heard the minister of
some small hyper chapel utter the same truth. Oh! my heart was full of
rapture; I panted after that gospel. "Oh!" I thought, if God would but
love me, if I might but know myself to be his!" For the enchanting part
of it was, that if I were so he would keep me to the end. That made me
so in love with the gospel, that boy as I was, knowing nothing savingly
about the gospel, it made me love the thought of being saved, because,
if saved, God would never turn me out of doors. That made the gospel
very precious to me in my childhood; so that when the Holy Spirit
showed me my guilt and led me to seek a Saviour, that doctrine was like
a bright star to my spirit. I always looked forward to that. I thought,
"Well, if I can once look to Christ, and cast myself on him, then he
will grant me grace that I shall to the end endure." And oh! that
doctrine is so precious to me now, that I do think if anybody could
possibly convince me that final perseverance is not a truth of the
Bible, I should never preach again, for I feel I should have nothing
worth preaching. If you could once make me believe that the
regeneration of God might fail of its effect, and that the love of God
might be separated from his own chosen people, you might keep that
Bible to yourself; between its cover there is nothing that I love,
nothing that I wish for, no gospel that is suitable for me. I count it
to be a gospel beneath the dignity of God, and beneath the dignity of
even fallen manhood, unless it be everlasting, "ordered in all things
and sure."

And now poor trembling sinner, thou that knowest thy sins, believe on
Christ this morning, and thou art saved, and saved for ever. Do but
this moment look to him that died upon the tree, and, my brother, my
sister, give me thine hand, and let us weep for joy that thou
believest, and let our joy accumulate when we remember that the pillars
of the heavens may totter, the solid foundations of the earth may reel,
the countenance of the heavens may be astonished, the sun may be turned
into darkness and the moon into blood, but nought shall pluck thee from
the strength of Israel's hands. Thou art, thou shalt be infallibly
secure. Come, O Holy Spirit, bless these words; for Jesus sake. Amen.