A Sermon
(No. 23)
Delivered on Sabbath Evening, May 13, 1855, by the
REV. C.H. SPURGEON
At Exeter Hall, Strand.
"The sting of death is sin; and the strength of sin is the law. But,
thanks be unto God, which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus
Christ."–1 Corinthians 15:56-57.
While the Bible is one of the most poetical of books, though its
language is unutterably sublime, yet we must remark how constantly it
is true to nature. There is no straining of a fact, no glossing over a
truth. However dark may be the subject, while it lights it up with
brilliance, yet it does not deny the gloom connected with it. If you
will read this chapter of Paul's epistle, so justly celebrated as a
master-piece of language, you will find him speaking of that which is
to come after death with such exultation and glory that you feel, "If
this be to die, then it were well to depart at once." Who has not
rejoiced, and whose heart has not been lifted up or filled with a holy
fire, while he has read such sentences as these: "In a moment, in the
twinkling of an eye, at the last trump; for the trumpet shall sound,
and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed.
For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put
on immortality. So, when this corruptible shall have put on
incorruption, and this mortal shall have put on immortality, then shall
be brought to pass the saying that is written, Death is swallowed up in
victory. O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?"
Yet, with all that majestic language, with all that bold flight of
eloquence, he does not deny that death is a gloomy thing. Even his very
figures imply it. He does not laugh at it; he does not say, "Oh, it is
nothing to die;" he describes death as a monster; he speaks of it as
having a sting; he tells us wherein the strength of that sting lies;
and even in the exclamation of triumph, he imputes that victory not to
unaided flesh, but he says, "Thanks be to God, who giveth us the
victory through our Lord Jesus Christ."
When I select such a text as this, I feel that I cannot preach from it.
The thought o'ermasters me; my words do stagger; there are no
utterances that are great enough to convey the mighty meaning of this
wondrous text. If I had the eloquence of all men united in one, if I
could speak as never man spake (with the exception of that one godlike
man of Nazareth), I could not compass so vast a subject as this. I will
not therefore pretend to do so, but offer you such thoughts as my mind
is capable of producing.
To-night we shall speak of three things: first, the sting of death;
secondly, the strength of sin; and thirdly, the victory of faith.
I. First, THE STING OF DEATH. The apostle pictures death as a terrible
dragon, or monster, which, coming upon all men, must be fought with by
each one for himself. He gives us no hopes whatever that any of us can
avoid it. He tells us of no bridge across the river Death; he does not
give us the faintest hope that it is possible to emerge from this state
of existence into another without dying; he describes the monster as
being exactly in our path, and with it we must fight, each man
personally, separately, and alone; each man must die; we all must cross
the black stream; each one of us must go through the iron gate. There
is no passage from this world into another without death. Having told
us, then, that there is no hope of our escape, he braces up our nerves
for the combat; but he gives us no hope that we shall be able to slay
the monster; he does not tell us that we can strike our sword into his
heart, and so overturn and overwhelm death; but, pointing to the
dragon, he seems to say, "Thou canst not slay it, man; there is no hope
that thou shouldst ever put thy foot upon its neck and crush its head;
but one thing can be done–it has a sting which thou mayest extract;
thou canst not crush death under foot, but thou mayest pull out the
sting which is deadly; and then thou need not fear the monster, for
monster it shall be no longer, but rather it shall be a swift-winged
angel to waft thee aloft to heaven. Where, then, is the sting of this
dragon? Where must I strike? What is the sting? The apostle tells us,
"that the sting of death is sin." Once let me cut off that, and then,
though death may be dreary and solemn, I shall not dread it; but,
holding up the monster's sting, I shall exclaim, "O death, where is thy
sting? O grave, where is thy victory?" Let us now dwell upon the fact,
that "the sting of death is sin."
1. First, sin puts a sting into death, from the fact that sin brought
death into the world. Men could be more content to die if they did not
know it was a punishment. I suppose if we had never sinned, there would
have been some means for us to go from this world to another. It cannot
be supposed that so huge a population would have existed, that all the
myriads who have lived from Adam down till now could ever have
inhabited so small a globe as this; there would not have been space
enough for them. But there might have been provided some means for
taking us off when the proper time should come, and bearing us safely
to heaven. God might have furnished horses and chariots of fire for
each of his Elijahs; or, as it was said of Enoch, so it might have been
declared of each of us, "He is not, for God hath taken him." Thus to
die, if we may call it death to depart from this body and to be with
God, would have been no disgrace; in fact, it would have been the
highest honor; fitting the loftiest aspiration of the soul, to live
quickly its little time in this world, then to mount and be with its
God; and in the prayers of the most pious and devout man, one of his
sublimest petitions would be, "O God, hasten the time of my departure,
when I shall be with thee." When such sinless beings thought of their
departure, they would not tremble, for the gate would be one of ivory
and pearl–not as now, of iron–the stream would be as nectar, far
different from the present "bitterness of death." But alas! how
different! Death is now the punishment of sin. "In the day thou eatest
there of thou shalt surely die." "In Adam all die." By his sin every
one of us become subject to the penalty of death, and thus, being a
punishment, death has its sting. To the best man, the holiest
Christian, the most sanctified intellect, the soul that has the nearest
and dearest intercourse with God, death must appear to have a sting,
because sin was its mother. O fatal offspring of sin, I only dread thee
because of they parentage! If thou didst come to me as an honor, I
could wade through Jordan even now, and, when its chilling billows were
around me, I would smile amidst its surges; and in the swellings of
Jordan my song should swell too, and the liquid music of my voice
should join with the liquid swellings of the floods, "Hallelujah! It is
blessed to cross to the land of the glorified." This is one reason why
the sting of sin is death.
2. But I must take it in another sense. "The sting of death is
sin:"–that is to say, that which shall make death most terrible to man
will be sin, if it is not forgiven. If that be not the exact meaning of
the apostle, still it is a great truth, and I may find it here. If sin
lay heavy on me and were not forgiven–if my transgressions were
unpardoned–if such were the fact (though I rejoice to know it is not
so) it would be the very sting of death to me. Let us consider a man
dying, and looking back on his past life: he will find in death a
sting, and that sting will be his past sin. Imagine a conqueror's
deathbed. He has been a man of blood from his youth up. Bred in the
camp, his lips were early set to the bugle, and his hand, even in
infancy, struck the drum. He had a martial spirit; he delighted in the
fame and applause of men; he loved the dust of battle and the garment
rolled in blood. He has lived a life of what men call glory. He has
stormed cities, conquered countries, ravaged continents, overrun the
world. See his banners hanging in the hall, and the marks of glory on
his escutcheon. He is one of earth's proudest warriors. But now he
comes to die, and when he lies down to expire, what shall invest his
death with horror? It shall be his sin. Methinks I see the monarch
dying; he lies in state; around him are his nobles and his councillors;
but there is somewhat else there. Hard by his side there stands a
spirit from Hades; it is a soul of a departed woman. She looks on him
and says, "Monster! my husband was slain in battle through thy
ambition: I was made a widow, and my helpless orphans and myself were
starved." And she passes by. Her husband comes, and opening wide his
bloody wounds, he cries, "Once I called thee monarch; but, by thy vile
covetousness thou didst provoke an unjust war. See here these wounds–I
gained them in the siege. For thy sake I mounted first the scaling
ladder; this foot stood upon the top of the wall, and I waved my sword
in triumph, but in hell I lifted up my eyes in torment. Base wretch,
thine ambition hurried me thither!" Turning his horrid eyes upon him,
he passes by. Then up comes another, and another, and another yet;
waking from their tombs, they stalk around his bed and haunt him; the
dreary procession still marches on, looking at the dying tyrant. He
shuts his eyes, but he feels the cold and bony hand upon his forehead;
he quivers, for the siting of death is in his heart. "O Death!" says
he; "to leave this large estate, this mighty realm, this pomp and
power–this were somewhat; but to meet those men, those women, and
those orphan children, face to face; to hear them saying, Art thou
become like one of us?' while kings whom I have dethroned, and monarchs
whom I have cast down shall rattle their chains in my ears, and say,
Thou wast our destroyer, but how art thou fallen from heaven, O
Lucifer, son of the morning! How art thou brought down as in a moment
from thy glory and thy pride!'" There, you see, the sting of death
would be the man's sin. It would not sting him that he had to die, but
that he had sinned, that he had been a bloody man, that his hands were
red with wholesale murder–this would plague him indeed, for "the sting
of death is sin."
Or, suppose another character–a minister. He has stood before the
world, proclaiming something which he called the gospel. He has been a
noted preacher; the multitude have been hanging on his lips; they have
listened to his words; before his eloquence a nation stood amazed, and
thousands trembled at his voice. But his preaching is over; the time
when he can mount the pulpit is gone; another standing-place awaits
him, another congregation, and he must hear another and a better
preacher than himself. There he lies. He has been unfaithful to his
charge. He preached philosophy to charm his people, instead of
preaching truth and aiming at their hearts. And, as he pants upon his
bed, that worst and most accursed of men–for surely none can be worse
than he–there comes up one, a soul from the pit, and looking him in
the face, says, "I came to thee once, trembling on account of sin; "I
asked thee the road to heaven, and thou didst say, Do such and such
good works,' and I did them, and am damned. Thou didst tell me an
untruth; thou didst not declare plainly the word of God." He vanishes
only to be followed by another; he has been an irreligious character,
and as he sees the minister upon his deathbed, he says, "Ah! and art
thou here? Once I strolled into thy house of prayer, but thou hadst
such a sermon that I could not understand. I listened; I wanted to hear
something from thy lips, some truth that might burn my soul and make me
repent; but I knew not what thou saidst; and here I am." The ghost
stamps his foot, and the man quivers like an aspen leaf, because he
knows it is all true. Then the whole congregation arise before him as
he lies upon his bed; he looks upon the motley group; he beholds the
snowy heads of the old, and glittering eyes of the young; and lying
there upon his pillow, he pictures all the sins of his past life, and
he hears it said, "Go thou! unfaithful to thy charge; thou didst no
divest thyself of thy love of pomp and dignity; thou didst not speak
'As though thou ne'er might'st speak again,
A dying man to dying men.'"
Oh! it may be something for that minister to leave his charge, somewhat
for him to die; but worst of all, the sting of death will be his sin:
to hear his parish come howling after him to hell; to see his
congregation following behind him in one mingled herd, he having led
them astray, having been a false prophet instead of a true one,
speaking peace, peace, where there was no peace, deluding them with
lies, charming them with music, when he ought rather to have told them
in rough and rugged accents the Word of God. Verily, it is true, it is
true, the sting of death to such a man shall be his great, his
enormous, his heinous sin of having deluded others.
Thus, then having painted two full-length pictures, I might give each
one of you miniatures of yourselves. I might picture thee, O drunkard,
when thy cups are drained, and when thy liquor shall no longer be sweet
to thy taste, when worse than gall shall be the dainties that thou
drinkest, when, within an hour, the worms shall make a carnival upon
thy flesh; I might picture thee as thou lookest back upon they misspent
life. And thou, O swearer, methinks I see thee there, with thine oaths
echoed back by memory to thine own dismay. And thou, man of lust and
wickedness, thou who hast debauched and seduced others, I see thee
there; and the sting of death to thee, how horrible, how dreadful! It
shall not be that thou art groaning with pain, it shall not be that
thou art racked with agony, it shall not be that thy heart and flesh
faileth, but the sting, the sting, shall be thy sin. How many in this
place can spell the word "remorse?" I pray you may never know its awful
meaning. Remorse, remorse! You know its derivation; it signifies to
bite. Ah! now we dance with our sins–it is a merry life with us–we
take their hands, and, sporting in the noontide sun, we dance, we
dance, and live in joy. But then those sins shall bite us. The young
lions we have stroked and played with shall bite; the young adder, the
serpent, whose azure hues have well delighted us, shall bite, shall
sting, when remorse shall occupy our souls. I might, but I will not,
tell you a few stories of the awful power of remorse; it is the first
pang of hell; it is the ante-chamber of the pit. To have remorse is to
feel the sparks that blaze upwards from the fire of the bottomless
Gehenna; to feel remorse is to have eternal torment commenced within
the soul. The sting of death shall be unforgiven, unrepented sin.
3. But if sin in the retrospect be the sting of death, what must sin in
the prospect be? My friends, we do not often enough look at what sin is
to be. We see what it is; first the seed, then the blade, then the ear,
and then the full corn in the ear. It is the wish, the imagination, the
desire, the sight, the taste, the deed; but what is sin in its next
development? We have observed sin as it grows; we have seen it, at
first, a very little thing, but expanding itself until it has swelled
into a mountain. We have seen it like "a little cloud, the size of a
man's hand," but we have beheld it gather until it covered the skies
with blackness, and sent down drops of bitter rain. But what is sin to
be in the next state? We have gone so far, but sin is a thing that
cannot stop. We have seen whereunto it has grown, but whereunto will it
grow? for it is not ripe when we die; it has to go on still; it is set
going, but it has to unfold itself forever. The moment we die, the
voice of justice cries, "Seal up the fountain of blood; stop the stream
of forgiveness; he that is holy, let him be holy still; he that is
filthy, let him be filthy still." And after that, the man goes on
growing filthier and filthier still; his lust developes itself, his
vice increases; all those evil passions blaze with tenfold more fury,
and, amidst the companionship of others like himself, without the
restraints of grace, without the preached word, the man becomes worse
and worse; and who can tell whereunto his sin may grow? I have
sometimes likened the hour of our death to that celebrated picture,
which I think you have seen in the National Gallery, of Perseus holding
up the head of Medusa. That head turned all persons into stone who
looked upon it. There is a warrior there with a dart in his hand; he
stands stiffened, turned into stone, with the javelin even in his fist.
There is another, with a poniard beneath his robe, about to stab; he is
now the statue of an assassin, motionless and cold. Another is creeping
along stealthily, like a man in ambuscade, and there he stands a
consolidated rock; he has looked only upon that head, and he is frozen
into stone. Well, such is death. What I am when death is held before
me, that I must be forever. When my spirit goes, if God finds me
hymning his praise, I shall hymn it in heaven; doth he find me
breathing out oaths, I shall follow up those oaths in hell. Where death
leaves me, judgment finds me. As I die, so shall I live eternally.
"There are no acts of pardon passed
In the cold grave to which we haste."
It is forever, forever, forever! Ah! there are a set of heretics in
these days who talk of short punishment, and preach about God's
transporting souls for a term of years, and then letting them die.
Where did such men learn their doctrine, I wonder? I read in God's word
that the angel shall plant one foot upon the earth, and the other upon
the sea, and shall swear by him that liveth and was dead, that time
shall be no longer. But, if a soul could die in a thousand years, it
would die in time; if a million of years could elapse, and then the
soul could be extinguished, there would be such a thing as time; for,
talk to me of years, and there is time. But, sirs, when that angel has
spoken the word, "Time shall be no longer," things will then be
eternal; the spirit shall proceed in its ceaseless revolution of weal
or woe, never to be stayed, for there is no time to stop it; the fact
of its stopping would imply time; but everything shall be eternal, for
time shall cease to be. It well becomes you, then, to consider where ye
are and what ye are. Oh! stand and tremble on the narrow neck of land
twixt the two unbounded seas, for God in heaven alone can tell how soon
thou mayest be launched upon the eternal future. May God grant that,
when that last hour may come, we may be prepared for it! Like the
thief, unheard, unseen, it steals through night's dark shade. Perhaps,
as here I stand, and rudely speak of these dark, hidden things, soon
may the hand be stretched, and dumb the mouth that lisps the faltering
strain. Oh! thou that dwellest in heaven, thou power supreme, thou
everlasting King, let not that hour intrude upon me in an illspent
season; but may it find me rapt in meditation high, hymning my great
Creator. So, in the last moment of my life, I will hasten beyond the
azure, to bathe the wings of this my spirit in their native element,
and then to dwell with thee for ever–
"Far from a world of grief and sin,
With God eternally shut in."
II. "THE STRENGTH OF SIN is the law."
I have attempted to show how to fight this monster–it is by extracting
and destroying its sting. I prepare myself for the battle. It is true I
have sinned, and therefore I have put a sting into death, but I will
endeavor to take it away. I attempt it, but the monster laughs me in
the face, and cries, "The strength of sin is the law. Before thou canst
destroy sin thou must in some way satisfy the law. Sin cannot be
removed by thy tears or by thy deeds, for the law is its strength; and
until thou hast satisfied the vengeance of the law, until thou hast
paid the uttermost farthing of its demands, my sting cannot be taken
away, for the very strength of sin is the law." Now, I must try and
explain this doctrine that the strength of sin is the law. Most men
think that sin has no strength at all. "Oh," say many, "we may have
sinned very much, but we will repent, and we will be better for the
rest of our lives; no doubt God is merciful, and he will forgive us."
And we hear many divines often speak of sin as if it were a very venial
thing. Inquire of them what is a man to do? There is no deep repentance
required, no real inward workings of divine grace, no casting himself
upon the blood of Christ. They never tell us about a complete atonement
having been made. They have, indeed, some shadowy idea of an atonement,
that Christ died just as a matter of form to satisfy justice; but as to
any literal taking away of our sins, and suffering the actual penalty
for us, they do not consider that God's law requires any such thing. I
suppose they do not, for I never hear them assert the positive
satisfaction and substitution of our Lord Jesus Christ. But without
that, how can we take away the strength of sin?
1. The strength of sin is in the law, first, in this respect, that the
law being spiritual, it is quite impossible for us to live without sin.
If the law were merely carnal, and referred to the flesh; if it simply
related to open and overt actions, I question, even then, whether we
could live without sin; but when I turn over the ten commandments and
read, "Thou shalt not covet," I know it refers even to the wish of my
heart. It is said, "Thou shalt not commit adultery;" but it is said,
also that whosoever looketh on a woman to lust after her hath already
committed that sin. So that it is not merely the act, it is the
thought; it is not the deed simply, it is the very imagination, that is
a sin. Oh now, sinner, how canst thou get rid of sin? Thy very
thoughts, the inward workings of thy mind, these are crimes–this is
guilt and desperate wickedness. Is there not, now, strength in sin?
Hath not the law put a potency in it? Has it not nerved sin with such a
power that all thy strength cannot hope to wipe away the black enormity
of thy transgression?
2. Then, again, the law puts strength into sin in this respect–that it
will not abate one tittle of its stern demands. It says to every man
who breaks it, "I will not forgive you." You hear persons talk about
God's mercy. Now, if they do not believe in the gospel, they must be
under the law; but where in the law do we read of mercy? If you will
read the commandments through, there is a curse after them, but there
is no provision made for pardon. The law itself speaks not of that; it
thunders out without the slightest mitigation, "The soul that sinneth
it shall die." If any of you desire to be saved by works, remember one
sin will spoil your righteousness; one dust of this earth's dross will
spoil the beauty of that perfect righteousness which God requires at
your hands. If ye would be saved by works, men and brethren, ye must be
as holy as the angels, ye must be as pure and as immaculate as Jesus;
for the law requires perfection, and nothing short of it; and God, with
unflinching vengeance, will smite every man low who cannot bring him a
perfect obedience. If I cannot, when I come before his throne, plead a
perfect righteousness as being mine, God will say, "you have not
fulfilled the demands of my law; depart, accursed one! You have sinned,
and you must die." "Ah," says one, "can we ever have a perfect
righteousness, then? Yes, I will tell you of that in the third point;
thanks be unto Christ, who giveth us the victory through his blood and
through his righteousness, who adorns us as a bride in her jewels as a
husband arrays his wife with ornaments.
3. Yet again; the law gives strength to sin from the fact that, for
every transgression it will exact a punishment. The law never remits a
farthing of debt: it says, "Sin–punishment." They are linked together
with adamantine chains; they are tied, and cannot be severed. The law
speaks not of sin and mercy; mercy comes in the gospel. The law says,
"Sin–die; transgress–be chastised; sin–hell." Thus are they linked
together. Once let me sin, and I may go to the foot of stern Justice,
and as, with blind eyes, she holds the scales, I may say, "O Justice,
remember, I was holy once; remember that on such and such an occasion I
did keep the law." "Yes," saith Justice, "all I owe thee thou shalt
have; I will not punish thee for what thou hast not done; but remember
you this crime, O sinner?" and she puts in the heavy weight. The sinner
trembles, and he cries, "But canst thou not forget that? Wilt thou not
cast it away?" "Nay," saith Justice, and she puts in another weight.
"Sinner, dost thou recollect this crime?" "Oh!" says the sinner, "wilt
thou not for mercy's sake-?" "I will not have mercy," says Justice;
"Mercy has its own palace, but I have naught to do with forgiveness
here; mercy belongs to Christ. If you will be saved by Justice, you
shall have your full of it. If you come to me for salvation, I will not
have mercy brought in to help me; she is not my vicegerent; I stand
here alone without her." And again, as she holds the scales, she puts
in another iniquity, another crime, another enormous transgression; and
each time the man begs and prays that he may have that passed by. Says
Justice, "Nay, I must exact the penalty; I have sworn I will, and I
will. Canst thou find a substitute for thyself? If thou canst, there is
the only room I have for mercy. I will exact it of that substitute, but
even at his hands I will have the utmost jot and tittle; I will abate
nothing; I am God's Justice, stern and unflinching, I will not alter, I
will not mitigate the penalty." She still holds the scales. The plea is
in vain. "Never will I change!" she cries; "bring me the blood, bring
me the price to its utmost; count it down, or else, sinner, thou shalt
die.
Now, my friends, I ask you, if ye consider the spirituality of the law,
the perfection it requires, and its unflinching severity, are you
prepared to take away the sting of death in your own persons? Can you
hope to overcome sin yourselves? Can you trust that, by some righteous
works, you may yet cancel your guilt? If you think so, go, O foolish
one, go! O madman, go! work out thine own salvation with fear and
trembling, without the God that worketh in thee; go, twist thy rope of
sand; go, build a pyramid of air; go, prepare a house with bubbles, and
think it is to last forever; but know it will be a dream with an awful
awakening, for as a dream when one awaketh will he despise alike your
image and your righteousness. "The strength of sin is the law."
III. But now, in the last place, we have before us THE VICTORY OF
FAITH. The Christian is the only champion who can smite the dragon of
death, and even he cannot do it of himself; but when he has done it, he
shall cry, "Thanks be to God who giveth us the victory through our Lord
Jesus Christ." One moment, and I will show you how the Christian can
look upon death with complacency, through the merits of Jesus Christ.
First, Christ has taken away the strength of sin in this respect, that
he has removed the law. We are not under bondage, but under grace. Law
is not our directing principle, grace is. Do not misunderstand me. The
principle that I must do a thing–that is to say, the principle of law,
"do, or be punished; do, or be rewarded," is not the motive of the
Christian's life; his principle is grace: "God has done so much for me,
what ought I to do for him?" We are not under the law in that sense,
but under grace.
Then Christ has removed the law in this sense, that he has completely
satisfied it. The law demands a perfect righteousness; Christ says,
"Law, thou hast it; find fault with me; I am the sinner's substitute;
have I not kept thy commandments? Wherein have I violated thy
statutes?" "Come here, my beloved," he says, and then he cries to
Justice, "Find a fault in this man; I have put my robe upon him; I have
washed him in my blood; I have cleansed him from his sin. All the past
is gone; as for the future, I have secured it by sanctification; as for
the penalty, I have borne it myself; at one tremendous draught of love
I have drunk that man's destruction dry; I have borne what he should
have suffered; I have endured the agonies he ought to have endured.
Justice, have I not satisfied thee? Did I not say upon the tree, and
didst thou not coincide with it, It is finished; it is finished?' Have
I not made so complete an atonement that there is now no need for that
man to die and expiate his guilt? Do I not complete the perfect
righteousness of this poor, once condemned, but now justified spirit?"
"Yes" saith Justice, "I am well satisfied, and even more content, if
possible, than if the sinner had brought a spotless righteousness of
his own." And now, what saith the Christian after this? Boldly he comes
to the realms of death, and entering the gates there, he cries, "Who
shall lay anything to the charge of God's elect?" And when he had said
it, the dragon drops his sting. He descends into the grave; he passes
by the place where fiends lie down in fetters of iron; he sees their
chains, and looks into the dungeon where they dwell, and as he passes
by the prison door, he shouts, "Who shall lay anything to the charge of
God's elect?" They growl and bite their iron bonds, and hiss in secret,
but they cannot lay aught to his charge. Now see him mount aloft. He
approaches God's heaven, he come against the gates, and Faith still
triumphantly shouts, "Who shall lay anything to the charge of God's
elect?" And a voice comes from within: "Not Christ, for he hath died;
not God, for he hath justified." Received by Jesus, Faith enters
heaven, and again she cries, "Who even here amongst the spotless and
ransomed, shall lay anything to the charge of God's elect?" Now the law
is satisfied, sin is gone; and now surely we need not fear the sting of
the dragon, but we may say, as Paul did, when he rose into the majesty
of poetry–such beautiful poetry that Pope himself borrowed his words,
only transposing the sentences, "O grave, where is thy victory? O
death, where is thy sting?"
If it were necessary to-night, I might speak to you concerning the
resurrection, and I might tell you how much that takes away the sting
of death, but I will confine myself to the simple fact, that the sting
of death is sin, that the strength of sin is the law, and that Christ
gives us the victory by taking the sting away, and removing the
strength of sin by his perfect obedience.
And now, sirs, how many are there here who have any hope that for them
Christ Jesus died? Am I coming too close home, when most solemnly I put
the question to each one of you, as I stand in God's presence this
night, to free my head of your blood; as I stand and appeal with all
the earnestness this heart is capable of? Are you prepared to die? I
sin pardoned? Is the law satisfied? Can you view the flowing
"Of Christ's soul-redeeming blood,
With divine assurance knowing,
That he hath made your peace with God?"
O! can ye now put one hand upon your heart, and the other upon the
Bible, and say, "God's word and I agree; the witness of the Spirit here
and the witness there are one. I have renounced my sins, I have given
up my evil practices; I have abhorred my own righteousness; I trust in
naught but Jesus' doings; simply do I depend on him.
'Nothing in my hand I bring,
Simply to thy cross I cling.'"
If so, should you die where you are–sudden death were sudden glory.
But, my hearers, shall I be faithful with you? or shall I belie my
soul? Which shall it be? Are there not many here who, each time the
bell tolls the departure of a soul, might well ask the question, "Am I
prepared?" and they must say, "No." I shall not turn prophet to-night;
but were it right for me to say so, I fear not one-half of you are
prepared to die. Is that true? Yea, let the speaker ask himself the
question, "Am I prepared to meet my Maker face to face?" Oh, sit in
your seat and catechise your souls with that solemn question. Let each
one ask himself, "Am I prepared, should I be called, to die?" Methinks
I hear one say with confidence, "I know that my Redeemer liveth." "Let
him that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall." I hear another
say with trembling accents–
"Ah! guilty, weak, and helpless worm,
On Christ's kind arms I fall;
He is my strength and righteousness,
My Jesus and my all."
Yes, sweet words! I would rather have written that one verse than
Milton's "Paradise Lost." It is such a matchless picture of the true
condition of the believing soul. But I hear another say, "I shall not
answer such a question as that. I am not going to be dull to-day. It
may be gloomy weather outside to-day, but I do not want to be made
melancholy." Young man, young man, go thy way. Let thine heart cheer
thee in the days of thy youth; but for all this the Lord shall bring
thee to judgment. What wilt thou do, careless spirit, when thy friends
have forsaken thee, when thou art alone with God? Thou dost not like to
be alone, young man, now, dost thou? A falling leaf will startle thee.
To be alone an hour will bring on an insufferable feeling of
melancholy. But thou wilt be alone–and a dreary alone it will be–with
God an enemy! How wilt thou do in the swellings of Jordan? What wilt
thou do when he taketh thee by the hand at eventide, and asketh thee
for an account; when he says, "What didst thou do in the beginning of
thy days? how didst thou spend thy life?" When he asks thee, "Where are
the years of thy manhood?" When he questions thee about thy wasted
Sabbaths, and inquires how thy latter years were spent, what wilt thou
say then? Speechless, without an answer, thou wilt stand. Oh, I beseech
you, as ye love yourselves, take care! Even now, begin to weigh the
solemn matters of eternal life. Oh! say not, "Why so earnest? why in
such haste?" Sirs, if I saw you lying in your bed, and your house was
on fire, the fire might be at the bottom of the house, and you might
slumber safely for the next five minutes; but with all my might I would
pull you from your bed, or I would shout, "Awake! awake! the flame is
under thee." So with some of you who are sleeping over hell's mouth,
slumbering over the pit of perdition, may I not awake you? may I not
depart a little from clerical rules, and speak to you as one speaketh
to his fellow whom he loves? Ah! if I loved you not, I need not be
here. It is because I wish to win your souls, and, if it be possible,
to win for my Master some honor, that I would thus pour out my heart
before you. As the Lord liveth, sinner, thou standest on a single plank
over the mouth of hell, and that plank is rotten. Thou hangest over the
pit by a solitary rope, and the strands of that rope are breaking. Thou
art like that man of old, whom Dionysius placed at the head of the
table; before him was a dainty feast, but the man ate not, for directly
over his head was a sword suspended by a hair. So art thou, sinner. Let
thy cup be full, let thy pleasures be high, let thy soul be elevated,
seest thou that sword? The next time thou sittest in the theatre, look
up and see that sword: when next in thy business thou scornest the
rules of God's gospel, look at that sword. Though thou seest it not, it
is there. Even now, ye may hear God saying to Gabriel, "Gabriel, that
man is sitting in his seat in the hall; he is hearing, but is as though
he heard not; unsheathe thy blade; let the glittering sword cut through
that hair; let the weapon fall upon him and divide his soul and body."
Stop, thou Gabriel, stop! Save the man a little while. Give him yet an
hour, that he may repent. Oh, let him not die. True, he has been here
these ten or dozen nights, and he has listened without a tear; but
stop, and peradventure he may repent yet. Jesus backs up my entreaty,
and he cries, "Spare him yet another year, till I dig about him and
dung him, and though he now cumbers the ground, he may yet bring forth
fruit, that he may not be hewn down and cast into the fire." I thank
thee, O god; thou wilt not cut him down to-night; but to-morrow may be
his last day. Ye may never see the sun rise, though you have seen it
set. Take heed. Hear the word of God's gospel, and depart with God's
blessing. "Whosoever believeth on the name of the Lord Jesus Christ
shall be saved." "He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved."
"He is able to save to the uttermost, all that come unto him."
"Whosoever cometh unto him, he will in no wise cast out." Let every one
that heareth say, "Come; whosoever is athirst, let him come and take of
the water of life, freely."