Death for Sin and Death to Sin

A SERMON DELIVERED ON LORD'S-DAY MORNING, NOVEMBER 16, 1873,

BY C. H. SPURGEON,

AT THE METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE, NEWINGTON.

"Who His own self bore our sins in His own body on the tree, that we,
being dead to sins, should live unto righteousness: by whose stripes
you were healed." 1 Peter 2:24.

PETER, in this chapter, exhorted Christians to holiness and dwelt upon
that branch of holiness which consists in the patient endurance of
wrong. He could find no better argument with which to plead with the
saints than the life and example of their Lord, and, indeed, who could
find a better? Since the Lord Jesus is all our salvation, He is also
all our desire. And to be like He is, is the highest object of our
ambition. If, therefore, we find Him patient under wrong, it is to us a
conclusive argument that we should be patient, too. I admire the
Apostle Peter, because in using so good an argument he selected from
the life of his Lord that particular portion of it which must have been
most vividly written upon his own soul.

Judge you, my Brothers and Sisters, if I am not correct in this. Which
hour do you think, of the sufferings of the Lord, from Gethsemane to
Golgotha, would be most deeply engraved upon the memory of Peter?
Surely it would be that space of time in which He was mocked and
buffeted in the hall of the High Priest, when Peter sat and warmed his
hands at the fire–when he saw his Lord abused and he was afraid to
admit that he was His disciple, and by-and-by became so terrified that,
with profane language, he declared "I know not the Man."

So long as life lingered, the Apostle would remember the meek and quiet
bearing of his suffering Lord. He alluded to it in the 23rd verse,
"When He was reviled, He reviled not again; when He suffered, He
threatened not; but committed Himself to Him that judges righteously."
Many a tear had Peter to brush out of his eyes as he wrote that verse.
He remembered having seen the Lord with his own eyes and so he
mentioned, as an argument with others, that which was the most forcible
upon his own mind–in the hope that whenever they were misjudged, or
falsely accused–they might remember their Lord, and like He, be dumb
as a sheep before her shearers, and silent as a lamb led to the
slaughter.

Lest, however, we should think that the patience of our Lord was
intended to be our example and nothing more, the Apostle goes on to
speak expressly of the expiatory nature of the sufferings alluded to.
He has held up the Savior in all His woes as our example, but knowing
the evil tendency of skeptical minds, by any means, to becloud the
Cross, he now puts aside the example, for a moment, and speaks of the
Redeemer as the great Sacrifice for sin. The sacred writers are always
very clear and distinct upon this Truth of God and so must we be. There
is no preaching the Gospel if the Atonement is left out. No matter how
well we speak of Jesus as a pattern, we have done nothing unless we
point Him out as the Substitute and Sin-Bearer. We must, in fact,
continually imitate the Apostle and speak plainly of Him, "Who His own
self bore our sins in His own body on the tree."

It is to Christ, then, this morning, the Sin-Bearer, that I am about to
direct your attention. It may not be many times longer that I may have
the opportunity to preach the Gospel, for bodily pain reminds me of my
mortality. How soon are the hale and the strong, as well as the sickly,
carried off! So many, during the last few days, whom we knew, have been
borne from among us to the silent tomb! We are reminded how feeble our
life is–how short our time for service. Let us, then, Brothers and
Sisters, deal always with the best things and attend to the most
necessary works while yet our little oil suffices to feed the lamp of
life.

Rising newly from the sick bed, I have felt that if any theme in the
Scriptures has an importance far above all the rest, it is the subject
of the atoning blood. And I have resolved to repeat that old, old story
again and again. Though I may be guilty of needless repetition, I shall
keep on sounding this silver trumpet, or ringing this golden bell
again, and again, and again! And so, when I am dead and gone the way of
all flesh, you will, perhaps, say, "His fault was that he dwelt too

much on his favorite subject, the Substitution of Christ." Ah, may I
have no other fault to account for, for that shall be accounted to be
one of my highest virtues!

I would know nothing among men save Jesus Christ and Him Crucified! At
the same time, we shall try to make our subject practical, because the
second half of our text suggests the way by which the great Sacrifice
for sin leads us to make a slaughter of sin and tells us that when
Christ puts sin away for us, we are moved to put away sin from us. Two
things this morning, then–first, Christ's death for sin. Secondly, our
death to sin.

I. First, then, we will consider OUR LORD'S DEATH FOR SIN. May the Holy
Spirit help us to behold that wondrous sight of the Redeemer dying in
our place, a Sacrifice for our sins. And here, before we approach to
behold the great sight, let us take our shoes from off our feet and bow
down in lowest reverence of repenting grief, for, remember, if Jesus
had not died for sins, we must have died, and died eternally, too. The
pangs of the Savior on the Cross surpassed all estimate. But, such as
they were, they would have tormented us if they had not put Him to
anguish.

That cup which made Him sweat in the garden was bitter beyond
imagination, but to your lips and to mine it must have been placed and
unable as we would have been to drain it dry, we would have continued
to drink thereof forever and forever! "In the day you eat thereof you
shall surely die" is the great sentence against sin and for a soul to
die is a terrible doom, indeed. Our great father, Adam, felt the first
drops of the dreadful shower of death in the moment that he ate of the
forbidden fruit. He died to God, holiness, virtue and true happiness in
that same hour–and stood aghast before his God–before that very God
whom at other times he had met with rapture, and adored with delight.

We, his children, share in his spiritual death in our depraved natures.
And we would soon have passed away from the present death of this time
state to that corruption which naturally follows upon death in the
world to come when restraining and preserving influences are removed
and the worm begins its work–"where their worm dies not, and their
fire is not quenched." Yes, were it not for Him "who His own self bore
our sins in His own body on the tree," we should not have been here to
speak to one another, or look each other in the face.

Or if the forbearance of God had allowed us a brief existence on earth,
I might have stood here compelled to tell you that there remained
nothing for any of us but to die and to endure the wrath of God in body
and soul, world without end! Oh, the bitterness of our souls had we
been in such a state! With my hands upon my loins this morning, in
anguish of spirit, I might have been compelled to utter more woes than
ever fell from the lips of Jeremiah, from whom all joy was gone, while
I declared to you, and to your children, that there was no hope here or
hereafter–that we had offended God and He had given us over to utter
destruction! Blessed be His name, we have another message to deliver!
We may rather imitate Isaiah, today, than Jeremiah, and tell of
redeeming Grace and dying love instead of having to sound the dreadful
knell of every hope and to proclaim the birth of legions of sorrows.

With this fact upon our minds, let us come lovingly to the blessed
place of Calvary, once cursed on our account. Jesus died for me, that
is the uppermost feeling of each one. There was a Substitution for our
sins and by that Substitution Believers are saved. There was a
Substitution! "He His own self bore our sins in His own body on the
tree." A Substitute intervened–the sins which would have crushed us
were borne by Another–actually and literally borne by Another! "He His
own self bore our sins." The sentence means that He bore the punishment
which was due to our sins–we are sure it means that.

But surely it means more! I cannot divest myself of the conviction that
it means more, for it does not say, "He bore the punishment of our
sins," which would be the most natural expression if that were the
meaning intended, but, "He bore our sins." In that wonderful Gospel
chapter of Isaiah we are told, "The Lord has made to meet on Him the
iniquity of us all." And again, "He bore the sin of many." It does seem
as if the bearing of the punishment, great as that is, would not
exhaust the meaning of such phrases. The expression is so compact, so
concise, so definite–it must mean what it says.

At any rate, I am content to believe that God knows how to speak and to
express His own meaning and that the less we twist the Scriptures, or
get away from the simple sense which they would suggest to a child, the
more likely we are to understand them. "He His own self bore our sins."
In some wondrous sense He bore the sin, as well as the punishment. I
know not how. This I know–He was never a sinner, for, "in Him was no
sin." This I know–He never was defiled. It could not be–reject the
blasphemy with indignation! He, the Son of God, the Immaculate Man,
stained with sin? Never! We abhor the thought! And yet, "He bore our
sins" is still a Truth of God and we must not flinch from it.

Does it not mean that He was a representative Person? He was the Second
Adam and therefore He stood for His people. And therefore the Lord
dealt with Him as if the sins of all He represented had been His own
sins. He was the Shepherd and the Lord bade Him give an account for the
flock–and all the wanderings of all the sheep and all their
transgressions. Divine Justice visited upon the Shepherd's head,
because He was, by office and by Nature, the Representative of all
those for whom He died, and so could justly be called to account for
all that they had done. Sin was laid upon the Lord Jesus, for He was
forsaken of His God.

The Lord did not merely chasten Him and scourge Him, and put Him to
grief by the use of agencies which were suitable for such a purpose in
an innocent Person. He went further and hid His face from Him, which
was a sorrow fitting only for One upon whom sin was laid. Why should
God forsake Him, unless He had first laid sin upon Him? When Jesus
asked, "My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?" there was no answer
to that inquiry except this one, (at least I cannot imagine another),
"I have laid sin upon You, and therefore I must forsake You." If He
were merely suffering for others in the sense of doing others good by
His sufferings, the Father might surely have looked upon Him with
complacency, and even, if possible, with increased delight and have
encouraged Him in the benevolent disinterestedness which made Him stoop
to such sufferings.

But inasmuch as He was not only enduring for others, but enduring in
the place of others and bearing their sins, it became necessary that,
despite the love of the Father and the admiration which glowed in His
bosom towards His dear Son who was, then, above all things magnifying
the Nature of God, the Father, regarding Him as bearing sin–I say the
Father must hide His face from Him, and smite Him with the blows of a
cruel one till He cried out, "Eloi, Eloi, lama Sa-bachthani." Yes,
there was a Substitution, and that Substitution went mysteriously far!
It was not merely a transfer of punishment from one to Another, but
there was a transfer of sin in some deep sense, or else the Scripture
speaks not what it means–"He bore our sins in His own body on the
tree."

Now, I want you to pause a minute, again, having noted the fact of
Substitution, to consider the Substitute. "He His own self bore our
sins." And who was "He"? Beloved, I want you to feel a personal love to
our dear Lord and Master. I want your souls, at this moment, to realize
the actual Character of His existence and His true Personality. He is
not here, this morning, in Person, to show Himself to you, else might I
very well withhold my words, for His Presence would have an infinitely
superior power over you. But remember that He lives and is as real as
you are–and at this moment bears in His body the scars of His
sufferings for you. Think, then, who He was, and let your spirits kiss
His feet in humble contrite love.

He who bore our sins in His own body on the tree was God over all,
blessed forever, of whom and through whom and by whom are all things!
Without whom was not anything made that was made. Less than God could
not have borne your sins so as to put them away. But the infinitely
glorious Son of God did actually stoop to become a Sin-Bearer! I wonder
how I can talk of it as I do. It is a Truth of God scarcely to be
declared in words. It needs flame and blood and tears with which to
tell this story of an offended God–the Heaven-Maker and the
Earth-Creator–stooping from His Glory that He might save the reptiles
which had dared to insult His honor and to rebel against His Glory!
And, becoming one of them, to suffer for them, that without violation
of His Law He might have pity upon the offending things–things so
inconsiderable that if He had stamped them all out, as men burn a nest
of wasps, there had been no loss to the universe!

But He had pity on them and became one of them, and bore their sins.
Oh, love Him! Adore Him! Let your souls climb up to the right hand of
the Majesty above, this morning, and there bow down in lowest reverence
and adoring affection, that He, the God over all, whom you had
offended, should, His own self, bear our sins! Though God over all, He
became a Man like unto ourselves! A body was prepared for Him and that
body, mark you, not prepared, alone, and made like man but of man. No,
He was not otherwise fashioned than ourselves. He came into the world
as we come– born of a woman, a Child of a mother–to hang upon a
woman's breast! Not merely like man, but Man, born in the pedigree of
manhood, and so bone of our bone and flesh of our flesh, yet without a
taint of sin.

And He, in that double Nature but united Person, was Jesus, Son of God
and Son of the Virgin. He it was who "bore our sins in His own body on
the tree." Here we call to your remembrance the fact stated in the text
so positively–that the Substitution of Christ was carried out by Him,
Personally–not by proxy. "He His own self bore our sins in His own
body." The priest of old brought a substitution, but it was a lamb. He
struck the knife and the warm blood flowed down it. But our Lord Jesus
Christ had no substitute for Himself! He, "His own self bore our sins
in His own body."

O Priest of God! The pangs are to be Your own pangs! The knife must
reach Your own heart! No lamb for You, You are, Yourself, the Lamb! The
blood which streams at Your feet must be Your own blood. There must be
wounds, but they must be wounds in Your own flesh. Oh, turn your loving
eyes to your Lord, and remember that everything He did for you He did
Himself! You sometimes say that another voice may speak for Jesus–you
are often willing to serve God through the energy of another–and I
will not chide you. But oh, remember His personal sacrifice for you!
Remember the griefs which Jesus bore put His own soul into a tempest of
grief–and made His own heart to boil like a cauldron within Him. The
heart which was broken for our sins was His own heart! And the life
given up was His own life! Not by another, though he were an angel,
could Christ have redeemed mankind, but He, "His own self bore our sins
in His own body on the tree."

Notice, also, that the Substitution of Christ is described in our text
in a way which suggests consciousness, willingness and great pain. "He
His own self bore our sins." They were upon Him. They pressed Him. The
Greek word for "bore" suggests the idea of a great weight, "He bore our
sins"–stooped under them, as it were–they were a load to Him. There
are men in the world who may be bearing in their bodies the result of
the sin of their parents, but they are not aware of it. And even if
they were, they are voluntary bearers, just the same. But our Lord
assumed our sins as one takes a weight upon his shoulders–and when the
sins were there He knew that He was carrying our burdens–and still
consented to do so.

There was not a moment in Christ's life in which the pressure of our
sin was unfelt. Though the wrath of God, on account of sin, was more
especially felt by Him at Gethsemane, and up to the tree, yet at all
times He was stricken, smitten of God and afflicted. What a weight was
this! The solid earth cannot bear the weight of sin! It groans and
travails in pain together, even now, like a creaking chariot whose
axles are unable to bear up under the stupendous weight. Yet on Jesus
was the burden laid–a far weightier one than the fabled Atlas
bore–and He sustained it to the tree. The text, in our English
version, might seem to teach that our Lord bore our sins only on the
tree–and that erroneous dogma has been drawn from it.

No inference could have been more feebly sustained, for the original
does not necessarily set forth anything of the kind. The word
translated "on" is precisely the same word which in the next verse is
translated "to," or, "unto"–"We are now returned 'unto' "–and might
have been just as correctly read, "unto," in this case. I have not the
slightest doubt that the meaning of the text is, "He His own self bore
our sins in His own body to the tree," so that when He reached the tree
He left our sins there, condemned and crucified forever and ever.
Instead of the doctrine being deduced that Christ was a Substitute only
on the tree, the fact is He always was a Substitute up to the tree, and
then and there that Substitution culminated in His dying as a
Sin-Offering. Let us, this morning, know that consciously, from the
time He was a babe in Bethlehem till the moment when He bowed His head
and gave up the ghost, "He His own self bore our sins in His own body"
to the tree.

And, Brothers and Sisters, He bore those sins manifestly. I think that
is the mind of the Spirit–when He says, "in His own body," He means to
give vividness to the thought. We are so constituted that we do not
think so forcibly of mental and spiritual things as we do of bodily
things. But our Lord bore our sins "in His own body." If you had looked
at Him, had you been instructed by the Spirit, you would have seen in
His body that He was a Sin-Bearer. Listen to this verse–"As many were
astonished at you, so His visage was more marked than that of any man,
and His form more than the sons of men." Remember another text–"Yet we
did esteem Him stricken, smitten of God."

Think of that! Those who looked into the Savior's face thought Him
"smitten of God." First they thought Him stricken or demented, like one
who has passed through such an awful sorrow that the mind has quailed
beneath it. And then they looked at Him as smitten of God! Even the
Jews judged Him to be near to 50 when He was scarcely 30 years of age,
so worn and haggard did He look, that "Man of Sorrows and acquainted
with grief." He smiled and He cheered others. He wore a cheerful
countenance among the sons of men that He might not make those who saw
Him, sorrowful, and deep down in His heart there glowed a secret
fire–a wondrous joy that He was redeeming His own chosen–but still
imponderable, incomprehensible infinite griefs perpetually rolled over
Him, so that all His lifetime He might have said, "All Your waves and
Your billows have gone over Me."

"Who His own self bore our sins in His own body," so that His visage
seemed to tell of it. And when He came to the tree, oh, how His body
bore our sins, then, in communion with His sinless soul! I do not care
who it is that speaks against

descriptions of the Crucifixion, or who would have us keep in the
background the bodily sufferings of Jesus–I am persuaded that the
highest, most intense and forceful piety that ever existed among men
has arisen out of contemplations of the agony of Gethsemane and the
death throes of Calvary.

The Romish Church, with all her errors, and they are countless, has
always had in her midst a band of loving, adoring spirits who have
entered into the Redeemer's passion and whose meat and drink have been
the flesh and blood of Christ in their silent contemplations. And if
Protestant Christians ever fall into the idea that we must not think
too much of the blood and wounds of Jesus, they will lose the richest
spiritual sustenance and we shall cease to have eminent saints among
us. I shall not be ashamed at any time to talk to you of the bodily
griefs of Jesus, when I remember that Peter, or rather the Holy Spirit
by Peter, puts it so in the text–"Who His own self bore our sins in
His own body to the tree."

There is the Cross and there is the body–there are the visible things,
as well as the spiritual and the unseen. We will not forget the second,
but we will, by no means ever despise the first! We will speak lovingly
and tenderly of the Body and of the bodily sufferings of the Lord. Oh,
see, then, the Lord of Life and Glory taken outside the city gate of
old Jerusalem and there, amidst a ribald throng, treated as a common
criminal! It was the Tyburn, the Old Bailey of the city, where felons
were usually executed–and they took our Master, malefactors being with
Him, and treated Him as a felon! They nailed His hands! Look! The cruel
iron is driven through His feet!

They lift Him up, a spectacle of shame! They have stripped Him! They
have gambled over the few garments which He had–and there He hangs.
They gather round Him and they mock Him, as if the Cross were a pillory
as well as a gallows! They insult Him with studied sarcasm and He has
no reply to make except to bless them with His prayers and to appeal to
His God! All His friends have fled and when they timidly return they
can only share His sorrow, but they cannot alleviate it. He must
die–die in extreme pain of body–and die with unknown inward agonies,
the veil of which we will not attempt to lift. "He His own self bore
our sins in His own body on the tree." Blessed are You, O Savior, and
blessed are the eyes that have seen You and have looked to You by
faith.

Our Lord Jesus Christ, let it be remembered, never ceased to bear our
sins till He had taken them right up to the tree. And when He had taken
them to the tree, there He hung them forever as a spectacle of eternal
scorn. He, Himself, dying while He made our sins die. Himself crucified
while He crucified our sins once and for all. O you who use a cross as
an ornament, why do you do it? It is a gallows whereon our sins were
hung up in shame! Will you wear a gallows around your neck? Will you
make an adornment of that which was your Master's death! I had as soon
wear about my neck a butcher's knife which had killed my mother, as a
cross on which my Savior was murdered!

It looks as if you had sided with His murderers and gloried in the
instrument of His torture! It was a shameful thing to die the death of
the cross–and the Lord knew it to be so–and yet He "His own self bore
our sins in His own body to the tree." Mark the tree of the Cross for a
moment with much attention. It was the place of pain. No death could be
more full of agony than that of crucifixion. When the headsman's axe
falls on the neck the head is severed and the pain is over–even to
stand burning at the stake is a shorter, if at the time a sharper, way
to Heaven. But the pains of crucifixion may last for days!

Cases have been known in which men have actually lived after a three
days' nailing to a cross. The pain, itself, is inconceivably great. The
most tender parts of the hands and feet, where they are most liable to
bring on lockjaw, being torn by the nails–and the strain of the body
continued tearing at the wounds. Yet our Savior bore that pain. Ah, it
is not till you suffer pain that you begin to know the love of Christ
to the fullest. You may thank Him, you sons of sorrow and daughters of
suffering, for all your pangs, for now you have fellowship with Him.
Blessed be Your love, O Jesus, that You could bear pain and death for
us!

But the cross was not the place of pain merely, it was the place of
scorn. To be fastened to the cross! Why they would not put the meanest
Roman there though he committed murder–it was a death for slaves and
menials. When scorn mingles with pain you know what a compound of grief
it makes. To be laughed at when you suffer is to suffer seven-fold. But
more, it was the place of the curse, for, "cursed is everyone that
hangs on the tree," and the Word of God has told us, "He was made a
curse for us." Last of all, it was the place of death, for Jesus must
not merely bleed, but bleed to death. He must not only suffer, but
suffer till life, itself, was gone. O dying Savior, Your love to me was
wonderful, for death, itself, could not turn it aside, and therefore
blessed, forever blessed, be Your name!

Before we leave the Cross, let the Believer sit down and see on the
Cross his sins hanging up as dead. Christ carried them up to the Cross
and slew them. The Law comes to me and says, "I arrest you for sin,"
but I reply, "I have no sin. What would you do with my sins if I had
any?" "I would put them to a shameful death." "Lo, they are yonder,
executed upon the accursed tree by Jesus Christ." Look, then, at your
sins hanged up on the gallows–abhor and loathe them– but rejoice
that, loathsome as they are, they are dead! The Lord put them all to
death and put sin away forever by His death upon the tree. The death of
Jesus is the death of our sins.

I fear I am addressing some who never knew what it was to have sin
pardoned. Dear Hearer, all your hope of pardon lies in what I have been
telling you this morning. You cannot make recompense to God for your
sin either by repentance or by future reformation. Your only hope is to
look to Jesus Christ, who bore the sins of His people in His own body
on the tree. And if you will come and put your trust in Jesus, your sin
shall be put away from you and you shall be accepted. Oh, I pray that
at this hour you may be enabled to believe in Jesus and find peace
through the Cross, and to Him shall be all the Glory!

II. And, now I hope I shall not strain your attention while I bid you
consider the second part of the text–OUR DEATH TO SIN. "Who His own
self bore our sins in His own body on the tree, that we, being dead to
sin, should live unto righteousness: by whose stripes you were healed."
Now, observe right well that we are dead to the condemning power of
sin. No sin can condemn a Believer in Jesus Christ. For what reason?
Because Christ has suffered what we ought to have suffered on account
of sin–He has rendered a full recompense to Divine Justice.

You bring me a large file full of bills and you say to me, "Are not
these bills against you?" I answer, "No doubt they are all correct in
every item, and they might take me many a month to examine." You ask
me, "Can you pay them?" "No, and I do not need to try." "But do they
not trouble you?" "No. I can make a pillow of them if that is all, and
sleep, notwithstanding their number and greatness." You are
wonder-struck to think that I should have such a mass of bills and take
the matter so coolly. I ask you to take off these bills from the file
one by one, and as you do so you see that they are all paid for–there
is a red mark at the bottom of every one. Who troubles himself about a
bill when it is paid?

"But did you pay those debts?" "No, not I. I have not paid a penny."
"Did you not pay part of them?" "Not I. I never contributed a rusty
farthing towards them." "Did you not offer a composition?" "No, not a
farthing in the pound." "Yet you are perfectly easy?" "Yes, because He
who bore my sins in His own body on the tree, took all my debts and
paid them for me, and now I am dead to those debts–they have no power
over me. I am dead to my sins. Christ suffered instead of me. I have
nothing to do with them. They are gone as much as if they had never
been committed–

"Now freed from sin, I walk at large; My Sa vior's blood's my full
discharge." From now on I have nothing to do but to live as a righteous
man, accepted in the Beloved–to live by His righteousness and rejoice
in it–blessing and magnifying His holy name!

Beloved, hear the text again! As many of you as have looked to Jesus
Christ bearing your sins in His own body on the tree, you are dead to
sin as to its reigning power! Dead, first, because we have seen its
detestable nature. The sin which was so base that it required the Son
of God, Himself, to die before it could be pardoned, is too awful and
desperate an evil for us to dally with any more. It had its charms, but
now we have perceived its hypocrisies. The false Prophet Mo-kanna, who
wore the silver veil upon his brow, deceived many, for he said that
should that veil be lifted, the light which would gleam from under it
would strike men blind, the glory was so great.

But when one had once perceived that the man was leprous and that on
his brow, instead of brightness, there were the white scales of a
leper, nobody would become his disciple. And so, O Sin, at the Cross I
see your silver veil removed and I mark the desperate leprosy that is
on you! I am dead to you! Begone, you foul blood-stained traitor! I
cannot harbor you in my heart. The death of Christ, then, is, to us,
the death of sin. We are dead to sin, again, because another passion
has absorbed all the forces of our life. Have you ever seen men dead to
other things because some one passion has eaten them up? Look at the
miser–ask him why he does not eat a full meal. He is dead to appetite.
Tempt him with rich wines. Bring before him the dainties of the season.

They will cost him money and he wants them not. He tells you he has no
taste nor love for such things. But you tell him that there is sweet
music to be heard and there are pleasures to be enjoyed. Yes, but there
must be money doled out for them and therefore he has no ear and no
eye. His own dear gold is everything! He is dead to all else. But there
is rent

due from a poor widow with many children and he will pounce upon her
and turn her out upon the cold stones of the street. Tell him of the
widow and her tears, of the orphans and their woes–what does he care?
He asks you whether you ever had any house property and assures you
that if you had, you would soon have as hard a heart as he has. But has
the man no heart at all? No, Sir, he has no life except that which
pulsates to the chink of his money bags. The zeal of his gold has eaten
him up!

Now, it is just so with us as to Christ. We have no eyes or ears for
anything but for our dear Lord who bled and died, and who is gone up
into His Glory. Now sin may charm, but we have the adder's ear. Sin may
put on all its allurements, but we are blind as bats to its beauty and
wish to be. We are dead to sin–so says the text. Another passion has
sucked up our life–and our life for sin is all dried up. And yet
again, sin appears to us now to be too mean and trivial a thing for us
to care about. Picture Paul going along the Appian way towards Rome. He
is met by some of the Christians far away at Puteoli, and afterwards by
others at the Three Taverns.

Can you imagine what was their conversation as Paul walked chained
along the highway? Why, they would commune concerning Jesus and the
Resurrection and the Spirit–and saints converted, and souls in Heaven!
I can conceive that the soldiers and others who would come up with them
along the Roman road, stopping at the taverns, and so on, would have
many things to talk of. One of them would say, "There will be a grand
fight at the amphitheatre next week." And another would say, "Oh, but
over at such a theater there is a splendid show–a hundred beasts are
to be slain in a single night, and the famous German gladiator is to
exhibit his prowess tomorrow evening."

And others would say, "Who is to be commander in Spain next year?" "Who
is appointed over the Praetorian Guard?" And the babble would be about
a thousand things–but the Apostle would be supremely indifferent to it
all. Not a topic that any one of those soldiers could bring before him,
or any one of the people around him, could interest him. He was dead to
the things to which they were alive and alive to the things to which
they were dead. So is the Christian! The Cross has killed him and the
Cross has quickened him! We are dead to sin that we should live unto
righteousness–and now our very power to enjoy sin, if, indeed, we are
resting in Christ, is gone from us!

We have lost, now, by God's Grace, the faculty which once was gratified
with these things. They tell us we deny ourselves many pleasures. Oh,
Sirs, there is a sense in which a Christian lives a self-denying life,
but there is another sense in which he practices no self-denial at all,
for he only denies himself what he does not need and what he would not
have if he could! If you could force it upon him it would be misery to
him, his views and tastes are now so changed. Have you ever looked at a
green field and marked the sparkling dew drops, and thought how bright
they are? Did you ever then turn your eyes on the sun and look at him
and try to stare him out of countenance?

If you have, I know what has happened, for when you looked down upon
the landscape again, you could not see it– you seemed to have lost
your eyes–they had been put out by the brightness on which you gazed.
So you may look on the world of sin and see some beauty in it till you
look at HIM–and then the brightness of His Glory puts out your eyes!
The world is dark and black, after that, and you wish it to be so. Let
these eyes be forever sightless as the eyes of night, and let these
ears be forever deaf as silence, rather than sin should have a charm
for me, or anything should take up my spirit save the Lord of Love who
bled Himself to death that He might redeem me unto Himself! This is the
royal road to sanctification! The death of Christ becomes the death of
sin. We see Him bleed for us and then we put our sin to death.

And it seems to me, Brothers and Sisters, and listen to it, as if the
last sentence of our text told us this–"By His stripes you were
healed." It is as good as if the Spirit said, "There is the recipe for
sanctification. If you want to know how to be dead to sin and alive
unto righteousness, there it is–His stripes will heal you." The welts,
the blue marks of His scourging–these will take out the lines of sin.
The wounds, the sweat, the death throes of the Savior–these will cure
you of sin's disease. You go to a physician and ask him to heal you. He
gives you what we commonly call a recipe. What does "recipe" mean?
Take. Ah, there is the cure for sin! We think that the cure for sin is
to give something out from ourselves and to do some good thing. But in
truth the cure for sin is, "Take."

Take what? Take your dear Lord's wounds and trust them! Take His griefs
and rest in them! Take His death and believe in it! Take Himself and
love Him! And by His stripes you are healed! Sanctification is by faith
in Jesus Christ! We overcome through the blood of the Lamb. And oh, as
the topmost stone is stained with the blood, so must the foundation be.
And I say, in parting, to every man and woman to whom I have spoken–as
you and I shall meet at the Great White

Throne at last, in the general assembly which shall be the last meeting
of the sons of men, and the last parting–if you would be found at the
right hand of God, believe the message I have brought you, for it is
the very Truth of God!

Do not only hear it, but act upon it, and before you leave this house I
do pray that the Spirit of God may show you what it is to believe in
Him, alone, "who His own self bore our sins in His own body on the
tree." And if you do, though your sins have been as scarlet, they shall
be as wool. Though you have been the most atrocious offender existing
on the face of the earth, you shall be clean every whit from every sin!
You may have come here as black as Hell, but you shall go out pure as
the white-robed hosts in Heaven, if you will but believe in Jesus. This
is the washing in the fountain, the Fountain which alone can make us
clean.

God help us to wash immediately, lest the time for washing be past and
the time for judgment be today. God bless you, for His name's sake.
Amen.

PORTION OF SCRIPTURE READ BEFORE SERMON–1 Peter 2.
__________________________________________________________________

A Mighty Plea