Camp Law and Camp Life

Camp Law and Camp Life

A SERMON INTENDED FOR READING ON LORD'S-DAY, DECEMBER 14, 1890.

DELIVERED BY C. H. SPURGEON,

AT THE METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE, NEWINGTON, ON A THURSDAY EVENING,
BEFORE LEAVING HOME FOR HIS WINTER'S REST.

"For the Lord your God walks in the midst of your camp, to deliver you,
and to give up your enemies before you, therefore shall your camp be
holy that He sees no unclean thing in you, and turn away from you."
Deuteronomy 23:14.

I WILL scarcely allude to the context, which you ought to notice at
home, but I must say as much as this–the Lord cared for the
cleanliness of His people while they were in the wilderness, literally
so–and this text is connected with a sanitary regulation of the wisest
possible kind. What I admire in it is that God the Glorious, the
All-Holy, should stoop to legislate about such things. Such attention
was very necessary for health and even for life, and the Lord, in
condescending to it, conveys a severe rebuke to Christian people who
have been careless in matters respecting health and cleanliness.
Saintly souls should not be lodged in filthy bodies. God takes note of
matters which persons who are falsely spiritual speak of as beneath
their observation. If the Lord cares for such things, we must not
neglect them. But oh, what condescension on His part that His Spirit
should dictate to Moses concerning these grosser concerns! I bow before
the majesty of a condescension to which nothing is too low.

Observe, also, how it shows us the all-reaching character of the Law of
Moses. It overshadowed everything! It guided, arranged, restrained or
suggested all the acts of the people under its tutorship. Wherever they
were, in their most public or private acts, the people were always
under the supervision of the Law. By reason of their sinfulness, this
holy code of regulations became a yoke which they were not able to
bear. Still, it was a very necessary and salutary Law, for which they
should have been grateful at all times, since it was for their good in
every respect and tended to bless them both spiritually and physically,
socially and religiously.

Dear Friends, the great thing that I would bring out at this time is
the spiritual lesson of the text–how the Lord would have His people
clean in all things. The God of Holiness commands and loves
purity–purity of all kinds. He says, "Be you clean, that bear the
vessels of the Lord." Cleanliness of body is sometimes neglected by
persons professing godliness–I speak to their shame. It ought not to
be possible for Grace and dirt to meet in the same person. I must
confess I feel a great horror at Christian people who are so dirty that
one cannot sit in the same pew with them without nausea. This is the
trial of many visitors among poor people who profess religion, that
certain of them are not clean in their houses and in their clothes.

Filth may be expected in persons of unclean hearts, but those who have
been purified in spirit should do their utmost to be pure in flesh,
clothes and dwelling. If cleanliness is next to godliness–and I am
sure it is–it ought to be observed by those who profess godliness.
Does not the same text which says, "having our hearts sprinkled from an
evil conscience," also say, "and our bodies washed with pure water"?
The Christ who redeemed us did not redeem us that we should be covered
with filthiness! He has redeemed the body as well as the soul and He
has made it to be the temple of the Holy Spirit–surely we must cleanse
His temple and not suffer it to be defiled.

I like the idea of those sailors on board ship who knew that the ship
was going down, and therefore put on their Sunday best that they might
die as clean and neat as they could. I would not care to die in filth,
or to live in it. A Christian should be clean in all things–in his
person, in his house, in his garments and in his habits. For his own
sake, but especially for the sake of others, he should carefully
observe sanitary laws lest he be found guilty of the command which
says, "You shall not kill."

Now, if God speaks about this matter of cleanliness, I am sure I may do
so and ought to do so. If anyone is offended let him take a basin of
clean water and wash the offense away. If anyone thinks me personal,
let him have a personal bath and so obliterate the mark. If cleanliness
is a point which God does not omit, He would not have His servants
silent about it. Still, I pass on from that to the greater lesson of
the passage. You will notice that the Presence of God in the midst of
His people was all-reaching and everywhere. No part of the camp was
exempt from God's walking in it. Not merely in the Holy Place was God,
or in the Holy of Holies between the cherubim, but He was everywhere in
the streets of the canvas city and in the outskirts.

When troops of Israelites went out to war and consequently cast up
temporary camps, they were to remember that God was still walking in
the midst of them–and this was to be the great motive power of their
lives–the Presence of God! The high privilege of being a people near
unto Jehovah involved continual watching that nothing might offend His
Sacred Majesty. O Sirs, every man, whether a Christian or not, ought to
remember that God is everywhere–that there is no escaping from His
Presence–that even the shades of night furnish no veil under which we
may sin with impunity! But as for the chosen, who know the Lord, it is
for them to have the most respect unto One so glorious, and yet so
graciously near. We may ever pray that–

"Our weaker passions may not dare Consent to sin, for God is there." He
is daring, indeed, who would sin in the face of God. Sin to God's
teeth? Approach the Throne of the Great King and be disloyal there? God
forbid! The Lord forgive us our audacities! There is a special
Presence, higher and other than the universal Presence of God and as
this is the peculiar privilege of the saints, it should be to them a
constant check, or a perpetual spur. The Presence of God is to us a
check to evil and a spur to good. About this Presence and its effects,
I am going to speak at this time, as the Spirit of the Lord may help
me. Oh, for an anointing from the Presence of the Lord! There are three
things which I shall speak of. The first is an instructive comparison,
which I may draw from this text. The text speaks about the camp of
Israel and that is a comparison which may very aptly set forth the
nature of the Church of God, for the Church is spiritually a camp.

Secondly, here is a special privilege–"The Lord your God walks in the
midst of your camp, to deliver you, and to give up yours enemies before
you." And then, thirdly, here is demand for corresponding conduct.
"Therefore, because the Lord your God walks in the midst of your camp,
therefore shall your camp be holy, that He sees no unclean thing in
you, and turn away from you." May this lesson be learned by us all this
day!

I. First, then, AN INSTRUCTIVE COMPARISON. The Church of God is in many
respects comparable to a camp. It is a camp for separation. Men who are
encamped are separated from the traders, householders and others near
whom they are tarrying. They are separated especially from the
adversaries with whom they are at war. When you come near to a camp you
are challenged by the sentry, for you must not come there without
warrant. In wartime a picket is sure to be in your path whichever way
you come near to the camp, for during a campaign warriors are a
separated people and must keep themselves so.

Such ought the Church of God to be. We are crusaders and are separated
from the mass for the service of the Cross which we bear on our hearts.
We are in an enemy's country and we must keep ourselves to ourselves
very much, or else we shall certainly fail of that holy military
discipline which the Captain of our salvation would have us strictly
enforce. An attempt is being made, here and there, to make the Church
like the world and it has already been carried out by actual
experiment. The most ridiculous and even discreditable things are, in
such cases, done in the name of religion and under cover of Church
purposes. O Friends, this custom comes from the lowest depth and is
full of the cunning of Satan! It will be our destruction if the attempt
should succeed!

The great object of a Christian should be to separate the Church more
and more entirely from the world. Our Lord was not of this world, but
was crucified outside the gate–"Let us go forth therefore unto Him
outside the camp, bearing His reproach." The reproach today, dreaded by
feeble minds, is that of being narrow-minded, bigoted, strict, precise.
Let us willingly take it up. It is His reproach–let us not attempt to
escape it. Let it be our resolve that as far as ever we can, we will be
nonconformists to the ways even of worldly Christians. Let us not be
conformed to this world, but transformed in the spirit of our minds.
Ours is the holy dissidence of spiritual dissent from evil, the sacred
separation of Separatists from error.

Are we a camp, dear Friends? The question might lead us to judge
others–I will put it in the singular. Am I a soldier of the Cross, a
follower of the Lamb? If so, I must, as a soldier, live in my barracks,
or abide in my lines. I must be separated and I must, as a follower of
the Lamb, "go forth unto Him outside the camp," being determined to
live the separated life as He sets it before me. Every true Church,
then, is a camp for separation.

Next, it is a camp, because it is on the defensive. As I have said
before, we are marching through an enemy's country. The children of
Israel marched through the wilderness and the Amalekites frequently
harassed them and slew the hindmost of them–as the Amalekites harass
us and, alas, they slay the hindmost of us! It is not those that are at
the front for their Captain, not those who follow close to the
standard, nor those who go forth armed in His strength that fall by the
enemy. Those who play about in the rear–who gather up the stones of
the desert and hoard them up as a treasure– it is these upon whom the
Amalekites pounce!

But their arrows are far flying and none of us is safe from the enemy,
except as the Lord keeps us. Therefore we must go about armed at all
times. I heard say of a certain clergyman, that he told his bishop,
when he went to a ball, that he was "off duty"–but his bishop very
properly replied, "When is a clergyman off duty?" I put the same
question to a Christian, "When are you off duty?" Never! The policeman
wears a badge on his arm to show that he is on duty–you wear nothing
upon your arm–it is upon your whole self! Buried with the Lord in
Baptism, the sacred watermark is on you from head to foot–the token
that from now on you are dead to the world and are alive in newness of
life! You cannot strip yourself of so comprehensive a distinction. It
is impossible to erase it. It is an indelible token and if you are
false to it, then you are traitors, indeed!

If you are living as you should, you are living unto Christ, always and
ever, in every place and at all times. You are to serve God in your
enjoyments, as well as in your employments–in your leisure as much as
in your labor. You are to serve Him, not only in what is mistakenly
called His House, but also in your own house. Yes, and you, yourself,
are to always be the temple of the living God! Brothers and Sisters, we
are soldiers at all times and must never doff our uniforms! We must
keep rank and march in close order, for every day is a battle for the
Church of God! There is no truce between the Church and error, between
the saint and sin! If there is a truce, it is an unholy one and must be
broken, for God Himself has proclaimed eternal war between the seed of
the woman and the seed of the serpent! Our condition is one of warfare
and nothing else, until the last great victory shall crush the
serpent's head. The Church is a camp, for it is on the defensive.

It is a camp, too, especially, because it is always assailing the
powers of darkness. It is carrying the war into the enemy's territory.
That, no doubt, is the special intention of the words of our text. Read
the ninth verse, "When the host goes forth against your enemies, then
keep you from every wicked thing." Learn, then, that we are to go forth
against the enemy. It is not for the Church of God to protect her own
borders and think, "This is enough"–she must go forth to conquer fresh
territory for her Lord! There used to be in our Churches too much of
contentedness with isolation and inactivity. The hymn went up from a
quiet, do-nothing assembly–

"We are a garden walled around,

Chosen and made peculiar ground,

A little spot enclosed by Grace

Out of the world's wide wilderness." We dare not feel content to let
the wilderness remain what it is! We may not give up vast regions to
the dragon and the owl. No, no, dear Friends, we are going to break up
more ground and make the little spot into a far wider space. And if the
garden is walled around, we hope to build a wall round many more acres
of ground and so enlarge the garden of the Great King!

The Church of God is like fire and you cannot say to fire, "You must
burn comfortably at the corner of that haystack and never think of
going any farther." "No," says the fire, "I will burn it all down."
"But there are farm buildings yonder–do not touch those sheds and
barns." The fierce fire is insatiable. It never stops while there is
anything to be consumed. Even so, a true Church has within herself an
ambition for her Lord that His kingdom may be extended everywhere! And
that ambition is as insatiable as that of Alexander, who a conquered
world could scarcely content. If there were only one sinner left, it
would be worth the while of all the saved millions to continue to pray
day and night for that one sinner and to set all its tongues moving to
tell to that one sinner the Gospel of Christ!

Alas, we are a very long way off from having a lone soul to watch over!
A few are saved and untold millions are perishing! Feeble are the lamps
which as yet are kindled–the vast proportion of the world is wrapped
in tenfold night. We are as yet only a handful of corn on the top of
the mountains and our desire should be to grow till "the fruit thereof
shall shake like Lebanon: and they of the city shall flourish like
grass of the earth." We have a world to conquer and we cannot afford to
loiter! We have a kingdom to set up for the Lord of Hosts and we must
not sleep, for the adversaries of the Lord are raging! We are an army,
sworn to war against the Canaanites of error and sin–to cast down
their walled cities, to break their idols–and to cut down their
groves.

The Church of God is the great army of peace, purity, liberty,
love–she wars against war, she wars against sin, she wars against
oppression, she wars against falsehood, uncleanness, intemperance,
unrighteousness–and her fight has only yet begun. Do you not feel, my
Brethren, dwelling in this wicked city of London, that our appropriate
description is a camp?

And next, dear Friends, the Church of God is a camp because we are on
the march. A camp is pitched in one spot for temporary purposes, for
the army is moving on tomorrow and then the camp will be in another
place. The Israelites, especially, were not dwelling in the
desert–they were only marching through it into the land that God had
promised them. It is well for us to remember that we are, ourselves, in
a movable camp, marching, marching onward, marching forward–ever
marching and moving! This is not our rest. We are not at home. We are
on foreign land. Alas, I am afraid that we do not realize this, but are
like the children of Israel who took 40 years in the wilderness to
perform a journey which, I suppose, might have been accomplished in 40
days or less.

It was not far, after all, from Egypt to Canaan. We should think
nothing of it as a journey now. And even for that great mass of people,
who necessarily traveled slowly, it needed not to have been a long
passage–but they took 40 years over it because they marched this way
and that way, in endless mazes, lost, wandering rather than journeying
towards a definite spot! Do you not think that a great many Christian
people are practicing the same method of motion without progress? Have
you not seen some of them, like the King of France, march up a hill and
down again? Is not that the way with most? Bravely they lift the lance
and hold the shield. They rush forth to the fight. They ride round the
enemy and take stock of him–and come home to tell what they have
seen–and that is all they do!

Multitudes are forever playing at being Christians. Do you not note
their childish seesaw, up and down, up and down? And their movement
leaves them no higher than at the first. God save us from this! The
camp must go onward. Thus says the Lord, "Speak unto the children of
Israel, that they go forward." We ought to be advancing in Divine
Grace, in knowledge, in earnestness, in holiness, in usefulness–and if
not, we scarcely resemble the figure of a camp.

Yet, once more, no doubt a camp, as formed for temporary purposes, was
a token of the Church, for although the Church stands still and abides,
yet in her individual members she is subject to the same law of decay,
death and change as the rest of the world. Soon shall the camp cease
and the soldiers become citizens, and the tents be exchanged for
mansions. The Church is militant upon the earth for a season only. We
are here today and gone tomorrow. O Brothers and Sisters, we are at
present rather a camp than a city, for we pass away and our Brethren
also, as the days fly by.

I remember this Church and congregation 36 years ago and my Brother,
William Olney. Alas, my Brother, W. Olney has himself since crossed the
stream! Behind me will recollect it, too, but neither he nor I can
recall all the names of our Brother soldiers who were with us then.
They are gone from us at our Captain's call. I say not that they are
lost, for they are not so–but they are lost to us for present aid. You
cannot say that a thing is lost when you know where it is and we know
where they are–but they are not here and we sadly miss them. Others
have sprung up, but a whole generation has passed away. Part of our
legion have forded the dividing stream–

"And we are to the margin come, And soon expect to die."

To us, also, there remains a rest, but we recollect that here we have
no continuing city, we seek one to come. We endeavor to make the camp
as comfortable as the desert will permit, but it can never be a home.

When you are in the East, your tent-bed awaits you. You sleep well, you
wake up, there is your breakfast. But very soon they roll up the tent,
pull up the poles and put the whole thing on camels–and you are again
homeless on the burning sand. You can never reckon upon anything like
steadfastly abiding in one place when you are following camp life. Such
is the life of the Believer–camp life is his lot–and it is well for
him to be prepared to rough it. Here we are in

a tabernacle, that is, a tent which is to be taken down–but we are
going to a city that has foundations, whose Builder and Maker is God!
We have a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens, and we are
wending our way there– but, as yet, we are like Bedouin Arabs, or like
our own soldiers on a campaign when they have no permanent barracks–
but abide in tents.

We remember, very sadly, that when rough men get into camp–and
soldiers, as a rule are rough enough–they think that they may do
anything. In this respect the camp of God is to differ from all other
camps, as much as white from black. To this day it is a sort of popular
error that a soldier may indulge himself in uncleanness and be less
blamable than other people. I have heard the remark, "The young man is
in the army. What can you expect of him?" But God's people are to be
soldiers and theirs is to be camp life–and their camp is holy and so
must each one of them be. Thus says the Lord, "When the host goes forth
against your enemies, then keep you from every wicked thing." "The Lord
your God walks in the midst of your camp, to deliver you, and to give
up your enemies before you; therefore shall your camp be holy; that He
sees no unclean thing in you, and turn away from you."

A camp of angels should not be more holy than a Church of saints among
whom the Lord God has taken up His abode! Thus much upon the very
instructive figure of the text.

II. Secondly, I come to notice A SPECIAL PRIVILEGE. The text mentions a
privilege specially promised to Israel, but I am sure, to a very high
and real degree, enjoyed by ourselves. "The Lord your God walks in the
midst of your camp, to deliver you, and to give up your enemies before
you." By this walking is intended a special Presence of love. The Lord
is present in His Church in a higher sense than in the world. The Lord
walks in the midst of His Church as a man takes pleasure in the walks
of his garden. The Church is the garden of the Lord, His Paradise. "His
delights are with the sons of men." He looks on this one, and on
that–all plants of His own right-hand planting–He looks to see where
the knife is needed, that He may prune the vine, or where refreshment
is needed, that He may water the roots.

The Lord, with unutterable care, is in the midst of His Church.
Remember how He says, "I the Lord do keep it; I will water it every
moment; lest any hurt it, I will keep it night and day." If you want to
find God on earth, you must look among His chosen! Where is a father
most at home but with his children? God has said, "This is My rest
forever: here will I dwell; for I have desired it." While Israel was a
dweller in tents the Ark of the Covenant was among them, the token of
the Lord's Presence–and in His warring Church the great Captain of the
host is ever lovingly near! Hear how He gives the assurance, "Lo, I am
with you always, even unto the end of the world."

There are special lines of love to His own which make us, sometimes,
ask, "Lord, how is it that You will manifest Yourself unto us, and not
unto the world?" But so it is our Lord Jesus walks up and down our
ranks and sees our order or disorder, our courage or our cowardice–and
this is the best reason why we should behave ourselves aright. He loves
us and we must not grieve Him. See the force of this argument, "The
Lord your God walks in the midst of your camp; therefore shall your
camp be holy." God is present in the camp of His people with a special
Presence of observation. He sees all things, but His eyes are, in the
first place, fixed on His Church. With burning glance He searches the
very heart of professors. I tremble while I speak this word! It is
often bowing me to the dust.

With regard to the ungodly, I may say of them, "The times of this
ignorance God winks at," but to His people He says, "You only have I
known of all the families of the earth: therefore I will punish you for
all your iniquities." There is a discipline in the House of God which
is carried on, not by Church officers, nor by the Church itself, but by
the Providence of God. Men die before their time and others are sick
who might be well–sick, I mean, through ill behavior in the Church of
God. Thus says the Apostle–"For this cause many are weak and sickly
among you, and many sleep." If you are not my child I have nothing to
say about your behavior–I leave you to your own father. But if you are
my boy, my child at home, I must speak to you, I must correct you for I
bear a responsibility towards you. So it is with God. He will bear much
from the ungodly which He will not endure from His own people.

Here is a text which I would like to wrap up in my heart–"The Lord
your God is a jealous God." That wondrous love of His must have
jealousy linked with it. Our God loves us so much, so entirely–with
all the Infinity of His Godhead–that if we do not love Him in return
and yield the holy fruits of love–He is grieved and angry. "The Lord
your God is a jealous God." See, then, the argument–if it is so, that
God is specially watchful over His Church, let your camp be holy. The
Lord cries, "Be you holy; for I am holy." "Be you clean, that bear the
vessels of the Lord." It is not for Jehovah's camp to be fouled. He
would not have any putrid matter, anything offensive remain within the
camp

literally–and spiritually He will have us keep all filthiness away
from His Church. He will have us just, true, pure, sincere, holy–and
if we are not so–His anger will burn like fire. Lord, have mercy upon
us! Christ, have mercy upon us! What more can we say?

Again, dear Friends, the peculiar privilege of Israel is to have a
special Presence of salvation. "The Lord your God walks in the midst of
your camp to deliver you." God is with His people, to help them in
their times of trouble, to rescue them out of danger, to answer their
cries in their necessity, to save them in the hour of temptation. He is
with us to deliver us in all things in which we require deliverance!
Have we not found Him so? I could touch this string with no feeble or
wavering hand. This very week I have found Him with me, to deliver me
in many things–many things that seemed to lay me low–matters which
concerned the Lord's Church. Trouble was there, but the Lord was there,
also. Oh, what a blessing it is! "The Lord is there." Have you any
troubles and difficulties, dear Friend, and are you a child of God? Do
you belong to Christ? Well, the Lord is with His people to deliver
them. Should not this be a grand argument why the camp should be holy,
for if He hears our prayers, we are bound to obey His precepts. If He
will give us our will, let His will be done on earth, even as it is in
Heaven. God help us to do so!

And, next, the Lord is with the camp of His people, not only to deliver
them, but as a special Presence for victory. He routs their enemies and
gives His saints success. All the hope that the Church has of doing any
good in the world must come from the Lord's being in the midst of her!
If any error is to be trampled down as straw for the dunghill. If any
sinner is to be snatched like a lamb from between the jaws of the lion.
If any dark neighborhood is to be enlightened, it must be because God
is with His people. "Without Me you can do nothing." This word is most
true! It is He and He alone, that can give up our enemies before us.
Very well, then, let the camp be holy, lest we lose that Presence and
He is gone.

Once more, it is a special Presence in covenant. "The Lord your God."
Listen to that word–"Jehovah your God walks in the midst of your camp
to deliver you." The living God is our God! Men have many gods, even in
England– gods of their own making–but my God is the God of Abraham
and of Isaac and of Jacob, the God and Father of our Lord and Savior
Jesus Christ! I believe in the Old Testament God who is the same as the
God of the New Testament. I abhor the idea of a new Godhead! Jehovah is
One and the same to me. But oh, if He is our God by special covenant.
If He has taken us to be His people and we have taken Him to be our
God, it is most delightful–but it involves us in a grave
responsibility to be a holy people!

If we can say–

"'Tis done, the great transaction's done. I am my Lord's, and He is
mine," then let us be holy and let our whole camp be holy! Otherwise
our vows are a fiction and our professions are a lie! Do we wish to
provoke the Lord and to vex His Spirit? The Lord save us from this
evil! See, then, the special privilege! I have already told you what it
involves.

III. So now I have only to dwell for a minute or two upon the last
point a little more distinctly– CORRESPONDING CONDUCT. "Therefore
shall your camp be holy that He see no unclean thing in you, and turn
away from you." Observe, then, that this rule, that the camp be holy,
applies to the most common places wherein we are found. "Therefore
shall your camp be holy." As I have already said, men generally think
that they may take great license in a camp. But the Lord says,
"Therefore shall your camp be holy." When you are out for a holiday, be
holy. When you say, "Now we have one or two friends coming to the house
and we will indulge ourselves somewhat," be holy and let the
conversation and the entertainment be holy. Let not only the Church
meeting be holy, but let the family gathering be holy, whether at
Christmas, or on a bank holiday, or at another time.

Let the common meals be holy, no excess or murmuring being tolerated.
Let the board and the bed be holy. Let the body and the mind be holy.
Let the most common act you do be holiness to the Lord. Let the bells
upon the horses ring out only this note, "Holiness unto the Lord."
"Holiness becomes Your house, O God," but holiness becomes, also, all
the houses of Your people. Holiness is the ordained livery of a servant
of God and he that does not wear this garment has disgraced himself and
his Master. He is wearing, in fact, the livery of the King's enemies!
Let him mind what he is doing.

If my memory does not deceive me, when Oliver Cromwell was first
contending with the king, the soldiers who joined him were mostly
gentlemen farmers and they wore their own buff coats–and as many on
the other side were

dressed much the same, mistakes were made–and, in a rough-and-tumble
fight, they did not know cavalier from roundhead. So Cromwell said,
upon a certain occasion, that all his soldiers must be dressed in a
certain color and not a man should be in his troop who did not come by
such a day with such a coat on.

Well, you say, why should they wear a uniform? Some of them did not
like it. But his orders were peremptory, that not a man should be with
him if he did not wear the regulation dress, since by their common
array they knew each other and could not be mistaken in a scuffle.
Holiness is the white raiment of the Believer–be sure that you put it
on, because otherwise we shall not know you–and the world will not
know you and you will be mistaken for an enemy. I am afraid you will be
treated as having gone over to the enemy if we catch you in the
usurper's black instead of the king's white! The Holy Spirit arrays you
in the white raiment of holiness that you may shine out bright and
clear and distinct before the sons of men.

But now, notice this, too. While this holiness pertained to their most
common things, it was also ordered that every unclean thing was to be
put from them. "That He see no unclean thing in you." This is an awful
text–I will not preach about it, but I will just repeat it to you
again–"That He see no unclean thing in you." Ah, me! We often see
unclean things in ourselves, do we not? Yes, and we often overlook much
uncleanness and do not notice it because our eyes are dim. We have
lost, perhaps, the spiritual nostril that would smell the unclean
thing. Our senses have become perverted by the foul world in which we
live. But then, think of this–the pure and holy God–the thrice holy
God–He speaks of Himself in this sort, "That He see no unclean thing
in you."

Brothers, Sisters, what a house-cleaning this calls for! What hard
sweeping this requires–that, "He see no unclean thing in you"!
Remember, the pith of that text concerning the Paschal Lamb lies in
God's sight of the sprinkled blood. Notice, "When I see the blood, I
will pass over you." So here the very force of the text lies–"that He
see no unclean thing in you." Oh, for Grace and watchfulness to keep
clear of touching the unclean thing! Let us come continually to the
washing place–even to the opened Fountain. Let us beseech the
cleansing Spirit to operate as with fire and burn His purifying way
through and through our souls that in the Church of God the Lord may
not see any unclean thing in any one of us!

Note well the fearful warning which is added. If there is in the camp
an unclean thing tolerated and delighted in and He sees it–if it
becomes conspicuous and grievous to Him, then the worst consequences
will follow–"Lest He turn away from you." Oh, what would happen to us
if the Lord were to turn away from us as a Church? Horror takes hold on
me at the thought! The pastor will die in due time–that is a small
matter–for the Lord can send another. But if the Lord were to pass
away from us, what an overwhelming desolation! Ichabod would be written
in large capital letters across this house if the Lord were gone! And
yet my wonder often is that He has not gone when I remember the unclean
things that I have to see and mourn over!

I see very little compared with what the Lord sees, but I see enough to
make me tremble! The Lord sees much about us that grieves Him, even
when we think there is nothing amiss. Let us pray that the Lord does
not go from us! I invite you earnestly to pray that during my absence
God may keep all the camp in holy working order–that He may see no
unclean thing–and may not turn away from His people. O Lord, in Your
love bear with us and abide with us evermore! I have done, but there is
a little fragment that follows my text which I want some of you to get
before I go. Read this. This follows the text. It is a curious thing
that it should follow the text. I think that it is put here on purpose
for me to have a word for the sinner before I have done.

"You shall not deliver unto his master the servant which is escaped
from his master unto you: he shall dwell with you, even among you, in
that place which he shall choose in one of your gates, where it pleases
him best: you shall not oppress him." I wonder whether any runaway has
come into our place of worship tonight? Certainly there are some of
Satan's slaves here! I would recommend you to run away from the devil
and not give him a moment's notice. Flee from his service directly!
There is no getting away from sin except by instantaneous flights. Run
for it! Run at once! Steal away to Jesus! Do not stop to think twice!
The prodigal said, "I will arise, and go to my father," and he arose
and went to his father.

Deliberating about it and giving notice never answers anybody's purpose
in the matter of repentance unto life. Instantaneous flight is your
wisdom! Run away in a twinkling! If you do run away and get among the
Lord's people, we will never give you up to your old master. He may
come here after you, but we know him, and are not to be deceived by

him in this matter. He has come here after many–but we have not given
up any of his runaways and, by God's Grace, we will never part with
you, but defy the man-catcher to take you away! Jesus says, "Him that
comes to Me I will in no wise cast out"–and so, you see, He will
harbor you and not return you to your master.

There were slaves in Moses' day, but if they ran away nobody ever sent
them back to their master and therefore it was not much of slavery,
after all. The devil has many slaves, but if they run away to Jesus
they shall never be sent back! Come, then! Dare to be free from Satan's
power! Strike for liberty! Your tyrant lord has no right to you! I know
you sold yourself, but you were not your own to sell–you were stolen
goods! The devil can have no more property in you than you had in
yourself and that was nothing, for you are not your own! Fly away, poor
hunted Dove, to Jesus' wounds and when once you get there, the hawk
cannot reach you! Safe in the Rock of Ages you shall dwell as a dove in
the clefts.

Though I have dealt faithfully with the uncleanness of professing
Believers, I now invite the vilest and the foulest to come to Jesus for
safety and liberty–

"There is a Fountain filled with blood,

Drawn from Immanuel's veins

And sinners, plunged beneath that flood,

Lose all their guilty stains."

Ransomed sinners may dwell among us, in whatever place they shall
choose! Neither will we oppress them with hard questions or irksome
duties, but we will bind them to be free as we are ourselves bound to
liberty in the name of the Lord our God! God bless you, dear Friends,
and during my absence may you be fed with the finest of the wheat! May
the blessing of the Lord rest upon you! If we do not meet again in this
wilderness below, may we meet, when camp life is over, in the City
above, to go no more out forever! The blessing of the Lord rest on you
evermore!

PORTION OF SCRIPTURE READ BEFORE SERMON– 1 Peter 2.