The Clean and the Unclean

The Clean and the Unclean
A Sermon
(No. 499)
By the
Rev. C. H. SPURGEON,
At the Metropolitan Tabernacle, Newington
"Speak unto the children of Israel, saying, These are the beasts which
ye shall eat among all the beasts that are on the earth. Whatsoever
parteth the hoof, and is clovenfooted, and cheweth the cud, among the
beasts, that shall ye eat."–Leviticus 11:2, 3.
THE MOSAIC LAW ATTACHED great importance to meats and drinks: the
Christian religion attaches none. The apostle Peter was shown by the
vision of a sheet let down from heaven, not only that all nations were
now to receive the gospel message, but that all kinds of food were now
clean, and that all the prohibitions which had formerly been laid upon
them for legal purposes were now once for all withdrawn. A Christian
may, if he pleases, put himself under restrictions as to these matters.
You will remember that the apostle Paul says, "I know and am persuaded
of the Lord Jesus that there is nothing unclean of itself, but to him
that esteemeth anything to be unclean, to him it is unclean." I wot our
apostle was tender of weak consciences; but he could expostulate with
the brethren somewhat thus, "If ye be dead with Christ from the
rudiments of the world, why, as though living in the world, do ye
dogmatize–touch not this, taste not that, handle not the other–and
all about things which perish with the using?" The doctrine of the New
Testament is expressly laid down, "Every creature of God is good and
nothing to be refused, if it be received with thanksgiving." And as for
the practice enjoined upon believers, "All things are lawful, but all
things are not expedient." In the example of Paul we have full liberty;
he would put no embargo upon the conscience. But in his example we have
also fervent charity; he would put no stumbling-block in his brother's
way. "If meat make my brother to offend, I will eat no flesh while the
world standeth." The levitical law enjoined many precepts as to meats
and drinks; but those carnal ordinances were imposed until the time of
reformation. Since then, this Mosaic institution was not designed to be
perpetual, we feel certain that it must have had some use at the time
when it was first established, and during the time in which it was
sustained. As that was pecuharly a typical dispensation, we feel
persuaded that we shall not exaggerate the uses of the text if we show
that there was something instructive to us and something typical of the
better covenant in the command that the people were to eat no creatures
but those which divided the hoof and those which chewed the cud.
I. It is our firm belief that these distinctions of meats were laid
down on purpose TO KEEP THE JEWS AS A DISTINCT PEOPLE, and that herein
they might be a type of the people of God, who are also, throughout all
ages, to be a distinct and separate people–not of the world, even as
Christ was not of the world.
You that are conversant with the old Levitical rule, well know that it
was quite impossible for the Hebrews to mix with any other nation,
without violating the statutes they were commanded to keep. Their food
was so restricted that they could not possibly enter into social
intercourse with any of the neighboring peoples. The Canaanites, for
instance, ate everything, even the flesh that had been torn by dogs,
and the dogs themselves. Now, a Jew could never sit at a Canaanites
table, because he could never be sure that there would not be the flesh
of some unclean and accursed thing upon it. The Jews could not even eat
with the Arabs, who were near akin to them, for they frequently partook
of the flesh of the camels, the hare, and the coney, all which, as we
shall see presently, were forbidden to the Jew. The Arabs on the south,
and the Canaanitish nations all round Palestine, were the most likely
people with whom the Jews would associate, and this command about what
they should and should not eat prevented them for ever from mingling
with these people, and made them a distinct and isolated republic so
long as they were obedient to the law. We are told by Eastern travelers
that the Mohammedan regulations, which are far less strict than those
of the Jew, prevent their becoming socially intermingled either with
the idolaters or with Christians. It is a well-known fact that no
people that have prescriptions about meats and drinks have ever changed
their religion to that of another people, because the famiharity which
seems necessary in order to proselyte is quite prevented by the barrier
that precludes from intercourse at the table. It is at the social table
men enjoy the most genial intercourse; it is there they pour out their
souls with the least reserve, and mix their thoughts one with another
in the greatest freedom of conversation. Check them there; prevent
their sitting at the same board, and there is no likehhood that they
will ever blend or intermingle in any kind of affinity, the races must
be distinct. I believe, dear fiiends, though I have been somewhat prosy
in explaining myself, that it was God's real intention, to keep the
children of Israel, until the coming of Christ, separate from all the
nations that were upon the face of the earth. They could not join in
the worship of other nations, for other nations sacrificed to their
gods the very animals which to the Jew were unclean. They could not
join in social intercourse, as we have already seen; and hence marriage
with any other nation would be, not only, as it was, prohibited by the
law, but would be actually prevented by the possibilities of the case.
It must in each instance put the transgressor beyond the pale of his
own tribe. They would remain as much a distinct people, as if a great
wall of brass had been built all around them, or as if they had been
transported to some island, and an impassable gulf had been put between
them and any other kindred upon earth. They were separated for ever.
Now friends, you will say, "What is the use of this to us?" I answer,
it is the earthly type of a heavenly mystery. When the Jews were put
away as the people of God for a time, then the Gentiles were grafted
into their olive, and though we did not inherit the ceremonies, we did
inherit all the privileges to which those ceremonies point. Thus all of
you who name the name of Christ and are truly what you profess to be,
are solemnly bound to be for ever separated from the world. Not that
you are to leave off your daily intercourse with men. Our Savior did
not do so. He was holy, harmless, undefiled, and separate from sinners.
Yet, you know, he was always in the company of sinners, sitting at
their table, seeking their good, and hunting after their souls. He was
with them, but he was never of them; he was among them, but always
distinct and separate from them; not conforming himself to them, but
transforming them to himself. He hath set us an example. It is not the
seclusion of a hermit, nor the exclusion of yourselves in a monastery,
where you would be of no service to your fellow-men, but it is a higher
and more spiritual separation which I claim of Christians to-night. You
are to be in the world, and among the world, you are to mingle with all
sorts and conditions of men, but still to maintain the dignity of your
newborn character, and to let men see that you are among them as a
speckled bird, as a light in the midst of darkness, as salt scattered
over putridity, as heavenly angels in the midst of fallen men. So are
ye to be a distinct people, a chosen generation.
But you will ask of me in what respects are you to be distinguished? In
a pure consistency always, in a vain eccentricity never. This shall be
my first reply. Not in your garments, my brethren. All those inventions
of broad-brimmed hats, and coats without collars, perish in the using.
Let your dress be, nevertheless, so distinguished from that of some
other men, that there shall be none of the pride and foppery in which
they delight. The Apostle Peter has well laid down the regulations by
which our sisters in Christ are to adorn themselves, but I need not
mention what you know so well and practice so little–that chaste and
becoming neatness which is always right in the sight of God, and
beautiful in the assembly of Christians. Not by my pecuhar Jargon in
your speech are you to be known. For my part I abhor in any man that
sanctimonious tone and sacred whine which many affect; even in the
pulpit I despise it. I believe that the reason why the pulpit has lost
so much of its former power is because men must needs mouth our blessed
Saxon tongue, and talk as if everything natural were to be eschewed
there, and men, metamorphosed into ministers, were to be as unnatural
and grotesque in their modes of speech as possible. No, not these, not
these; all such artificial separations we leave to the people whose
vanity feeds on its own conceit. Nor need you make any straining effort
to be distinguished by any stiff buckram of your own; do not try to
make yourself look like a Christian. True Christians can do a great
many things that sham Christians must not do. As for me, I am never
afraid to laugh, for I shall never crack the paint on my face, laugh as
I may. A sincere man may do a great many things that a hypocrite dare
not do, for he will spht the garments of his hypocrisy if he ventures
to run as a Christian may. Heavenly realities within do not always need
to be plastered up and labelled outside, so that everybody may see and
recognize you, and say, "There goes a saint." There are other modes of
being distinguished from the world than any of these.
What are they then? Well, brethren, we ought ever to be distinguished
from the world in the great object of our life. As for worldly men,
some of them are seeking wealth, others of them fame; some seek after
comfort, others after pleasure. Subordinately you may seek after any of
these, but your main and principal motive as a Christian should always
be to live for Christ. To live for glory? Yes, but for his glory. To
live for comfort? Yes, but be all your consolation in him. To live for
pleasure? Yes, but when you are merry, sing psalms, and make melody in
your hearts to the Lord. To live for wealth? Yes, but to be rich in
faith. You may lay up treasure; but lay it up in heaven, where neither
moth nor rust doth corrupt, where thieves break not through nor steal.
It is thought, you know, that ministers do live for God; merchants
should do the same. I would, my brethren, that you would trade, and do
your merchandise for his service; or do ye plough, and sow, and reap,
and mow, do it for Christ! Would God you could do this quite as much in
his service, as we do ours, when we preach for Christ! You can make the
commonest calling become really sacred. You may take the highest orders
by dedicating your daily life wholly to the service of Jesus. There is
such a thing–and let those that deny the possibility stand
self-convicted that they obey not the precept–"Whether ye eat or
drink, or whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God."
By your spirit as well as your aim you should likewise be
distinguished. The spirit of this world is often selfish; it is always
a spirit that forgets God, that ignores the existence of a Creator in
his own world, the land which he makes fat by his own bounty. Men with
God's breath in their nostrils forget him who makes them live. Now,
your spirit should be one of unselfish devotion, a spirit always
conscious of his presence, bowed down with the weight, or raised up
with the cheer of Hagar's exclamation–"Thou God seeest me;" a spirit
which watcheth humbly before God, and seeketh to know his will and to
do it through the grace of God given to you. Such a spirit as this,
without the drab of one sect, or the phylacteries of another, will soon
make you quite as distinct from your fellow men as ever meats and
drinks could make the Jews a separate people.
Your maxims too, and the rules which regulate you, should be very
different from those of others. The world says "Well, it is usual in
the trade; there is no use in being over scrupulous; we must not be too
Puritanic, or too severe; we shall never get on if we are picking at
this and frowning at that." A Christian never considers what is usual,
but what is right; he does not estimate a wrong by its commonness; he
counts that a fraud, and a falsehood will be as much fraud and
falsehood, though all the world shall agree to practice it, as though
but one man should do it in the dark. The believer reads things, not in
man's light, in the obscurity of which so many blind bats are willing
to fly, but he reads things in the sunlight of heaven. If a thing be
right though he lose by it, it is done; if it be wrong, though he
should become as rich as Croesus by allowing it, he scorns the sin for
his Master's sake. We want our merchants on the Exchange, our traders
in their shops, and our artisans in their factories; yea, and we want
all masters, employers, and overseers too, to be distinguished, as the
clean from the unclean, in the maxims that govern their daily life, and
thus manifestly separate from the world.
This will naturally lead to the next point–the Christian should be
separate in his actions. I would not give much for your religion unless
it can be seen. I know some people's religion is heard of, but give me
the man whose religion is seen. Lamps do not talk, but shine; a
lighthouse sounds no drum, it beats no gong, and yet far over the
waters its friendly spark is seen by the mariner. So let your actions
shine out your religion. Let your conduct talk out your soul. Let the
main sermon of your life be illustrated by all your conduct, and it
shall not fail to be illustrious. Have I not told you before that the
only bit of ecclesiastical history we have in the whole New Testament
is–what? The sermons of the Apostles? No, no, the "Acts of the
Apostles." So let your history be written, so that it may have this
title–"The acts of such-and-such a man." This will furnish the best
proof that you have been with Jesus.
A Christian is distinguished by his conversation. He will often trim a
sentence where others would have made it far more luxuriant by a jest
which was not altogether clean. Following Herbert's advice–"He pares
his apple–he would cleanly feed." If he would have a jest, he picks
the mirth but leaves the sin; his conversation is not used to levity;
it is not mere froth, but it ministereth grace unto the hearers. He has
learned where the salt-box is kept in God's great house, and so his
speech is always seasoned with it, so that it may do no hurt but much
good. Oh! commend me to the man who talks like Jesus, who will not for
the world suffer corrupt communications to come out of his mouth. I
know what people will say of you if you are like this: they will say
you are straight-laced, and that you will not throw much life into
company. Others will call you mean-spirited. Oh, my brethren!
bold-hearted men are always called mean-spirited by cowards. They will
admonish you not to be singular, but you can tell them that it is no
folly to be singular, when to be singular is to be right. I know they
will say you deny yourselves a great deal, but you will remind them
that it is no denial to you. Sheep do not eat carrion, but I do not
know that sheep think it a hardship to turn away from the foul feast.
Eagles do not prefer to float on the sea, but I do not read that eagles
think it a denial when they can soar in higher atmosphere. Do not talk
of self-denial. You have other ends and other aims; you have welds of
comfort that such men know not of. It would be a shame for you to be
eating husks with swine, when your Father's table is loaded with
dainties. I trust, my dear brethren, that you know the value of the
gold of heaven too well to pawn it away for the counterfeits of earth.
"Come ye out from among them; be ye separate, and touch not the unclean
thing." By a holiness which merely moral men cannot equal, stand as on
a pedestal aloft above the world. Thus men may know you to be of the
seed of Jesus, even as they knew the Jew to be the seed of Israel.
How shall I urge you to give more earnest heed to this holy separation?
Let me add the voice of warning to that of entreaty. If we do not see
to this matter we shall bring sorrow on our own souls; we shall lose
all hope of honoring Christ, and we shall sooner or later bring a great
disaster on the world. You know the world is always trying to
nationalize the Church. What a mercy it is that there are some who will
not have it! If you could once make the Church and the nation one, what
would follow? It must be destroyed; it must fall. It was when the
church and the world became one in Noah's day that the Lord sent the
flood to destroy all people. No, the proper position of a Christian is
not with the world, even in its best state and its most exalted
condition. We are to be separated from this present evil world
according to the will of God. Our position to-day is as much as in
Christ's day, outside the camp, not in it; we are still to be
protesters, still to be testifiers against the world. "Ye are of God,
little children, and the whole world lieth in the wicked one."
Scripture never supposes that the world will get better till the coming
of Christ. It does not propose to lift the world up and marry it with
the Church. It always supposes the Church to be as an alien and a
stranger here until Christ, her husband shall come. On which side will
you rank? Truce there cannot be, links between the two there must not
be. God and mammon cannot go together. For which will you be–for
God–for truth–for right? Or for Satan–for the he–for the wrong?
Which shall it be? May the Spirit of God whisper in your heart
to-night, and say, "Believe thou in Christ Jesus; take up thy cross and
follow him, and be enlisted on his side henceforth and for ever."
II. We have now a second and an important matter to bring forward. The
distinction drawn between clean and unclean animals was, we think,
intended by God TO KEEP HIS PEOPLE ALWAYS CONSCIOUS THAT THEY WERE IN
THE NEIGHBOURHOOD OF SIN.
Just let me picture it. I have caught the idea from Mr. Bonar, though I
fear I cannot paint it in words so well as he has done. An oriental
Jew, sensible and intelligent, walks out in the fields. He walks along
close by the side of the high-road, and what should he see but a string
of camels going along? "Ah!" he says to himself "those are unclean
animals." Sin, you see, is brought at once before his mind's eye. He
turns away from the road and walks down one of his own fields, and as
he goes along a hare starts across his path. "Ah!" says he, "an unclean
animal again; there is sin in my path." He gets into a more retired
place, he walks on the mountains; surely he shall be alone there. But
he sees a coney burrowing among the rocks; "Ah!" says he, "unclean;
there is sin there!" He lifts his eye up to heaven; he sees the osprey,
the bald eagle, flying along through the air, and he says, "Ah! there
is an emblem of sin there!" A dragon-fly has just flitted by him–there
is sin there. There are insects among the flowers; now every creeping
thing, and every insect, except the locust, was unclean to the Jew.
Everywhere he would come in contact with some creature that would
render him ceremonially unclean, and it were impossible for him, unless
he were brutish, to remain even for ten minutes abroad without being
reminded that this world, however beautiful it is, still has sin in it.
Even the fish, in sea, or river, or inland lake, had their divisions;
those that had no scales or fins were unclean to the Jew, so the little
Hebrew boys could not even fish for minnows in the brook but they would
know that the minnow was unclean, and so their young hearts were made
to dread little wrongs and little sins, for there were little sins in
the little pools even as there were leviathan sins floating in the deep
and nude sea. Ah! friends, we want to have this more before our minds.
Look at the fairest landscape that your eye has ever beheld; see the
towering Alp, the green valley, and the silver stream
"These are thy glorious works, Parent of good,
Almighty,"
but the slime of the serpent is on them all,
"Keep me, O, keep me King of kings,
Beneath the shadow of thy wings."
When I walk abroad in this temple of nature, and seek to behold
nature's God, I may not light upon a spot in the universe where the
curse of sin has never inflicted a blight, or where the hope of
redemption should not inspire a prayer. Sometimes, brethren you get all
alone and quiet, but do not imagine that you are even there free from
sin. As the most beautiful landscape, so the sweetest retirement cannot
shut out uncleanness. As the fly or the insect would intrude into the
arbour where the Jew would worship, so sin will haunt and molest us
even in the closet of devotion. Get up Christians, and be upon your
watch-towers. You may sleep, but your enemies never will; you may
suppose yourselves safe, but then are you most in danger. See that you
put on the whole panoply of God, and are armed from head to foot, and
having done all, watch and pray lest ye enter into temptation. Every
morning we ought to ask the Lord to keep us from unknown sins, to
preserve us from temptations that we cannot foresee, to check us in
every part of life if we are about to go wrong, and to hold us up every
hour that we sin not. You will say it must have been an unpleasant
thing for the Jew always to have sin before his eye, nor would you wish
every aspect of life to be thus fouled before your eye; but it will not
be so unpleasant for you, my brother, because you know there is a
redemption, and your faith can realize the end of the curse by sin
being put away. Shut not your eyes to sin, but keep Christ always
before you, and you will walk aright. I wish that some of my hearers
had sin before their eyes now. Oh! you that trifle with it, you do not
know what it is! Fools make a mock of sin. You laugh at it now; you do
not understand what a fire it is that you have kindled to consume your
soul! Oh! you that think it is such a little thing, its deadly poison
will soon envenom all your blood, and then you will discover that he
that plays with sin plays with damnation. May the Lord set sin straight
before your eyes, and then set the cross of Christ there too, and so
you will be saved. Two prayers I ask all my hearers to pray–they are
very brief–"Lord show me myself." If there is any man here who says he
would pray but he does not know what to pray, for; pray that every
night and morning–"Lord show me myself;" and if God hear you, you will
soon be in such a wretched state that you will want another prayer, and
then I give you this–"Lord show me thyself;" and then if he shall show
you himself hanging on the tree, the expiation for guilt, the Great God
become man that he might put away sin, your salvation will be
accomplished. Tis all the prayer that is wanted–"Lord show me myself;
Lord show me thyself; reveal sin and reveal a Savior." Lord, do this
for all of us for thy name's sake.
III. And now, I come to show you a third teaching of my text. As this
injunction was meant to separate the Jews from other nations, and to
keep the pious Israelite in constant remembrance of his danger of
falling into sin, so it was also intended to be A RULE OF
DISCRIMINATION BY WHICH WE MAY JUDGE WHO ARE CLEAN AND WHO ARE UNCLEAN,
THAT IS, WHO ARE SAINTS AND WHO ARE NOT.
There are two tests, but they must both be united. The beast that was
clean was to chew the cud: here is the inner-life; every truehearted
man must know how to read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest the sacred
Word. The man who does not feed upon Gospel truth, and so feed upon it,
too, that he knows the sweetness and relish of it, and seeks out its
marrow and fatness, that man is no heir of heaven. You must know a
Christian by his inwards, by that which supports his life and sustains
his frame. But then the clean creatures were also known by their walk.
The Jew at once discovered the unclean animal by its having an
undivided hoof; but if the hoof was thoroughly divided, then it was
clean, provided that it also chewed the cud. So there must be in the
true Christian a pecuhar walk such as God requires. You cannot tell a
man by either of these tests alone; you must have them both. But while
you use them upon others apply them to yourselves. What do you feed on?
What is your habit of life? Do you chew the cud by meditation? When
your soul feeds on the flesh and blood of Christ have you learned that
his flesh is meat indeed, and that his blood is drink indeed? If so tis
well. What about your life? Are your conversation and your daily walk
according to the description which is given in the Word of believers in
Christ? If not, the first test will not stand alone. You may profess
the faith within, but if you do not walk aright without, you belong to
the unclean. On the other hand, you may walk aright without but unless
there is the chewing of the cud within, unless there is a real feeding
upon precious truth in the heart, all the right walking in the world
will not prove you to be a Christian. That holiness which is only
outward in moral not spiritual; it does not save the soul. That
religion, on the other hand, which is only inward is but fancy; it
cannot save the soul either. But the two together; the inward parts
made capable of knowing the lusciousness, the sweetness, the fatness of
Christ's truth; and the outward parts conformed to Christ's image and
character: these conjoined point out the true and clean Christian with
whom it is blessed to associate here, and for whom a better portion is
prepared hereafter.
If you read the chapter through you will find there were some two or
three animals about which the Jew would have some little difficulty.
There was the camel that did chew the cud, but did not exactly divide
the hoof. Now this animal seems to me fitly to represent–though it may
not have been so intended–those men who seem really to feed on the
truth and yet their walk and conversation are not aright. Their feet
have been formed rather for the sandy desert of sin than for the sacred
soil of godliness. Oh! I know some of you–come, let us be
personal–there are some of you if I would always preach the doctrine
of predestination, or some other doctrine of that kind, how sweet it
would be to you! But your lives are not what they should be. Thank God
there are not many of that sort who come here. They get angry with me
very soon, and go off to other places where they can get sweet and
savoury morsels, which exactly suit their taste, and hear no
admonitions about their lives whatever. May the Lord deliver my
ministry from ever being comfortable and flattering to souls that live
in sin. I hope you will sometimes have to say, "I must either give up
that sin or else give up my seat there." I know one who said, "Well! it
has come to this: I cannot go there on Sunday evening and keep my shop
open in the morning; it will not do for me to go and sit there, and
hear the Word, and sing with those people on Sunday evening, and then
hear songs and join in revelries on week-nights." I hope the Word of
God here will be such a searching Word to some of you that you will
even gnash your teeth at the preacher. He would sooner for you to do
that than for you to say; "Peace, peace, where there is no peace,"
sucking in sweet doctrine, and yet living in sin. God deliver us from
Antinomianism! We do preach against Arminianism, but that is a white
devil compared with the black devil of Antinomianism. God save us from
that! If there is any religion that will drug conscience, stimulate
crime, crowd jails, and turn this world into an Aceldema, it is the
religion of the man who preaches divine sovereignty but neglects human
responsibility. I believe it is a vicious, immoral, and corrupt manner
of setting forth doctrine, and cannot be of God. It would undermine
morality, and put the very life of society in peril if it were largely
believed, or if it were preached by men of any great weight who should
have any great numbers to follow them. Oh, dear friends! be not as the
animal which cheweth the cud but yet divideth not the hoof. Seek not
merely to get precious doctrine, comforting to yourselves, but see that
your walk is such as it should be.
Then there was another animal. It did not chew the cud, still the Jews
thought it did. This was the coney–the nearest approach to it is the
rabbit of our land–"The coney, because he cheweth the cud but divideth
not the hoof; he is unclean." The coney was a very timid creature,
which burrowed in the rocks. "The coneys be a feeble folk, but they
make their dwellings in the rocks," says Solomon. Now, there are some
people who seem as if they like the gospel truth, and they may be put
down in the class in which Moses puts the coney, which appeared to chew
the cud, though it did not really do so. There are hundreds of this
sort we know. They like the gospel, but it must be very cheap. They
like to hear it preached, but as to doing anything to extend it, unless
it were to lend their tongues an hour, they would not dream of it. The
coney, you know, lived in the earth. These people are always scraping.
John Bunyan's muck-rake is always in their hands. Neither to dig nor to
beg are they ashamed. They are as true misers, and as coyetous, as if
they had no religion at all. And many of these people get into our
Churches, and are received when thee ought not to be. Coyetousness
ought to exclude a man from Church fellowship as well as fornication,
for Paul says, "Coyetousness, which is idolatry." He puts the brand
right on its forehead, and marks what it is. We would not admit an
idolater to the Lord's table; nor ought we to admit a coyetous man;
only we cannot always know him. St. Francis Sales, who had a great many
people come to him to confession, makes this note, that he had many men
and women come to him who confessed all sorts of most outrageous
crimes, but he never had one who confessed coyetousness. It is a kind
of sin that always comes in at the back-door, and it is always
entertained at the back-part of the house. People do not suspect it as
an inmate of their own hearts. Mr. Coyetousness has changed his name to
Mr. Prudent-Thrifty; and it is quite an insult to call him other than
by his adopted name. Old vices, like streets notorious for vice, get
new names given them. Avaricious grasping, they call that only "the
laws of social economy;" screwing down the poor is "the natural result
of competition;" withholding corn until the people curse oh! that is
"just the usual regulation of the market." People name the thing
prettily, and then they think they have rescued it from the taint.
These people, who are all for earth, are like the coneys, who, though
they chew the cud, burrow in the ground. They love precious truth, and
yet they are all for this earth. If there are any such here, despite
their fine experience, we pronounce them unclean–they are not heirs of
heaven.
The next creature mentioned in the chapter is the hare–"The hare,
because he cheweth the cud, but divideth not the hoof; he is unclean."
See how he fhes with bounding step over the ground! A clapping of the
hands, and how he starts and is away! The hare is such a timid
creature; she leayeth her food, and fleeth before the passer-by. I
would not say a hard thing, but there are some people who appear to
chew the cud, they love to hear the gospel preached; their eyes will
sparkle sometimes when we are talking of Christ, but they do not divide
the hoof: Like the hare, they are too timid to be domesticated among
the creatures whom the Lord has pronounced clean. They do not come out
from the world, enter into the Church, and manifest themselves wholly
on the Lord's side. Their conscience tells them they should baptized as
believers–but they dare not; they should be united with the people of
God, and confess Christ before men–but they are ashamed, ashamed,
ashamed! One fears lest his wife should know it, and she might
ridicule. Some start abashed lest their friends should know it, for the
finger of scorn or the breath of raillery could frighten them out of
their senses. Others of them are alarmed because the world might,
perchance, give them an ill name. Do you know where the fearful go? Not
the fearing, not the doubting–for there are many poor, humble doubters
and fearers that are saved–but do you know where the fearful go? The
fearful that are afraid of being persecuted, mocked, or even laughed at
for Christ–do you know where they go? You will find it in the Book of
the Revelation–"But the fearful and unbelieving shall have their part
in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone, which is the second
death." Have you never read that sentence which says, "Whosoever shall
be ashamed of me and of my words, of him shall the Son of man be
ashamed when he shall come in his own glory, and in his Father's, and
of the holy angels?" There you are, young men! you are ashamed of
Christ. You have just come up from the country, and you did not pray to
God the other night because there was another young man in the room,
and you were ashamed of him! In the name of God I do entreat you, nay,
I command you, be not ashamed of your Master, Christ, and of the
religion which you learned at your father's knee. There are others of
you who work in a large shop, and you do not want to be jeered at, as
the other young fellow is who works with you, because he is a
Christian. You keep your love as a secret do you, and will not let it
out? What! if Christ had only loved you in secret, and had never dared
to come here on earth to be despised and rejected of men, where would
you have been? "No man lighteth a candle and putteth it under a
bushel." Do you think that Christ has lit a candle in your hearts that
you may hide it? Oh! I pray you, be not like the hare. Let your hoof be
so divided from the rest of mankind that they may say, "There is a
man–he is not as bold as a hon, mayhap, but he is not ashamed to be a
follower of Jesus; he does bear the sneer and gibe for him, and counts
it his honor to be thought evil of for Jesus' sake." Oh! be not, I pray
you, like the timid hare, lest you be found among the unclean!
There is one other creature mentioned–"The swine, though he divide the
hoof, and be cloven-footed, yet he cheweth not the cud; he is unclean
to you." Now, the swine is the emblem of those who do act rightly. They
make a profession; before men they are the most upright and the most
devout; but then the inner part is not right; they do not chew the cud.
The foot is right, but not the inward part. There is no chewing, no
masticating, no digesting the Word of Life. "But," says one, "why pick
out a swine, because that does not seem to be a fair comparison." Yes
it is, for there are no people in the world more like swine than those
Pharisees who make clean the outside of the cup and the platter; whose
hoof is divided enough, but whose inward part is very wickedness. I do
not know an animal that might more filly picture out those vile,
unclean Pharisees. You may say you think it is too hard a picture for
you. You are put down thus in the catalogue, and I have no other place
in which to put you. You are like swine, unless the grace of God be in
you. What good does the swine do? Of what concern is life to him but to
feed grossly and slumber heavily? And so your life, since the inward
part is wrong, you bring no glory to God, you bring no good to your
fellow-men. Oh! that the Lord would show you that dead morality,
unattended by the love of God in the soul, will most certainly be of no
avail! "You must be born again." "Except ye be converted, and become as
little children, ye shall in no wise enter into the kingdom of heaven."
My text seems to be a dividing one; it divides the house in two.
Remember, dear friends, the day is coming when a greater division than
that which description can give will occur to all of us. But the same
rule will be enforced. We shall be assembled in one crowd, a mightier
crowd than language can picture, or imagination grasp. The books shall
be opened–books more terrible than this Book of Mercy. The Book of
Life shall be unfolded and read, in which those washed in Jesu's blood,
and so made clean, shall find their names recorded. They are borne to
heaven. Listen to the music of the angels as they bear them up to God's
right hand! Where will you be? Will you be with those who mount to
heaven, or with yonder trembling, shrieking, screaming souls, who, as
hell opens her mouth, descend alive into the pit? God help you if you
are not on the righthand side! It is not too late. Jesus Christ is
still preached to you. The way of salvation is very plain. It is
this–Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved. Believe
thou in Jesus. Then make a profession of thy faith in God's own
ordained way and method, and you have his promise for it that you will
be saved. God help you to believe, and you shall be saved through
Jesus, and unto him shall be the glory for ever and ever. Amen.