Reasons For Parting With Sin

A SERMON DELIVERED ON LORD'S-DAY MORNING, FEBRUARY 13, 1876,

BY C. H. SPURGEON,

AT THE METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE, NEWINGTON.

"Come now, and let us reason together, says the Lord: though your sins
are as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they are red
like crimson, they shall be as wool." Isaiah 1:18.

IT is the great joy of our heart that we do not labor in vain nor spend
our strength for nothing. God is calling out from the congregations
which gather here a people unto Himself who shall show forth His
praise. Our heart is filled with adoring joy while we find company
after company coming forward and saying, "We have found the Lord,
because the Lord, in mercy, has found us." Unto the name of the Ever
Merciful be praise forever and ever because His hand is stretched out,
still, and the Spirit of the living God is not restrained among us!
Still there is a bass to this music–there are some, and these not a
few, who remain unblest where others are saved–this plot of ground is
rained upon and another is not rained upon! The sun shines and hearts,
like wax, are melted, but other hearts, like clay, are hardened.

This last and saddest of results has happened to some for whom we hoped
better things. The almost persuaded have, in fact, been our peculiar
trial. Some of you, my Hearers, have remained under the sound of the
Gospel now for years, not without impression, but without conversion.
The arrows of conviction have wounded your feelings, but they have not
slain your sins. Ah, how many have disappointed their best friends in
this respect! They have manifested the most hopeful appearance at
times. Their tears have glittered like the dewdrops of the summer's
morning but, alas, their goodness has been like the morning cloud and
the early dew in another respect, for they have vanished away and they
are as dry and graceless as ever they were.

Nor is this all. They are even worse than they were before, for they
have added to their sin–they have increased their responsibility, they
have diminished the sensitiveness of their conscience–and the
probabilities are daily increasing that they will perish in their sin!
How terrible that they should go from the invitation of the Gospel to
the condemnation of the Judgment Seat–and that after having looked
God's minister of mercy in the face! They will have to confront the
Greater Minister of Justice, from whose face they will entreat the
rocks and hills to hide them. Oh that these would come to their senses
and reason with themselves! Then would they listen to the call of the
text which invites them to talk with their Lord and receive His Grace.

Among these persons there are some who, in their hearts, venture to lay
the blame of their present condition upon God. They do not exactly say
so, but they mean it. They would tremble to make the accusation in set
terms. They would even think it blasphemy to do so! But this is the
real intent of their thoughts. They complain that they cannot find
peace with God, though they claim that they have used all means within
their power and have been really earnest and prayerful. They go to hear
the Gospel and love to hear it. They would be very sorry if they were
not able to enter the place where their favorite minister preaches, for
he affords them much delight and even when he rebukes them, they admire
his boldness.

But though they have heard the Gospel and have heard it continuously,
and claim to have heard it with good intent, yet no happy result has
come to them. They have heard and their souls do not live! They remain
as they were, dead in trespasses and sin. It is not their fault, so
they say, and we know, therefore, whose fault it must be! They have
even prayed for salvation and have not found it. Their chambers can
bear witness that sometimes they have bowed the knee in earnest
supplication and have cried to God–and this not once or twice, but
many times–and yet they still remain in their sins as undecided,
unregenerate and unforgiven as ever.

"Surely," say they, "this is a strange thing, that hearing the Gospel
has not blessed us and that crying unto God has not brought us an
answer of peace! What can be the cause?" It is obvious that something
hinders. What can it be? The

promises of God cannot fail! Why, then, are these seekers left in the
dark? Some of these people are not anxious to know too much and they
will not be pleased when I state the true reason for their continuing
without hope. They impute it to the Sovereignty of God, or to some
withholding of Infinite Love. They put the reason into some doctrinal
shape or other and quote a text or two so as to look orthodox, but
their meaning comes to this–it is God's fault that they are unsaved!
It is certainly none of theirs.

I wish that this bold way of stating their secret thought may convince
them of the falsehood of it. At any rate, to such I speak! Listen to
me, O you who declare that you would gladly be saved but cannot be! O
you who say that you have been in earnest about salvation but God has
not been moved by your entreaties! He bids you come near and reason
with Him and end this quibbling! Come, now, and settle this matter and
end the dispute! It is not God who shuts you out of mercy! He declares,
on the contrary, that as far as He is concerned, He is a God ready to
be gracious. And though your sins are as scarlet they shall be white as
snow, though they are red like crimson they shall be as wool!

He will not admit your insinuations against His Grace. In the plainest
possible terms He denies your imputations. He declares that the
hindrance lies on your side and not on His. And He invites you to
reason with Him about it, that the truth may be clear to you. Come,
now, and argue with Him, for I would speak on God's behalf and press
His Word upon you. Oh, that this morning, while the argument goes on,
your reason might be taught right reason and your conscience might be
quickened to give assent to the Truth of God which, in God's name, I
will declare to you! Oh that so by the Spirit's power, being subdued by
the persuasion and reasoning which we would gladly use this morning,
you may yield yourselves unto God, for thus He says to you, "If you are
willing and obedient you shall eat the good of the land; but if you
refuse and rebel you shall be devoured by the sword, for the mouth of
the Lord has spoken it."

It is most certain that the real reason why men who have an earnest
desire to be saved and have sincere religiousness of a certain sort do
not find peace is this–they are in love with sin! Whether some one sin
is secretly indulged, or many sins are unrepented of and unforsaken,
they provoke the Lord with their trespasses and then hope to pacify Him
with their prayers. Therefore it is altogether vain for them to tread
God's courts! In vain they pray and in vain they attend religious
ceremonies with the view of finding peace–for they have hidden the
accursed thing in the midst of the camp– they are harboring a traitor
and until this accursed thing is destroyed and this traitor is driven
out they cannot be acceptable to God!

To all such, the Word of God says, "What have you to do with peace
while your offenses are so many?" O, ungodly man, your heart can never
rest in God while it goes forth after its idols! As long as you and
your sins are at peace, God and your soul must be at war! Until you are
ready to be divorced from sin you can never be married to Christ. God
will give salvation and the pardon of sin, and give them freely to the
very chief of sinners, but the sinner must confess and forsake his sin!
The Lord graciously says, "Let the wicked forsake his way, and the
unrighteous man his thoughts, and let him turn unto the Lord and He
will have mercy upon him, and to our God, for He will abundantly
pardon."

But He also says, "There is no peace, says my God, unto the wicked,"
and His Word solemnly declares that, "God shall wound the head of His
enemies, and the hairy scalp of such an one as goes on in his
trespasses." About this matter we will talk this morning, as the Lord
shall help us, and may His Holy Spirit bless us.

I. "Come now, and let us reason together, says the Lord." Let us have
this matter out and hear what is to be urged in favor of God's demands.
IT IS A REASONABLE THING THAT SIN SHOULD BE RENOUNCED. As soon as I
make that statement, every conscience here agrees with it. It is most
reasonable that if the rebel is pardoned, he should ground his arms and
cease to be a rebel. Look at the demand, for a minute, and it will
strike you as being founded in right. It is most reasonable that we
should renounce sin–that our heart should loathe it, first, because it
is most inconsistent to suppose that pardon can be given while we
continue in sin.

Dear Brothers and Sisters, suppose God were to say to the ungodly man,
"You may continue in your sin, and I will forgive you. You may go on in
your rebellion and I will never punish you for it"? What would this be
but granting license to sin and offering a premium to iniquity? How
could the Judge of all the earth thus wink at iniquity? Would not the
angels cease to sing, "Holy, holy, Lord God of Sabaoth," if the Lord
could act in this manner? Where would His justice be? Where His
righteousness?

This were to make him–I speak with reverence–an accomplice in man's
sin, a Justifier of transgression in the present and a promoter of
iniquity in the future! Where would moral government be if the Lord
bestowed His pardons upon

those who persevere in transgression? Shall men fondle their sins and
yet be in a state of Grace? Then might every adulterer and every thief
say, "What does it matter? I am forgiven! I will defile myself and rob
my neighbor, yet more and more." Only fancy what the effect would be
upon our country if a proclamation were issued that from now on all
manner of offenses against the law would be immediately forgiven and
men might continue still to perpetrate them! We should hasten to
emigrate from such a pandemonium!

The wicked might approve of such a relaxation of the bonds of law, but
it would be an awful curse to the righteous. If the Judge of all the
earth could possibly forgive sin while men continue to indulge in it, I
do not see how the world could be inhabited. It would become a den of
beasts, wild and without restraint, raging against all goodness and
even against themselves. The very pillars of society would be moved if
sin could be, at the same time, indulged by the sinner and pardoned by
the Lord. And what would be the effect upon the sinner, himself, if
such could be the case? Say to a man–you are not to be punished for
your sin and you may live in it. What worse turn could you do him?

Why, Sir, this would, in some respects, be a new curse to him! Here is
a bleeding wound in my arm. The surgeon says he will allow it to bleed,
but he will remove my sense of faintness and pain. He will leave the
mortal injury, but take away its attendant inconveniences so that I may
bleed to death and not know it? I would decline to have it so! No, let
me bear the pain, if that will the more persuade me to seek the binding
up of my wound! We do not want to be delivered from the punishment of
sin so much as from the sin, itself, for sin bears its punishment in
our hearts.

Suppose there were no Hell, no Lake of Fire into which the ungodly
shall be cast? Yet let the wicked live together and indulge envy,
revenge and malice and you will soon see that these passions would
create Hell! Turn men down together and let them be selfish, ambitious,
angry, lustful, jealous and envious–take away all the restraints of
moral government and let their passions be indulged without a single
hindrance. Oh, what a scene it would be! Imagine a den of wild beasts
let loose upon one another–that would be a scene of peace and beauty
compared with what this world would be if sin were patronized by a
promise of pardon to the impenitent!

Each man, also, would be hateful to himself. As long as he had sin
within him it would be impossible for him to rest, his seething
passions would boil against each other. Man is so constituted that sin
means an unhealthy and unhappy condition. The machinery will not work
easily unless it acts accurately. It is at once its glory and its
burden that it is so. O mighty God, Your wisdom makes You append
suffering to sin. It is well that we should feel it if we put our
finger into the fire. It were a pity to take away the pain from the
burning lest a man should sit by the fire and lose limb after limb and
not be aware of it. In the same manner, also, it is most meet that the
unhappiness caused by sin should give us warning of the mischief it is
doing to us.

We do not ask God to separate the suffering from the sin, (let them
stand as they are), but we need to be severed from the sin and then the
suffering will go as a matter of course. It is unreasonable, man, it is
unreasonable that you should expect that God will allow you to remain
impenitent and yet give you the kiss of forgiving love! It would be
neither honorable to God, nor good to your fellow men, nor really
beneficial to yourself. Is it not reasonable, too, that we should part
with sin, because sin is so grievous to God? I never know how to
express my feelings when I read this first chapter of the Prophet
Isaiah.

I have felt a heartbreaking sympathy with God when I have read those
words, "I have nourished and brought up children, and they have
rebelled against Me." It is so very sweet to us to have our children
love us in return for our kindness to them. They are to us a very great
joy and comfort and we are very glad and thankful to God for their
dutiful affection. But many a man has been ready to tear his hair when
the boy that he rocked on his knee has treated him with wanton insult.
With what sorrow and anguish has many a mother had to remember an
ungrateful daughter? Such iron enters into the soul. Such draughts of
gall embitter the inmost heart of life. And here is the good Lord, like
David of old, crying, "O Israel, My son, My son!"

To let us see how He regards sin, He describes Himself as calling the
universe to witness to the ingratitude which has assailed Him. "Hear, O
heavens, and give ear, O earth: I have nourished and brought up
children, and they have rebelled against Me. The ox knows his owner,
and the ass his master's crib: but Israel does not know, My people do
not consider!" There is another plaintive expression in one of the
Prophets, "Oh, do not this abominable thing that I hate," as though the
Creator turned Pleader to His own creatures, and said, "Do not follow
after that which so provokes Me, and is so

detestable to Me." It is for our sakes that He is so grieved. We vex
the Holy Spirit every time we go into sin, for He loves us much and
cannot bear to see us so dreadfully hurting ourselves.

Now, Sinner, is it not most reasonable that if you would find peace
with God you should cease from that which provokes Him? Are you to go
on vexing Him and yet expect Him to bless you? How would it be in your
own case if you were a father? Would it not seem right and reasonable
that the evil habit which vexed and broke your heart from day to day
should be given up by your child? Would you not expect him to say, "My
Father, I did not know I was grieving you so much as this. But now I
know it, I turn from my folly: teach me how I may please you and do
that which is right in your

sight."

A third reason why sin should be given up may also be found in the
chapter before us, for I am strictly following the connection of the
text. Should it not be given up because of the mischief it has already
done to man? Look at yourself, unconverted man or woman, what happiness
have your transgressions brought you? What peace has the love of sin
produced in your spirit? What are you now? Why, according to your own
confession, you are dissatisfied and ill at ease! Sometimes thoughts of
death haunt you and make you so wretched that you hardly know how to
live. The dread of Hell comes over you and you have often wished you
had never been born. You know it is so. You are well described in the
chapter before us–"The whole head is sick and the whole heart faint."

What has made you so sick and sorry? What but your wrongdoing? If you
could prove that some good had come to yourself through sin, even then
you ought to give it up, for God's sake, since it grieves Him. But no
good has ever come of it. Ills of every sort are its only offspring.
Look, Prodigal, look at your rags and see what your harlots and your
companions have done for you! Look at what the citizens of the far-off
country have done for you–sent you into the fields to feed swine! In
your degradation and your filthiness, ask yourself, is there not a
cause? What has deprived you of the comforts of a father's house? What
has made you ready to eat the husks to stop your craving hunger?

If you were wise you would hate the sin which has served you so badly.
You would long to shake it off as Paul shook the viper into the fire,
and cry to God, "Deliver me from it, O Lord, by Your Son, Jesus Christ,
for it is evil, only evil, and that continually, therefore cleanse me,
O Lord!" Remember also, my Friend, that unless sin is repented of and
forsaken, no act of yours, nor ceremony of religion, nor hearing, nor
praying can possibly save you. Do you see what these Jews did? They
brought expensive offerings. They said, "We will be very generous to
the cause of God" and, therefore, they brought bullocks and rams and
goats by the hundreds.

And what does God say of it? "To what purpose is the multitude of your
sacrifices unto Me? says the Lord. I am full of the burnt offerings of
rams, and the fat of fed beasts; and I delight not in the blood of
bullocks, or of lambs, or of he goats. When you come to appear before
Me, who has required this at your hand, to tread My courts? Bring no
more vain oblations; incense is an abomination unto Me; the new moons
and Sabbaths, the calling of assemblies, I cannot away with; it is
iniquity, even the solemn meeting." If their hearts had been right He
would have accepted the smallest offer-ing–a pair of turtle doves or
two young pigeons would have been acceptable to Him–but as long as
they lived in un-cleanness, their sacrifices were vain oblations and
their sweet smelling incense was an abomination unto Him.

"Ah," you have said, "I have given to the cause of God and yet I have
had no peace." Does God accept what is given by one who practices
dishonesty, or lives in pride, or revels in vice? "Ah," you say, "but I
have always attended the means of Grace." Yes, but suppose you go from
the Tabernacle to the gin palace–will your coming here be acceptable
with God? Suppose you go home to practice unholy living or continue in
malice against your brother–can the Lord regard you? Suppose you go
away from the assembly of the saints to find equally congenial company
in the society of sinners? Then I say to you, in God's name, who has
required this at your hands, that you should tread His courts?

Does He need courtiers to surround His Throne whose garments stink of
the dens of Belial? Does He need your hymns, O you who have been
singing lascivious songs? Do you think He will endure it that men
should rise from the bed of uncleanness and draw near to His altars? It
is scandalous to decency! It is insulting to the infinite majesty of
Heaven! And yet how many there are who are secretly doing this! Let the
consciences of those who hear the Gospel and yet live in known sin
attest the truth of my words!

Does not reason itself teach them that God must be angered rather than
pleased by the worship of those who live in sin? I heard to my deep
sorrow, the other day, of one who will walk several miles to hear me
preach, and yet in the place where he lives he is known to be a drunk!
He glories in his admiration of the preacher and yet lives
scandalously! O Sir,

do you think the preacher gains by the admiration of such as you are?
How much less can God be pleased with the adoration of men who live in
open sin? Their worship is a dishonor to His blessed name! He calls
your attendance at public worship the treading of His courts! It is
nothing more than a mere trampling upon holy things and if you dream
that there is anything acceptable in such conduct you are grievously
mistaken!

If you come here that you may repent of your sins and forsake them,
come and welcome! But if you imagine that coming up to the worship of
God will procure the condoning of your offenses, you dote on a
falsehood! Be not so deluded by Satan, but cast away this lie from your
right hand. "Well," said one, "but there must be something in prayer."
Hear, then, from the Lord's own mouth what there is in prayer while you
continue in sin. "When you spread forth your hands, I will hide My eyes
from you: yes, when you make many prayers, I will not hear: your hands
are full of blood." Though I cannot say of you that your hands are full
of blood, yet if they are full of any sin which you love in your heart,
your sacrifice will be an abomination unto God.

Do you dare to bow the knee, and say, "O God, forgive me my sin, though
I mean to continue in it"? How dare you offer such an impudent petition
to the majesty of Heaven! Is God to give you a dispensation–a permit
to sin with impunity? Is He such an One as you are, that He should
answer such a wicked prayer? "O God," you practically say, "give me a
sense of peace with You and let me still be unholy." God will not hear
such a request! I speak with reverence to His blessed name. God's holy
Nature forbids that He should ever listen to such a blasphemous prayer!
Alter it, and say, "Lord, help me to give up my sin. Lord, Help me to
deal righteously with my neighbors. Help me to love my fellow men and,
at the same time, grant me forgiveness for the past for Jesus' sake."

If this is your heart-felt language, the heavenly Father meets you
freely and says, "Though your sins are as scarlet, they shall be as
white as snow." But if you reply to that gracious Word, "I am willing
to accept the pardon, but am resolved to keep the sin," His reply to
you will be, "Ah, I will ease Me of My adversaries, and avenge Me of My
enemies." If you refuse and rebel, there is no mercy for you, but the
sword shall devour you, for the mouth of the Lord has spoken it!

II. Thus have I reasoned upon one point. Let me now go further and
declare that IT IS MOST REASONABLE THAT MAN SHOULD SEEK PURITY OF
HEART. You ask for pardon and forgiveness–and in return God says to
you, "Wash you, make you clean; put away the evil of your doings from
before My eyes, cease to do evil; learn to do well; seek judgment;
relieve the oppressed; judge the fatherless; plead for the widow." Is
there not reason in this command? You practically say, "Lord, enter
into amity and peace with me." The Lord replies, "There is no peace to
the wicked: only as you become renewed in nature can there be any peace
between us."

Do you dare to ask God to commune with you while you are a lover of
sin? Can two walk together except they are agreed? What communion has
Christ with Belial, what fellowship has light with darkness? You cannot
have amity with God till the evil of your doings is put away from
before His eyes and this He will enable you to do. Do you refuse the
work of His Grace? Do you decline to be purged from every false way?
Then you also decline friendship with God! You ask the Lord to make you
His child. When you pray, you call Him, "Our Father, which are in
Heaven," but do you not see that it is unreasonable to expect to be
enrolled in His family and yet remain the servant of Satan?

What would the world say? "If this is one of God's children, what a
Father He must be who has such a family!" As it is, the faults and
imperfections of the Lord's children often cause men to blaspheme His
name. But at any rate, His children desire to be clean from sin and He
has not a child in the world that is in love with evil! This is one of
the marks of His children–that they hate iniquity and that sin is a
plague and burden to them. John says, "In this the children of God are
manifest, and the children of the devil: whoever does not righteousness
is not of God, neither he that loves not his brother."

Shall the drunk, the liar, the oppressor, the revengeful, the pitiless,
the greedy, the dishonest be called the sons of God? Shall fornicators
and persons of unclean lives be called His children? True, He takes
such into His household, by His mighty Grace, but He washes, cleanses
and sanctifies them, making them new creatures in Christ Jesus. He
receives them while they are sick with sin, but it is in order to their
healing and if that healing is refused, they cannot become His children
at all. You have asked to be a disciple of Christ in your prayers. I
ask you again, how is it reasonable that you should be recognized as a
disciple of Christ if you will not imitate His Character and if you do
not desire to obey His commands?

This man a disciple of Christ? And yet he remains an habitual drunk, or
carries on a dishonest trade, or lives in un-chastity? Can he really be
a Christian? Every hallowed name forbids it! Such a man is a servant of
the devil, not of Jesus! You are the servant of whom you obey–there is
no mistake about that matter. He that does sin is the servant of sin.
If you yield yourselves unto evil, then you are the servants of evil
and the wrath of God abides upon you! Often, too, you pray the Lord to
take you to Heaven when you die and yet you intend to remain in your
sins. Why this folly? Are you devoid of thought? What? Carry your sins
into Heaven? Carry Hell into Heaven?

Man, woman, have you any reason left in you to expect God to have it
so? Shall even His own courts, where His Glory blazes forth with
ineffable splendor, be defiled with that which His soul abhors? Shall
His enemies be admitted to insult Him to His face in His own palace? It
cannot be! Holiness will never allow such an intrusion! Heaven's
portals are guarded by Omnipotence and cannot be invaded by His
enemies–

"Those holy gates forever bar Pollution, sin, and shame; None can
obtain admission there But followers of the Lamb."

Now, my Hearer, let us reason together, in God's name, while the Word
of the Lord shows you what it is you must be willing to become as the
result of salvation. Look at the portrait drawn by Isaiah–it pictures
the truly pardoned man's life towards his fellow man. It sets him forth
in those lovely colors in which the Spirit of God has adorned him. Read
the 16th and 17th verses. The pardoned man has, by Grace, been washed
and made clean. His life is pure, upright and commendable. He has put
away the evil of his doings from before God's eyes, that is to say, he
not only shuns open sin before the eyes of man, but he hates that,
also, which is only seen by the eyes of God. He desires to be cleansed
from secret faults and to be pure within.

He has also, by Grace, been led to cease to do evil. He breaks off his
sins by righteousness and flees from unholy habits. At the same time he
learns to do well–he is not perfect yet, he is a scholar and he is
learning–but with all his heart he studies to be practically holy and
by Divine teaching he is instructed in righteousness. He seeks judgment
and desires to deal faithfully with all, to be honest and upright and
to walk in all integrity, true to the word he speaks, even when it is
to his own loss. He counts his simple word to be as binding as another
man's oath and scorns to profit by a falsehood. Nor is this all, the
Grace of God teaches him to love his neighbor as himself and,
therefore, he relieves the poor and oppressed and is the generous
friend of the fatherless and the widow. In almsgiving and deeds of
Christian love he abounds.

Here is the portrait. Do you admire it? Do you wish to be made like it?
God's Grace is willing to make you this! Are you willing that it should
operate upon you? If, on the other hand, your hard heart cries out,
"No, I want pardon and peace, but I do not wish to be renewed in
heart," then the reply is–there is no peace for you. You are not to be
saved by, or for, your good works, but God's salvation brings these to
those in whom it works. God will not separate sanctifica-tion from
justification, nor free remission from regeneration. Pardon must be
followed by purity and Grace by the Graces. If any man will be forgiven
his sin, he must also be renewed in nature and submit to be molded into
the blessed likeness of the Lord Jesus Christ. Have you been made
willing that such should be your case?

III. IF THE SINNER REMAINS IMPENITENT IT IS MOST UNREASONABLE FOR HIM
TO LAY THE BLAME OF HIS NOT BEING FORGIVEN UPON THE CHARACTER OF GOD,
FOR GOD IS READY TO FORGIVE. Those who impute an unforgiving spirit to
the Lord, lie, and know not the truth. God gives the master argument to
confute that slander by saying–"Though your sins are as scarlet, they
shall be as white as snow. Though they are red like crimson, they shall
be as wool."

He is both willing and able to forgive! He is prepared to remove the
ingrained sins of our nature. Scarlet dye was fixed in the very wool of
the fabric before it was made up and so is sin inwrought into our
being. We were sinners by nature before we were sinners by
practice–but this deep-seated stain of our nature He is able to
remove, so as to make us white as snow! Though your sins should be
double-dyed as crimson was, though you should have sinned again and
again and again, multiplying your transgressions, yet He is able to
cleanse you!

And though you should have continued long in sin, as the scarlet cloth
lies long in the dye, and though your sins should be glaring and
startling as scarlet and crimson colors are, yes, though they should be
imperial sins, as though you had put on a royal robe to defy the
Sovereignty of God, yet even these shall be forgiven perfectly by His
Grace! Not only shall some of the more glaring color be taken out of
our character, but the scarlet shall be white as snow and the crimson,

red as it was, shall be as wool! And all this by the free, unmerited
Grace of God! There is perfect pardon to be had by the most vile
transgressor–immediate and irreversible pardon is freely given
according to God's infinite mercy and abounding Grace to the very chief
of sinners!

He waits to bestow mercy on the sons of men and, therefore, if you do
no have it, it is not because God is hard to appease. He delights in
mercy! To the ends of the earth He proclaims, "Let us reason together,
though your sins are as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow."

IV. Here is the last point upon which we will argue. IT IS A REASONABLE
THING THAT GOD SHOULD DEMAND, WITH THIS PARDON, OBEDIENCE TO HIS
COMMAND. And what is that command? It is, "If you are willing and
obedient you shall eat the good of the land; but if you refuse and
rebel the sword shall devour you." Great Lord, it seems most strange
that men should be unwilling to be saved from their sins and unwilling
to follow the direction of perfect love! Yet, so perverse is human
nature, that till Your Grace makes men willing, they will never lay
hold upon Your abounding mercy and transcendent forgiveness, but prefer
to abide in their sins.

Sinner, here is the great question–are you willing?" Willing for what?
I am willing to be saved from Hell." Ah, who is not? What criminal is
not willing to be saved from prison or the gallows? Are you willing to
be saved from yourself, to be saved from loving the sin which now
enthralls you? To be saved from finding pleasure in the unholiness
which now enchants you? To be saved from the indulgence of evil
passions which tyrannize over you? To be saved, in a word, from SIN?
Are you willing?

Some say that they are, but when it comes to the test and a sweet sin
comes before them, like a painted Jezebel, they are bewitched by it.
They fall into its arms and let Jesus go. Are you willing to give up
any sin, for Christ, and every sin for Christ? The Lord demands this of
you. Oh, may He also grant it to you, turning your heart of stone into
a heart of flesh! May you be made truly willing to be saved from sin in
God's way, that is, by simply believing in Jesus, believing in Jesus,
not that you may merely get rid of the past, but be delivered from the
present dominion of evil. If you are willing– that is the point.

His people shall be willing in the day of His power and if you are not
willing, and live and die unwilling, you are none of His. Then it is
added, "If you are obedient." Whenever the Lord saves a soul, He will
make that soul obedient, for Jesus Christ will not take into His army
soldiers who mutiny against His commands. "If you are willing and
obedient." Obedient to what? Obedient to all Gospel precepts.
"Repent"–let sin be hateful to you! "Repent and be con-verted"–that
is, turn round to seek after other things and better things than you
sought before. Are you willing to obey His command to love one another
as Christ also has loved you? Are you willing to be obedient to the
command, "Cease to do evil, learn to do well"?

"Oh," one says, "I am willing enough to be obedient, but where is the
strength to come from?" Ah, my blessed Lord does not ask you to find
the strength–for that you may look to Him! If you are willing, He will
grant you the power. No, in making you willing, He has already begun
the work! If, this morning, He has made you truly willing to give up
sin, His blessed Spirit will never leave you till sin is overcome!
Jesus is able to cleanse you from the power of sin as well as from the
guilt of it. The point is this–has He made you willing to be made
holy? Are you, at this present moment, willing to be washed and
cleansed?

Do not answer this question till you have looked at it and marked the
self-denial it will cost you. After doing so I fear that honesty will
compel some of you to say, "I am not prepared to undergo the change
which is here proposed." You know, my Hearer, that sin in some
attractive form is very sweet to you, and while it is so there can be
no hope of pardon for you. You think, perhaps, that I spoke sharply
just now? The Lord knows I desire to speak in all gentleness of spirit,
but I must be faithful to your souls and, by God's help, I will be. As
I look round I am not so utterly ignorant of you all as not to know
that there are some here who love to hear me preach and yet they love
their sins. They know their characters are disgraceful and yet they
pretend to believe that they are going to Heaven because they have a
notional faith in Jesus.

Now, Sirs, when you wake up in the Day of Judgment and find yourselves
deceived, you will be forced to admit that I have not deceived you. I
have never preached to you that you may live in sin if you only believe
in Jesus! I have never preached that you shall be saved without being
purified in heart! No, the salvation which this pulpit has proclaimed
is not salvation in sin but Salvation from sin, not a license to evil
but a deliverance from evil! The two-edged sword of our

Gospel divides between men and sin–and slays all the hopes of the
impenitent and disobedient. "Be not deceived, God is not mocked;
whatever a man sows that shall he also reap." "Without holiness no man
shall see the Lord" and this holiness is His gift to you!

Deliverance from sin is not a work of the flesh, but a work of Grace!
It does not spring from legal bondage, but from the gracious work of
the blessed Spirit. But you must have it, you must have it! And if you
will not have holiness, neither shall you have Heaven! There shall be
no blotting out of sin unless there is a ransom from the dominion of
sin. May God grant you Grace to be honest with yourself and honest with
your God who, again, invites you to reason with Him and entreats you
not to be so unreasonable as to continue in sin and, yet, expect
forgiveness! He invites you to cast out that evil which is as much your
enemy as it is His.

He points to this stumbling block which lies at your door and bids you
will to have it removed. He begs you to come to your senses and awake
from your dreams. Your past sin He is fully prepared to obliterate
forever, but it is your love of sin which lies in the way. O that you
would, from your heart, give it up and follow after better things! May
He help you, now, to say, "O Lord, I desire to be made pure and holy.
Give me strength, I pray you, to overcome temptation and walk in the
way of Your commandments. I want to be holy, even as You are holy. To
will is present with me. Give me also power to do that which I would. O
Lord, I would renounce my old sins, my constitutional sins, my once
beloved sins. I do not ask to be tolerated in any one of them, but
would be delivered from every false way, for Jesus' sake. Help me, O

Lord."

Your heavenly Father stands ready to help you, prepared to help you.
Though you are as yet a great way off, He comes to meet you and opens
His arms to embrace you. For the sake of the atoning Sacrifice of
Jesus, He has passed an act of amnesty and oblivion for all the past!
And He will rule over you for the future with the gentle scepter of His
holy love. "If you are willing and obedient"–are you, indeed, so? May
God grant you a subdued will and a submissive mind, for Jesus' sake.
Amen.

PORTION OF SCRIPTURE READ BEFORE SERMON–Isaiah 1. HYMNS FROM "OUR OWN
HYMN BOOK"–176, 459, 489.
__________________________________________________________________

Amazing Grace