General And Yet Particular

General And Yet Particular

DELIVERED ON SUNDAY MORNING, APRIL 24, 1864, BY THE REV. C, H.
SPURGEON, AT THE METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE, NEWINGTON.

"You have given Him power o ver all flesh, that He should give eternal
life to as many as You have given Him." John 17:2.

THIS was used by our Savior as an argument why the Father should
glorify Him in His dread hour of conflict. Our Lord did as much as say,
"You have already given Me what I now ask. Therefore, since You have
virtually bestowed it upon me in the Covenant, give it Me now in very
deed." So the Believer, when he prays, asks for what is already his
own. And when we come before the Lord in prayer this should encourage
us much, that our heavenly Father has already given us all things in
giving us His Son, so that we ask for what is virtually our own.

The text itself we will try to open up briefly. It contains two
statements–first, that Christ, as a Mediator, has received from God
universal authority over all flesh. And secondly, that the object of
this is special and peculiar, that He may give eternal life to as many
as the Father has given to Him. You have universal power, but you have
within it a special purpose. We know that our Lord Jesus Christ has all
power given to Him in Heaven and in earth–"Angels and men before Him
fall and devils fear and fly." All things, whether animate or
inanimate, confess the majesty of Him who is King of kings and Lord of
lords.

Our text, however, mentions the most stubborn thing in all the
world–"flesh." Jesus has power over all flesh. That willful, wicked,
disobedient thing called flesh Christ knows how to govern. He has power
over all men as fallen men, for such the term, flesh, describes. I
understand, then, that Christ has power over all men, to pardon all
whom He wills. Christ has this day as Mediator, power to convict of sin
every living soul by His Spirit, if so He wills. And power to bring all
men to the footstool of His Grace and to give them pardon if so it
seems good in His sight. We do not believe that there is any exception
to this rule–Christ has power over every man born of Adam, to give to
him the Grace of conviction and the Grace of pardon, if so it should
please Him to do.

He has power also to make those who are not convicted of sin and who
are not pardoned, subservient to His purpose. He has power to restrain
their evil passions from running to an excess of riot. He can use them
as His drudges to effect His purposes even when they proudly rebel
against Him–so that though they boast themselves in their own free
will–they shall really be working out His own eternal purpose. He has
a bit often in the mouth of His fiercest enemy and a hook in the jaw of
the bloodiest persecutor.

Over all flesh He has authority whether it is crowned with royalty or
wrapped in rags! Whether it curses with profanity or bows down with
reverent adoration. There is not a mortal man from the equator to the
poles, of any rank or any language, or bearing any hue upon his skin
who is not subject to this universal mediatorial power of the Lord
Jesus Christ. If I understand my text and Scriptures parallel with it,
it was ordained in order to the salvation of the chosen, that the whole
world of man should be taken from under the immediate rule of God as
absolute God and placed under a new form of government of which the
Mediator should be King and Head.

As the result of this gracious arrangement a fallen race is permitted
to exist–a sinful world coming into contact with an absolute God must
have been instantaneously doomed to Hell. Man, while yet a rebel, lives
on in virtue of the mediatorial power of Jesus! He has stepped in
between avenging Justice and the sinner and so the sinner is spared. I
trace to Christ's Atonement the continued life of the most obdurate.
All the long-suffering mercy of God seems to me to flow through the
channel of the Savior's authority over all flesh.

It is in virtue of this power that the Gospel is preached to all
men–"All power is given unto Me in Heaven and in earth. Go you,
therefore, and teach all nations." Hence the command to believe
receives its Divine sanction and those are condemned who believe not in
His name. On account of this universal dispensation of mediatorship, an
honest, gracious, and sincere invitation is given to whomever will, to
drink of the Water of Life freely. It is, I say, on account of this
universal mediatorial power of Christ that I can stand upon this
platform and say in the broadest possible terms, that whoever believes
on the Lord Jesus shall never perish, but have eternal life! And I can
preach a Gospel which, in its proclamation, is as wide as the ruin and
as extensive as the Fall.

But why all this? The text tells us that the object and design of all
this was not universal, but special–that the intention of God in thus
putting all men under the power of Christ was not that all men might
receive eternal life, but that He might give eternal life to as many as
had been given to Him. So that in all this universal dealing there is
the special and peculiar design that the chosen may receive life–that
the elect may be filled with spiritual life on earth and afterwards
enter into the Glory life above.

God might doubtless have acted upon another plan and have given Christ
power only over His elect if He had willed, that He might give eternal
life to them. But it has not so pleased God. It has, on the contrary,
pleased Him to put the whole race under the mediatorial sway of Jesus
in order that He might give eternal life to those who were chosen out
of the world. God might have commissioned His servants to go into the
world and preach the Gospel to the chosen only– He might have told us
to present Christ only to certain persons upon whom there should be a
peculiar mark. It has not so pleased Him.

He bids us go "into all the world and preach the Gospel to every
creature." His high decree and Divine intent being that those whom He
has ordained unto eternal life shall, through believing, enter into the
life which He has ordained for them. I do not know whether I have
brought before you what I am certain is the full idea of the text–a
general power given to the Mediator over all flesh–as the result of
which a proclamation of mercy is universally published to men and a
general declaration of salvation through faith presented to all
creatures. But this always with a special, limited, definite
design–that a chosen people–separated from before all worlds from the
rest of mankind should obtain eternal life.

I have aimed in my ministry constantly to preach, as far as I can, the
whole of the Gospel rather than a fragment of it. Therefore those
Brethren who are sounder than the Bible abhor me as much as if I were
an Arminian. And on the other side, the enemies of the Doctrines of
Grace often represent me as an Ultra-Calvinist. I am rejoiced to
receive the censure of both sides! I am not ambitious to be numbered in
the roll of either party. I have never cultivated the acquaintance nor
desired the approbation of those men who shut their eyes to Truths of
God which they do not wish to see.

I never desired to be reputed so excessively Calvinistic as to neglect
one part of Scripture in order to maintain another. If I am thought to
be inconsistent with myself, I am very glad to be so, so long as I am
not inconsistent with Holy Scripture. Sure I am that all the Truth of
God is really consistent, but equally certain am I that it is not
apparently so to our poor, finite minds. In nine cases out of ten he
who is nervously anxious to be manifestly consistent with himself in
his theological system, if he gains his end, is merely consistent with
a fool!

He who is consistent with Scripture is consistent with perfect Wisdom.
He who is consistent with himself is at best consistent with
imperfection, folly and insignificance. To keep to Scripture, even
though it should involve a charge of personal inconsistency, is to be
faithful to God and men's souls. My text seems to me to present that
double aspect which so many people either cannot or will not see.

Here is the great Atonement by which the Mediator has the whole world
put under His dominion. But still here is a special object for this
Atonement–the ingathering, or rather out-gathering–of a chosen and
peculiar people unto eternal life.

I. Let us, this morning, meditate upon the principle of the text and
our first remark shall be that THE DOCTRINE OF A GENERAL DISPLAY OF
POWER FOR THE ACCOMPLISHMENT OF A SPECIAL OBJECT IS IN ACCORDANCE WITH
THE ANALOGY OF NATURE. In the world around us we shall find the Creator
accomplishing special purposes by a far wider display of power than the
immediate object appears to require. Take, for instance, yonder plant.
What is the main object for which a plant lives? Every botanist and
every common observer will tell you that its object in living is that
it may produce seed and perpetuate its like.

God's object, then, in yonder plant is to produce a seed from it that
its species may be perpetuated. How will He do it? Will He send an
angel to watch over the seed and the seed alone? No, my Brethren, there
shall be a watchful care over root, stem, cells, tissues, leaves and
flowers. Although when winter comes, every leaf will drop off and rot
in the ground and never be heard of again, yet those leaves have been
the object of a superintending care, most marvelous and wise. Though
the real object of it all has been the seed alone, yet stem and leaf
and cell have all been watched over.

Just so, I think, it is in God's dealings with His elect. He is looking
to them as to the seed and substance of mankind, but those graceless
ones who will perish forever like fading leaves have been the object of
His tender care. If you tell me that the leaves were not absolutely
necessary to the seed, I will give you another illustration still more
clear. You are not to think that when God is about to accomplish a
purpose He studies just how much will do it and then spends no more
power than a pinching economy finds needful.

We are wanting rain. Our gardens and fields are crying out for showers.
Well, our gracious God will send it to us very soon. But will He just
allot a shower to that piece of ground which requires it–will He not
rather send a wide range of rain? I have sometimes wondered at this,
that when the shower falls it must be God's intention to bless the
field and yet He scatters the liquid blessing upon the salt and briny
sea where no plants can be nourished and where it seems to be a waste
to pour the cooling drops. You shall find it rain quite as heavily upon
the Atlantic as upon the thirsty earth which is opening its mouth for
the moisture.

Why is this? Because it is the rule of God when He is accomplishing a
purpose to deal after a general fashion though still the object is
specific. Here is this air about us. Why is it made up of oxygen,
hydrogen and nitrogen and so on? Is it not that plants and animals may
live upon it? Surely this is the Creator's drift in making such a
compound. But suppose you transfer yourself in imagination to the polar
regions where life cannot exist, or to spots in the great desert of
Sahara where even the vulture with swift wing has never flown. You will
find the air composed of precisely the same particles!

Why is this? There is no animal to breathe it, no plant to bloom in it.
Why then the same? Simply because God is not like finite man–He has
not to stint Himself to such an expenditure as shall just accomplish
His own purpose–He acts like a God and in the infinity of His Nature
He gives more than is absolutely necessary for the accomplishment of
His purpose. Think again, now, of nature in another aspect. We are
proud enough to think that God made this world for the comfort of man
and with an eye to human convenience. Suppose we grant that principle
for a moment.

Here is a violet peeping out among the green leaves. Why has it that
delicious perfume making glad the spring? Why, you tell me it is to
gratify man. Very likely, very likely. But here are millions upon
millions of violets which are never smelt by anybody which grow among
the nettles at the back of the Church, or away in the woods where not
even a child has wandered, or at a distance from the abodes of men
where they are never seen or heard of, for–

"Full many a flower is doomed to blush unseen, And waste its fragrance
on the desert air." Why is everything so painted by the sun? Why do
crystals sparkle when the sunbeams fall upon them? How is it you see
the many lines of a rainbow when the sun is shining on a crystal?

Why it must be to gratify the eye. God would have this world a place of
beauty and a joy forever! But crystals sparkle in the polar regions
where there is not even a bear to look upon them! In that inhospitable
region where life goes out and where we believe no creature having life
could possibly exist, the sun still shines and still the crystal
flashes back to Him the colors of the iris. Why is this? Why is this? I
cannot tell you, except that I perceive that God gives to the sun a
power over all things that He may give pleasure to the eye.

What multitudes of landscapes were never gazed upon by the artist's
eye, yet there they are, sleeping in their beauty beneath the eyes of
God. How the birds are singing this morning, how they are pouring forth
from their throats sweet melodious strains and yet they are singing
quite as well in the deep forest glade where no man can ever hear them
as in our gardens and walks. Why is this? Do we not think that the
birds sing for our joy and that the landscape is spread out for man's
mental delight?

It certainly is so, and yet there are landscapes and birds where there
are no men to see and ears to hear. So I think I might continue all the
morning giving you analogies from Nature in which God, in the
accomplishment of a specific purpose adopts a general mode of action.

II. I will take another view of the question. THIS PRINCIPLE IS SEEN IN
PROVIDENCE. All of you believe in a general Providence. You believe
that God superintends all the affairs of the universe so that there is
not a grain of dust blowing in the street today which has not its orbit
ordained and fixed as much as the planets in the sky. You believe that

God overrules the motions of the rush that waves by the river as much
as he does the policy of kings and emperors. Do not you believe in a
special Providence, too?

I do, and I believe you do. You believe that God is watching specially
over His own people and that all things work together for good to them
who love God, to them who are called according to His purpose. And did
it ever strike you that there was any inconsistency in believing in a
general and a special Providence? I do not suppose it ever did–I know
it never did me. I know I feel quite easy in believing the two things
and I should have been very uneasy in not being able to believe both. I
do not see why the Christian may not transfer the idea and believe that
there is a general influence for good flowing from the mediatorial
sacrifice of Christ and yet its special design and definite object is
the giving of eternal life to as many as the Father gave Him.

We will take one or two instances in Providence. There is Jonah going
to Tarshish. He has betrayed his Master and has fled from Nineveh. The
Lord will have him back. He intends to bring him back in a strange
conveyance–He has prepared a great fish to swallow him! How is Jonah
to be got out of the ship? The storm must come and when the storm comes
what does it do? Does it shake Jonah? Does it expose Jonah's life to
danger? It does, but it also shakes the whole ship and all who are in
the ship are afraid that they shall suffer shipwreck. And what is more,
if there were a thousand ships upon the sea that day they felt the
storm and yet God's special object was to have Jonah thrown into the
sea– though all the ships upon the sea must be tossed with the
tempest, still there is the special design.

Take another thing. It is ordained according to prophecy that Christ
must be born at Bethlehem. Then Mary His mother, who is great with
child, must be brought to Bethlehem. How shall it be done? Why, in
order to fetch Joseph and Mary to Bethlehem, every man and woman in
Judea must go to the place of their pedigree and still, though God's
express design is to bring Mary there that Jesus may be born, He uses a
general method in order to accomplish it and every other Jewish man and
woman must go to the place of their pedigree!

Here, again, is a particular object accomplished by general means. I
might continue with many, many other instances, but indeed, you have
only to open your eyes and see. My Brethren, if you pray tomorrow for
God to send a favorable wind to waft the missionary-ship to its haven,
the same wind will waft a merchantman, or a pirate, too, if they are
going the same way. It may be that you pray that rain may come to
extinguish a fire, and perhaps a shower comes, but you do not expect it
to fall just where the fire is, but also for miles around. If you know
some poor man living in Lancashire and you pray for him, that God would
deliver him from poverty–if your prayer is heard, it may very likely
be by quickening the trade of the whole country and conferring a
blessing on the people of the whole neighborhood!

In fact, you know yourselves if you are praying to God to bless your
children, it is not possible that your children should be blessed
without the blessing coming down upon others, because God's blessing
any one man is the means indirectly of blessing other people. You
cannot have a godly family down a court without the whole court being
the better for it. You cannot have one Christian man favored by his God
without his household having some portion of the favor. God sends the
favor only to His servants–that is the special intention–but still
there comes with that a wider blessing.

While thinking over this matter I could only compare it to the moon
when surrounded with a halo. The interior ring was the moon's own self,
but round about it was a halo of brightness. Such is God's dealing with
His people. There is the central substance of eternal, immutable
love–but round about it there is a Divine halo–it encompasses all the
creatures of God and makes them, in some measure, to participate in the
light of the great central love, which belongs peculiarly to His
saints.

III. Let us for one moment show that this has been ILLUSTRATED BY
MIRACLES. Joshua is fighting with the Ca-naanites. There has been a
long battle, but he desires to see his enemy exterminated and boldly
turning round he cries to the sun, "Stand still upon Gibeon. And you,
moon, in the valley of Ajalon." What did the sun and moon stand still
for? Why to help Joshua against the Canaanites! But do you not think
all the people everywhere had a longer day as the result? Did not every
man who looked up wonder how it was that the sun stood still? There was
a poor man with a hard task and he was afraid he should not finish it
before the sun went down. How glad was he to find an extra hour added
to the day!

He knew nothing about the special purpose and yet there was a special
purpose in it all. Every man and woman on that side of the hemisphere
enjoyed a length of light unusual for that time and yet there was no
design of blessing them in Joshua's prayer. They were blessed
incidentally. The real object was that the children of Israel might
fight the battle and complete it. Take another miracle–Sennacherib has
come against Jerusalem–he is about to swallow up Hezekiah and all the
little kingdom of Judah. Hezekiah takes Rabshakeh's letter and lays it
before the Lord. As the result of this, the angel of the Lord went
through the camp of Sennacherib and slew his mighty men and the power
of Assyria was broken.

What was the effect of it? There was the little straggling kingdom of
Babylon, then contending for existence with Assyria. That kingdom was
spared and became afterwards the destroyer of Assyria. And you read
that Berodachbaladan, the king, sent messengers to Hezekiah to thank
him for what was done. You see Babylon gets good out of the destruction
of Sennacherib, but was this the main design? Certainly not. The grand
object of God in destroying Sennacherib was to deliver Hezekiah and His
people and yet the whole earth rejoices and has rest when the great
hammer of the Lord falls on Assyria and its empire is broken and
destroyed. It was a blessing to all the East when the power of the
despot was broken that night–but the object of it was for Israel and
for Israel, alone.

Come to the days of Christ and observe another miracle–there is a ship
tossed within the tempest. Her mast is ready to go over the side. Her
timbers crack–she will be swamped and go down. No, she will not–for
there sleeps with His head upon the helm, the Master of the tempest,
the Lord High Admiral of the sea, King Jesus! And when He has been
awakened He stands up and rebukes the winds and waves and instantly
there is a great calm. Why did He make the calm? For the preservation
of His disciples and His own ship. But did the calm end there and give
no blessing to others? We are informed that there were with Him many
other little ships and so they all enjoyed the calm, too. The direct
and definite intention was to make His disciples at peace and in
safety. But the effect of it did not end with the disciples, but every
ship which was out upon the sea of Nazareth that night enjoyed the
calm.

One more instance and I will not multiply them, lest I fatigue you.
Paul and Silas are in prison–God's object is to terrify the jailer and
to bring out of prison His two servants, Paul and Silas. What does it
say?–"The foundations of the prison were shaken and Paul and Silas had
their bands loosed"? No, Brethren. "And every man's bands were loosed."
Was it God's object to bring every man out of prison? No one dreams of
such a thing! This was merely a concurrent benefit which went with
God's special object in dealing with His poor persecuted followers,
Paul and Silas.

So I believe that as it was in these miracles, so it is in that grander
miracle, the great work of Grace. Jesus Christ comes into the world as
a Propitiation for our sins and not for ours only, but for the sins of
the whole world. And yet it is true He loved His Church and gave
Himself for it. He laid down His life for His sheep and for His people
did He die and not for the world, in one sense, and yet in that other
sense which I have tried to bring out, He was a Propitiation for the
sins of the whole world.

IV. Let us now LOOK AT FACTS. How do we really find the Gospel operate?
I think I see this island of Great Britain covered with forests with
men living in them having their naked bodies painted, dwelling in
caves, feeding upon herbs and acorns. I think I see a simple-minded
man–some think it was Paul–landing upon the shore and coming forward,
trying to teach these savages the way of salvation. Oh, what a prolific
hour was that when first the Gospel was preached in Britain! What has
been the effect of it?

Brethren, let us answer another question first–What was the immediate
design of God in sending the Gospel to Great Britain? My answer is to
save as many as He had ordained to eternal life. That was His great
object. But what has been the effect of it? I trace the liberty, the
happiness and the prosperity of our country throughout these many
centuries, to the prevalence of the Gospel in it. And though I believe
God's design in sending the Gospel–I mean the central design–was that
He might separate unto Himself His own chosen people, yet in connection
with the Gospel, innumerable and incalculable blessings have come to
every Englishman.

And there does not live a man who claims the name of Briton who is not
under solemn obligation to the preaching of the Gospel for ten thousand
benefits. Christ has, indeed, in England, seemed to have power over all
Englishmen, that He might give eternal life to as many as the Father
gave Him. Look at the Reformation. What was God's object in raising up
Luther and Calvin and Zwingle to work the Reformation? Why, for this
grand purpose–that Christ might see of the travail of His soul and
that His chosen might believe in Him. That was the purpose of the
Reformation! But what did the Reformation accomplish?

Not only this, but a thousand things besides, for it was to the
Reformation that arts and sciences owed their progress. The human mind
was liberated and expanded. And millions of people who never obtained
eternal life through Jesus Christ, nevertheless, through the glorious
Reformation obtained their liberty and ten thousand other mercies
beyond all price. This is a matter of fact. And if you take the Gospel
to the South Seas, if you preach it to the benighted people there, you
will find that it will subdue all flesh to its Divine power. But still
the object is kept in view–that as many as God gave to Christ might
have eternal life.

Let us observe one self-evident truth. It is a remarkable fact that
where the Gospel is not preached in its general aspect, God does not
seem to work out His special object to any large extent. I mean to say
that if you will go into any Chapel in London and you find a minister
there who preaches nothing whatever of the Word of God, except that one
part of it which is most blessedly and sweetly true–God's electing
love–if you will listen to that man and hear him preach from the first
of January to the end of December upon that one topic–the specialty
and peculiarity of Divine Grace–you need not go into the vestry to ask
the deacons if they have many conversions.

I am certain you will find there are few, indeed, and those mostly
among persons who were convicted of sin and aroused elsewhere, and who
obtain liberty under the gracious doctrine. But the absolute conversion
of many is not a thing to be expected, and certainly not a thing found
where the preacher is so restrained by his sense of electing love as to
be unable to boldly preach the rest of the Gospel and say, "Believe in
the Lord Jesus Christ and you shall be saved." You have only to try it,
dear Friends–put your feet into the Chinese shoes and prevent their
growing to the proper size, in order to keep them in ecclesiastical
comeliness–and you will soon find your walk of usefulness very much
restricted.

Hold on to the point of being consistent! Make that the main
thing–banish those texts which speak about anything general–never
open your mouth with a universal invitation! Make it out that the Bible
has not a word in it directed to men as men, but only to the chosen and
I will undertake that unless there is an unprecedented act of God's
Sovereignty, you shall preach from one end of the year to the other and
you shall not be troubled at the number of the elect people. There will
be very few who will ever come forward.

But I know also, (and he who will look candidly will see it), that the
most effective ministry is that one which is not ashamed of the
Doctrines of Grace! The ministry which does not stutter or stammer in
talking about election! Does not trim or cut the Divine Sovereignty of
God, but which is equally clear upon the other point that God has
declared His own solemn oath, "I will not the death of a sinner, but
had rather that he should turn unto Me and live." A ministry which
holds Sovereignty but holds man's responsibility, too, which dares to
talk about God's special object with bold voice and yet insists upon it
that He has proclaimed to every creature under Heaven this gracious
proclamation, "Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and you shall be
saved."

Well, now, these are facts and facts which are not to be disputed,
either. We hear people sometimes sneer and say, "Ah, there are many
conversions, but are they genuine?" Sir, they are genuine! For we will
boast this much that if there are not genuine conversions found in this
Church, for instance, there are no conversions genuine under Heaven.
For when I see harlots made chaste and remaining honorable women year
after year. When I know drunkards who forswear the cup and who labor
with their might for the reclaiming of others. When I look upon those
who were once singing the song of the lascivious on the ale-bench who
now for years–mark you, not months–for years persevere in holiness, I
make this my glory!

If any can find better conversions under Heaven let them find them! I
am satisfied that they are such converts as Apostolic times added to
the Church–such as honor God in their lives and glorify Christ daily
by their walk and conversation. I believe you shall find most
conversions where neither Truth of God is held back, but where, as in
the text, the two are taught. "You have given Him power over all flesh,
that He should give eternal life to as many as You have given Him."

V. OUR PRINCIPLE EXPLAINS MANY SCRIPTURES and this goes very much in
its favor. I like to read my Bible so as never to have to blink when I
approach a text. I like to have a theology which enables me to read it
right through from beginning to end and to say, "I am as pleased with
that text as I am with the other." You know, Brothers and Sisters, you
must be conscious of it, that there are many texts of Scripture which
look wonderfully like universal redemption. Wonderfully like it and if
they do not intend some sort of generality, they certainly speak in a
very singular manner.

Such a text as this, "He is the Propitiation for our sins: and not for
ours only, but for the sins of the whole world." "Who gave Himself a
ransom for all to be testified in due time." I might mention more of
these–but if you get with an Arminian brother he will have them all at
his fingertips, so you will spare me the trouble. These people are
always dwell- ing upon these, and think they have quite upset the
doctrine of particular redemption though that is as plain in Scripture
as the nose upon a man's face! We know Scripture says, "He has laid
down His life for the sheep." He has redeemed us from among men.
"Christ loved the Church and gave Himself for it." And you know that
passage–"Husbands love your wives even as Christ also loved the Church
and gave Himself for it."

How did He love the Church? He loved the Church with a special love,
far above that which He gives to others, or else according to that
metaphor a husband ought to love his wife, and love every other woman
just as much! That is the natural inference of that text. But you
clearly see there must have been a special love intended in the husband
towards the wife and so there must be a special love in Christ. He
loved the Church and gave Himself for it.

Now do you not think, Brethren, as there are two sets of texts in the
Bible, the one of which very clearly speaks about the infinite value of
the Atonement and another which very evidently speaks about the
intention of that Atonement being for the chosen and for the chosen
only, that the best way is to believe them both and to say, "Yes, I see
it–as the result of Christ's death all men are put under the system of
mediatorial Grace, so that Christ has power over them. But the object
of His doing this is not that He may save all of them, but that He may
save out of these all which He now has in His own hands–those whom the
Father has given Him"?

The shepherd trusts me with all his sheep in order that I may sever
from them twenty which he has marked. A father tells me to go into the
midst of his family, his whole family, in order that I may take out of
it one of his sons to be educated. So God gives to Christ all flesh,
says the text, but still always with this definite and distinct
purpose–that He may give eternal life to those whom He has given to
Him.

VI. Let us go on in the sixth place to say briefly that this seems
quite CONSISTENT WITH THE NATURE OF

GOD. We too often measure God after a human standard and therefore make
mistakes. Remember that God has such an abundance of mercy and Grace
and power, that He never has to calculate how much will be necessary
for the accomplishment of His purpose. He does largely and literally
like one who cannot but act in an infinitely gracious manner. If you
have some chickens and you wish to feed them, you will only throw down
as much barley as the fowls will want, but you do not think of feeding
all the sparrows of the neighborhood!

It would be a very good thing if you could for they all need food. But
you throw down as much as will accomplish your purpose. Now our God
never has to stint Himself in this way, but with large handfuls He
feeds the special objects of His care and the ravens and kites besides.
God, again, exhibits a kingly character in His great methods of general
love. At the coronation of the old kings, the fountains in Cheapside
ran with red wine. Now you will say, "What a waste!" The gutters ran
down on both sides with wine. It was not necessary, was it? The king's
object was that his subjects might have wine.

Well, if that were his only object that might have been accomplished by
opening the bottles one by one and stopping when there was just enough
to satisfy their thirst. Why did it run down the streets? Was it a
waste? Not at all, it exhibited the royal glory. The king was glad to
give the people wine to drink, but he wanted also to show himself a
king and as nobody but a king could make gutters run with wine,
therefore he did it to illustrate his own magnificence. And our God,
when He is about to exhibit mercy, does not say, "So much will just
accomplish My purpose and save My elect"– that is His main object. But
behold, He makes the rivers run with wine and the floods with milk, so
there is enough and to spare and yet no waste, because His grander
object is His own Glory, and He is glorified even by that love which
does not effectually save.

When Napoleon was at war, his favorite tactics were, we are told,
always to bring crushing battalions to bear upon some one point to
carry everything before him. That, my dear Friends, is the mode of
procedure in which you and I have to act. If we have to accomplish a
purpose, we must concentrate the whole of our might upon that one
point. But suppose one greater than Napoleon, or a Napoleon with ten
times ten thousand times more troops than he had? He would not need to
concentrate his battalions upon one point, but simply cry to all his
hosts, "Advance!" and they would go crushing down his foes at every
point of the line.

So our God cares for the salvation of His elect. But that is not the
only thing He cares about–His own Glory is higher than this. His Glory
is the whole of the line and our God, while He effectually saves those
whom He has chosen, has no need to bring all His power upon one point.
He has abundance to spare after He has done all that we know of. He
can, while He is blessing His people, also bless the entire universe
according to His own will. And I doubt not that so He does and that
Heaven and earth are full of the majesty of His Glory, because Heaven
and earth, though they may not alike participate in the fullness of
Divine complacency, are full of the beams of His love.

VII. I have to conclude by saying that this principle is a MODEL FOR
OUR CONDUCT. I was talking the other day with a Brother. He said he did
not think the conversion of the world was the legitimate object of
missionary enterprise, because all that Christ intended by the Gospel
was the gathering out of a people. Well now, it seems to me that my
dear friend was quite right and quite wrong. As to God's purpose in the
sending of the Gospel to the world he was quite right, it is the
gathering out of a people.

But as to my work he was quite wrong, for the work of God's minister is
not the gathering out of a people. Christ surely knows what His own
disciple is to do. Just hear. "Go you and teach all nations, baptizing
them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit."
That is our work. He did not say, "Go you and sever out of all nations
a people to be taught and to be baptized." No! Christ's marching orders
to His people are in these words, "Preach the Gospel to every
creature." What will be the result of this universal proclamation?

The chosen will be saved. Then, Lord, why not send me to Your chosen?
Why send me to all nations? "What business have you to question your
Master's will? Is not this the very way in which I have chosen, that My
elect shall be brought, by the preaching of the Gospel to all nations?"
I look as the result of missionary enterprise, not for the world's
conversion–I do not expect it–I believe that God will gather out of
all people His chosen, and that Christ will come and when He comes,
then shall He reign from the river even to the ends of the earth. But
all the missionary societies put together will never convert the world,
nor do I believe they will do very much towards it unless they very
soon alter their tactics.

We shall have to try something very different from all the societies
which have ever been in operation before we see any great results. I am
waiting for a good time to come. Till then we must use old vessels till
we get better ones, but better ones will be found. My own impression is
that the world will never be converted by missionary agencies, but that
is not your business–I am not to make God's decrees the rule of my
walk. I am to make God's revealed will my rule of action. Christ tells
me to, "Preach the Gospel to every creature," and if I were absolutely
certain there was not one elect man upon earth, I would obey and preach
the Gospel for all that–because if there were not a single soul saved
by it, we are unto God a sweet-smelling savor.

So then, I say to you individually, talk about Christ
everywhere–preach Jesus Christ to every creature. Say to every man and
woman you meet, "There is life in a look at the Crucified One." Tell
men that, "Whoever comes unto Him, He will in no wise cast out," and
let this be always your comfort, that all that the Father gives to Him
shall come to Him! That Jesus shall see His seed. That of all that the
Father has given Him He will lose none, but will present them all at
His right hand at last. Fly back to God's electing love and the decrees
of God as the pillow of your rest.

But take the general command and the universal power of Christ over all
flesh as the sword with which you fight and the staff upon which you
lean. It is for this end that I ask you, dear Friends, to contribute as
you shall see fit, to the spreading of the Gospel in foreign lands by
the Missionary Society. I do not believe it is a perfect
organization–I believe it is full of faults. I believe, however, it is
the only way in which we can send the Gospel to the heathen just now.

We will have a better plan by-and-by, I hope, but meanwhile–as this is
the only one–let us use it with vigor, for, after all, it is not the
instrumentality, but God. And if I have to look upon this as an
ox-goad–an unfit tool to strike the Philistines, yet as I have not a
better I will use it till a better shall be found! Meanwhile let us
pray the Lord to speed His own cause and gather out His chosen by His
Grace. Amen.