Where The “If” Lies

Where The "If" Lies

(No. 1744)

Delivered on Lord's-Day Morning, October 14th, 1883, by

C. H. SPURGEON,

At the [3]Metropolitan Tabernacle, Newington

"Jesus said unto him, If thou canst believe, all things are possible to
him that believeth."— Mark 9:23.

I BELIEVE THAT OUR OWN Authorized Version conveys to the mind of the
reader the sense intended by the Evangelist; it is, however,
exceedingly probable that in exact words the Revised Version is nearer
to the original. It runs thus—"And Jesus said unto him, If thou canst!
All things are possible to him that believeth." Our own Version better
expresses the sense to the general reader, and the main object of a
translation is to give the meaning. The father of the lunatic child had
said to our Lord, "If thou canst do anything, have compassion on us,
and help us;" and our divine Master virtually replies, "If thou canst
lies not with me, but with thee. It is not if I can, but if thou
canst." Thus you see the word "believe" is implied if not actually
expressed. Jesus would certainly go as far as ever the man's faith
could go; but as the rule of the kingdom is, "According to thy faith,
so be it unto thee," the man's unbelief would hamper the Lord in his
working. If the suppliant could be rid of unbelief, Jesus would get rid
of the devil from his child. The difficulty of casting out the demon
lay mainly in the want of faith in the father. Let it, then, be
understood as the teaching of this text, that the difficulties in the
way of souls that would be saved do not lie with Jesus Christ, but with
themselves. They need never ask the question, "Can Jesus forgive?" or
"Can he renew?" there is a prior question—Canst thou believe that he
can forgive, and that he can renew? If God's grace enables thee to say,
"I can and do believe that Jesus can work in me according to the full
measure of my need," then all difficulty has vanished. Thy faith is the
shadow of the coming blessing, the token of the Lord's favor towards
thee. When thy faith believes in Christ's omnipotence, he is omnipotent
to thee, for "all things are possible to him that believeth."

I long at this time to get at some here who cannot get at Christ. I
would to God that by his Spirit I may deal with their difficulties, so
as to remove them once for all, so that they may come just as they are,
and put their trust in Jesus, and find eternal life this day.

I. The first subject we shall speak about is the vital question—WHAT IS
BELIEVING? After all these hundreds of years of gospel preaching, is
this question necessary? I believe it is so necessary that, if faith
were explained in every sermon, it would not be too often spoken of. It
is a good rule that every tract ought to contain the gospel; and it
ought to be put in the plainest way, for still, despite all the gospel
teaching which is around us, nothing is so little known or so little
understood as faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. I am also bound to admit
that many explanations of faith are all explanation, but tend to make
the subject darker than it was before; and I am fearful lest my own
explanation should be of the like order. Certainly, I will do my best
to avoid such a catastrophe, for I will speak very plainly.

Let us take the man before us as an example, and from him let us see
what faith is. This man evidently believed that Jesus was a healer, for
he says, " I brought my son unto thee." He would not have brought his
son to Jesus if he had not felt some measure of confidence in him. It
is a good beginning of faith to know that if I am saved it must be
through Jesus Christ alone; it is well to be aware that the salvation
of the soul must come from the work of Jesus, and from no one else,
since no other name is given among men whereby we must be saved. This
man had also some slight faith in Christ's willingness to help him. It
may not have been very strong, but still it was there, or else he would
not have laid the stress of his prayer upon the Lord's power; he did
not say "if thou wilt thou canst," but "if thou canst do anything, have
compassion on us, and help us." Looking up into that blessed face so
full of singular tenderness, the man felt that he might say, "Have
compassion on us." From some persons we could not ask compassion or
fellow-feeling, because they do not appear to have any; they wear a
harsh look, and a chill air surrounds them; but the Savior was not so;
the man felt that Jesus was full of compassion his suit was that this
compassion would show itself to him and his son. It is a good beginning
to saving faith if thou believest that Jesus is witting to save thee. I
trust that many of you have advanced as far as this.

What is it really and savingly to believe in Jesus? The suppliant
father had not yet reached that point of faith which would secure the
miracle. More was needed; what was it? He needed to believe in Christ's
power in reference to his own case. The point in which his faith failed
was our Lord's power as to the special case now before him, for he
said—"If thou canst do anything." Before you condemn the anxious father
for his doubt, let me remind you that his son was in a very evil
plight, and our Lord had just caused him to remember and review the sad
features of the case. The father had sorrowfully dilated upon the fact
that "wheresoever the spirit taketh him, he teareth him: and he
foameth, and gnasheth with his teeth, and pineth away;" and then he had
further told the Lord that the youth had suffered thus ever since he
was a child; and he had gone still more into detail, saying, "Ofttimes
it hath cast him into the fire, and into the waters, to destroy him."
After that painful detail he added his pitiful "If thou canst." Do you
wonder at it? Jesus seems to tell him, "If thou canst believe in the
teeth of all this, then thou shalt see the salvation of God." It is
very easy to say, "I believe" when you have no sense of your sin, and
no consciousness of your danger. It is the easiest thing in the world
to say, "Yes, Christ can save me," when you do not really believe that
you need saving. Faith, where there is no present sense of need, is but
the image of faith, and not the grace, which saves the soul. This is
the question: can you, my dear hearer, at this moment trust Jesus to
save you, though you feel that you are full of sin? Can you say, "Lord,
I am possessed with the spirit of evil: I am under bondage to him, and
have been so since I was a child? I have been driven to one sin and so
cast into the fire, and then I have been hurled into the opposite sin,
and so thrown into the water: I have been rent with passion, and torn
with evil desires; I have sinned against light and knowledge, I have
sinned against love and mercy; I have sinned in thought, and word, and
deed; I have sinned grievously and continually, and yet I believe that
thou canst pardon me, and that thou canst make me a new creature.
Wicked as I am, I believe that thou canst drive sin from the throne of
my heart and cause me to love thee and to serve thee all my days." If
thou canst believe in Jesus after this fashion he will save thee, yea
he has saved thee. If thou, as an undeserving sinner, canst so honor
the mercy of God as to believe that through Christ Jesus he can blot
out thy sin, it shall be done unto thee: only remember that this
confidence must not come unto thee because of thy forgetfulness of thy
sin, but whilst thou art conscious of it and humbled on its account. If
I persuade myself that I am merely a sinner in name, then I shall only
find Jesus to be a Savior in name. If I am not such a sinner as to deny
that I am a sinner, but pay the Lord the compliment of saying, "Oh,
yes, I am a sinner; we are all sinners," then 1 am a sham sinner, and I
shall become a sham believer, and the true Savior will have nothing to
do with me. Jesus came to save that which is really and truly lost. The
downright sinner, who dares not deny his guilt, is the object of the
Lord's saving search. In the teeth of thy conscious guilt, canst thou
believe that Jesus can wash thee and renew thee? Then thou hast one
main element of the faith which saves.

Yet, mark you, if this man could by any possibility have believed in
Christ's power to save his son and yet had refused to bring him to
Jesus for healing, he would have missed one of the essentials of true
faith. For, hark. If thou wouldst get to the very heart and bowels of
faith, thou hast it here: it is to trust the Lord. Trust! trust! that
is the word. To believe that Christ is able to save thee is an
essential, but to put thyself into his hands that he may save thee, is
the saving act. Believe Christ's word to be true; then appropriate that
word unto thyself as spoken to thee: believe that it is true to thee,
and rest in the truth of it—that is saving faith. To see Christ as such
a Savior as thou needest, able and willing to save thee, is a right
good sight, but thou must also take this Savior to be thine. Say
heartily, "Into that hand which was nailed to the cross I commit my
guilty soul, hoping and believing that Jesus will forgive all my
trespasses, and cause me to love all that is true and holy henceforth
and for ever."

"Thou canst, thou wilt (I dare not doubt),
The indwelling demons chase
I trust thy power to cast them out,
I trust thy pardoning grace."

He that trusts in Jesus is saved. I said not, "he shall be saved," but
he is saved. "He that believeth in him hath everlasting life." "He that
believeth in him is justified from all things, from which he could not
be justified by the law of Moses."

Will you please to notice about this man's faith that it was not
perfect faith. Though it obtained for him the healing of his son, it
"as weak faith, and for its weakness he was blamable; but the
faultiness of his faith was not the destruction of his faith. A feeble
faith can receive a mighty Savior, even as a beggar with a palsied hand
can receive a golden gilt. An heir to an estate has as good a title to.
it when he is a child as he will have when he is grown up, and even so
little faith possesses the inheritance, though as yet it be a babe. The
anxious father had to cry, "Lord, help my unbelief," but that unbelief,
confessed and lamented, did not shut him out of the blessing. The
unbelief which lingers around our faith is a thing to be got rid of by
the help of Christ, but still it will not destroy the virtue of the
faith which we possess. So, dear friend, if thy faith in Jesus Christ
amounts to this, that thou believest him able to save, and thou dost
therefore trust him, thou art a saved man, even though thou mayest he
staggered with a host of fears, and troubled with a multitude of sins.
Thy faith hath saved thee, go in peace; for that faith of thine shall
grow from a mustard-seed into a far-spreading tree. I would that thou
couldst take Jesus up into thine arms as Simeon did, for then wouldst
thou say with full assurance, "Mine eyes have seen thy salvation." But
if thou canst not do so much as that, at least stretch out thy finger
and touch the hem of the Lord's garment; for if thou dost but touch his
clothes thou shalt be magic whole. The faintest contact with the
ever-blessed Christ will open up a way by which saving power will flow
out of him into thee. Oh, how blessed it is to think that God hath
ordained this plain way of faith for poor sinners! It is of faith that
it might be of grace, to the end that the promise might be sure to all
the chosen seed.

This faith in the Lord Jesus ought to be to each one of us the easiest
thing in all the world. If we were what we ought to be it would never
occur to us to doubt our Lord Jesus; and our shameful unbelief of him
is the most conclusive evidence of our need of him, for we must have
become grievously wrong in heart to be forced to admit that we find it
difficult to believe in Jesus. What an insult to him! What a crime on
our part Remember the whole story of grace and blush for your wicked
unbelief. God, the ever-blessed, whom we had offended sent his dear Son
to be made in the likeness of sinful flesh, and he dwelt here among us
as our brother, friend, and helper. In the fullness of time he took
upon himself our sin and sorrow, and went up to the cross with the
awful load of our guilt. Though still the well-beloved Son of the
Father, he suffered even unto death in the room and stead of his
people, and God's record concerning him is that he has set him forth as
the propitiation for sin. God has accepted his atonement; will not
sinners accept it? This is the Savior; God has ordained him such: will
not the sinner agree that Jesus should save him? If not, why not? If we
were not fallen to the uttermost degree of depravity we should cry out
with delight, "Lord, we believe. Blessed be the dear name of Jesus, our
Substitute, we can and do trust him. We are quite sure if the Lord God
has made Jesus to be his salvation to the ends of the earth he must be
a perfect salvation; therefore we accept him with joy and delight." But
this is the curse of our nature, the inmate vice of our hearts, that we
cannot believe our God, thus making him a liar. Oh, the horror of
suspecting his truth whom angels adore with veiled faces! Oh, the
daring presumption of questioning the promise of a faithful God! It is
horrible, horrible, horrible to the last degree to mistrust the
Almighty Father, to doubt his bleeding Son! There ought to be no room
for an "if" when we know that in the Lord Jesus all fullness dwells. I
am not at this moment speaking to those who reject the word of God, and
deny the Deity of Christ: I can understand their position, and deal
with them another time; but I am now speaking to you who accept this
Bible as Gods word, and unquestioningly believe that Jesus Christ is
divine: to you I say that your refusal to put your trust in him is
without excuse; at least, I cannot find an excuse for you. Remember
those telling words of the Lord Jesus—"if I tell you the truth, why do
you not believe me?" If you believe Jesus to be the Son of God and the
Savior of men, why do you not trust your own soul with him? Why not at
this moment confide in him whom you admit to be worthy of your trust.

II. I have tried thus to explain the nature of faith. I will now, in
the second place deal with the startling question, HOW IS IT THAT FAITH
CAN BE DIFFICULT? It certainly is difficult to some. It cannot be so in
itself; yet many in trouble of heart find it to be so, and those that
labor to bring them to Christ, find themselves sore put to it.

Why, first, it is difficult to get the very idea of faith into some
men's minds—not only difficult for them to believe, but even to know
what it is to believe. I have met with persons who have attended a
place of worship regularly twenty or thirty years, and yet they have
never made the discovery that faith is a childlike trust in Jesus. I,
as a lad, was taught this blessed secret by the Spirit of God; but it
was at the first a great wonder to me that I should have attended
evangelical ministries for years, and yet should not have known what
was meant by believing in Christ. That simple truth broke in upon my
mind like a new revelation. I had read the Bible; there was no part of
it with which I was not acquainted, and yet even from that blessed book
I had not learned what believing in Christ meant. Is not this singular?
It is remarkable, and yet it is a general fact. We try by
illustrations, by anecdotes, by parables, to drill the notion of faith
into men; but we cannot even get it unto their heads, much less into
their hearts. Martin Luther complained that he thought he must take the
Bible and bang it about his hearers' heads because he could not get
them to see its clear teaching as to justification by faith. This idea
of believing is alien to men's minds, and it can only dwell there by
forcing its way against the tendency of human nature. Again, I say,
that this is a sad proof of human depravity, since in itself it is no
difficult idea: it is the simplest thought that can be uttered or
accepted. Trust thou thy salvation with Christ, and Christ will save
thee, is a lesson, which a babe may learn. Still, the unregenerate do
not think so: they muddle it all up, and stick to their belief that
faith is something to be felt, or seem, or done, or suffered. To trust
their God, to rely upon the atonement of his Son—this is not to their
mind, and so their foolish heart is darkened, and they cannot see the
way which lies straight before them.

When we get that thought into our hearers' heads, then there comes the
next difficulty, to make them believe that faith can save them. It
seems so difficult to believe this because the way is so easy. They
say—What! am I, after thirty, forty, fifty years of sin, to be
delivered from all the punishment of my transgressions by simply
trusting to the Lord Jesus Christ? If you were to tell them that they
must go to a desert and live there as hermits on berries and cold water
for the rest of their natural lives, they would believe the message. If
they were bidden to scourge themselves with whips of wire, they could
expect some good result from such suffering, but not from mere
believing. If they were to hook at the idea of propitiating God by
their personal suffering, it would soon become impossible of belief;
yet for a time they incline to it rather than to the doctrine of
salvation by trust in the great Substitute. Hideous imaginings,
despairings, and dreads are also looked upon hopefully by many; they
hope that by deep feelings they may arrive at forgiveness, and may
force their way to heaven by the gates of hell; but to trust Christ,
and to believe the promise of God, is a thing too simple for them; they
fear that safety is not to be found so soon! Ah! poor soul, if the
prophet had bid thee do some great thing, wouldst thou not have done
it? How much rather then when he saith to thee, "Believe and live?"

I wish you would change your opinion as to what faith really is, for it
is by no means so insignificant a matter as you suppose. Simple as it
is there lies within it great excellence and value. Faith in God is the
divinest exercise of the mind. To believe in God and his Christ is to
be reconciled to God and restored from enmity. We are in unison of
heart with those we trust. To believe your God is to worship him: the
essence of worship is faith. For a poor sinner to trust the Lord gives
him more honor than the cherubin can bring him with their loftiest
notes of praise. In the teeth of all my sin and sinfulness, with a
thorough sense of my guilt, I believe that the blood of Jesus has saved
me—is not this true praise? To confess scarlet sins, and yet to say,
"Wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow," gives unto the Lord great
glory for his mercy and his power. Yet the doctrine of "Believe and
live" startles poor sinners because it is too easy.

When they get over the idea of its extreme ease, they say to
themselves, "This news is certainty too good to be true. Do I really
understand you, sir, that if I trust the Lord Jesus now I am at once
delivered from sin and am made a new creature in Christ?" Yes, you
understand my teaching if that is the sense you find in my words. Yet
you say it is too good to be true. Do you not see how poorly you think
of your God? I know that pardoning grace is infinitely above your
deservings or thoughts; but then does not the Lord say of himself, "As
the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your
ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts?" Grace may be too good for
you to expect, but it is not too good for God to bestow. Oh that you
would think better of God than you have done, and say of his amazing
grace, "It is just like him!" Sing with me these words—

"Who is a pardoning God like thee?
Or who hath grace so rich and free?"

Salvation pitched in such a key as this, given freely to whosoever
believeth in Jesus! Why, that is like the Lord, and we will accept it
as having the divine stamp and impress upon it. He forgives like a God,
and this does not stagger our faith, but confirms it.

Then, again, men are astounded by the rapidity justification. Shall
fifty years sinning be forgiven in a moment? Shall an instant's
believing end the guilty past, and commence a holy future? It is even
so; in one instant a man begins a course of believing which introduces
him into a new world. What is strange about this? Is it not God's way
to do wonders in a short time? he took but a week to fit up the earth
for man; nay, six days sufficed, and on the seventh he rested. To make
the light in which we rejoice, only needed for the Lord to say, "Let
there be light." In the case before us our Lord only said to the demon,
"I charge thee, come out of him, and enter no more into him," and the
deed was done. If we had all time at our disposal, we could not work
such wonders, but to God there are no limits as to length or brevity of
time. A thousand years are to him as one day, and one day as a thousand
years. He speaks, and it is done. Think of it—salvation in a moment!
The moment a sinner believes he hives unto God, and his trespasses are
forgiven. Oh sinner! why shouldest thou doubt it? Yet we cannot get the
conscience-stricken one to believe it.

If we lead our friends out of this difficulty, they plunge into
another. They cannot be satisfied with the word of God atone as the
ground for their faith. Why do I believe that I am saved? I know that I
am saved because the word of God says, "He that believeth in him hath
everlasting life;" and I do believe in Jesus, and therefore I have
everlasting life. "But," saith one, "if I had that word applied to me
with power, then I could and would believe it." Just so; but until then
you refuse to believe the promise of God, and treat him as a liar! God
must, needs give you some pledge or bond beyond his promise, because
his word is not good enough for you, though you admit that even with a
good man his word is his bond. You cannot trust your God. "Oh, but if I
had a dream." Just so. You would have more faith in a silly dream,
perhaps caused by indigestion, than you have in the solemn word and
written promise of God. "Oh, sir, but if an angel were to speak to me,
I could believe." Just so; and if God does not choose to send the
angels, what then? Then he is not to be believed, but treated as a
liar. What is this but saying "Lord, thou shalt bow to my whims, or
else I will not believe a word thou sayest?" Is it come to this? Dare
you demand signs of God? Then let me ask you—Is this Book God's word?
Say "No," and I can understand your conduct; but if you believe, as I
know you do, that this is the very word of God, how dare you
disbelieve? If all the angels in heaven were to march by me in a file,
and assure me that God would keep his word, I should say, "I did not
require you to tell me that, for the Lord never fails to be as good as
his word." God is so true that the witness of angels would be a
superfluity. If my father were to make a statement, I certainly should
not call in his servant to confirm it. If this book be dictated by the
Holy Spirit, it is ours to believe it without demanding confirmations
or applications. Let us say, "That word is true, for God hath said it.
Jesus Christ came into the world to save sinners: I am a sinner, and I
trust him to save me. Inasmuch as the word says, 'To as many as
received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to
them that believe on his name;' I do believe on his name, and therefore
I have the power and privilege to become a child of God, and a child of
God I am. God says so: that is enough for me." We cannot get men to see
that the word of the Lord is surer than all signs and wonders—they want
something in addition.

If we compel them to own that the word of God is the only and
sufficient basis of faith, they straightway begin to took at their own
believing as if it were the Savior. They cry, "My faith is so weak; my
faith is so variable; my faith is so shaken," and so forth. It is as if
those who were bidden to look to the brazen serpent had, instead
thereof, tried to see their own eyes. Here is a child thirsty, and
there is a flowing fountain; you give the child a cup that it may drink
of the water. The child does not go to the fountain, but is so pleased
with its empty cup that it tries to satisfy its thirst out of it. What
a foolish child! Or suppose it should refuse to go to the fountain
because the cup was of earthenware, or of tin, would not that be a
strange way for a thirsty child to act? A child needs the cup to drink
out of, but it cannot drink out of an empty cup. Faith is the cup, but
Christ is the fountain. Faith is a secondary thing compared with
Christ. We must have faith to be as the finger with which we touch the
hem of the Master's garment, but the finger does not work the cure.
Shall I refuse to touch because perhaps I have not washed my finger
clean, or it has no gold ring upon it; or there are traces of
rheumatism upon it? To attach so much importance to the finger as to
refuse to touch Christ's garment with it would be insanity. Do not mind
your finger: touch the garment's hem. Sinner, get you to Christ
somehow, anyhow; for if you get to him you will live. It is not, after
all, the greatness nor the perfection of your faith, it is his
greatness and his perfection, which is to be depended on.

Then the next trial is, that we cannot get troubled sinners to see the
difference between their faith and its fruits. "I would believe in
Christ," says one, "if I were as holy as So-and-So, who is a believer,
but then you see I am a sinner." Now mark, dear friend, that the person
of whom you speak in that fashion does not think himself to be one
particle more deserving than you are. If you talk to that good man he
will tell you that whatever holiness you can see in him is the work of
grace, and that at the first he came to Jesus just as you must come,
that is, as a sinner. Faith produces holiness; but when we come to
Jesus, at the first we come as unholy persons, and as such he receives
us. Suppose that I have a number of bulbs which I am told will produce
most remarkable flowers; if I believe the statement I shall take care
to have them properly planted. The gardeners are beginning to put such
things into pots, that they may have hyacinths and other fair flowers
in the winter and early spring. Suppose that I resolve not to plant my
bulbs, because I use my own eyesight, and come to the conclusion that
as I cannot see a hyacinth or even the beginnings of one in any of the
bulbs, therefore there can be no use in planting them. Why, everyone
would tell me that in this matter I must go by faith, and plant my
hyacinth in order that I may in due time see it bloom. "That bulb will
yield a beautiful blue flower," says one. I answer that it is a brown,
dried-up sort of onion, and that I shall throw it on the dunghill, for
I can see no bud or flower in it. What a simpleton I should be if I
talked so! Though I cannot see it, yet there is, closely compacted and
quietly hidden away within that bulb, a slumbering thing of beauty
which will wake up at the call of spring. Even so, if thou believest in
Christ, there is a holy life packed away within thy faith, and it will
gradually develop itself. Even within a feeble faith there are the
elements of ultimate perfection. If thou dost truly trust Christ, thy
preparation for glory has begun. As the king was hidden in the oak so
is Christ hidden in true faith. Do not, however, expect to see all this
at the first: look to the root now and the growth will follow. You are
not to come to Christ because you are healed, but to get healing; your
faith must be a sinner's faith before it can be a saint's faith. Trust
Christ while yet you are foul, lost, and undone, and he will wash,
save, and restore you.

Still we find the awakened ones clinging to the idea that they must be
something or feel something before they may trust Jesus. We cannot get
them to see that the whole of their salvation lies in Jesus Christ and
in Jesus Christ alone. We cannot wean them from some sort of reliance
upon their own feelings, or weepings, or prayers, or Bible-readings, or
some other form of working. Why, they will even look to their own faith
rather than to Jesus Christ alone. Know ye not that our Lord has
offered a full atonement for sin, and brought in a perfect
righteousness for his people? His propitiation is to be accepted as
full and complete, and his righteousness we are to wear as our own. Our
whole trust must go to the perfect work of our Lord, it must not even
rest on our faith. To trust in our own trusting would be absurd. A
wounded man has healing ointment given him and a piece of linen with
which to bind on the ointment; now, if he were to wrap the linen around
the wound and leave out the healing agent, he could not expect a cure.
Faith is the linen whereon the ointment of Christ is spread, and we
must not put it out of its due place and order, or we shall be making
it a rival to Christ. Oh, that I could clear up some of the
difficulties with which men surround themselves, so that they would
consent to look out of themselves to Jesus only!

III. We must now speak to the last point. Oh, you that are seeking
rest, dwell upon each word as it is now lovingly delivered to you. WHAT
IS IT THAT CAN MAKE FAITH EASY? The Holy Spirit alone can do that; but
he does so by bringing certain truths to remembrance. Faith is rendered
easy to a man by the Holy Spirit when, first of all, he sees clearly
the infallible certainty of the sacred record; and this is the record
that God gave concerning his Son, that he that believeth in him hath
everlasting life. Is this Bible true or not? I believe in every letter
of it: I accept it as God's word in the most unreserved sense, and so
do you to whom I now speak. Well, if that be so, then it remains no
longer difficult to believe what is plainly taught in this book. If God
hath spoken then questions are ended. It may be a hard saying, it may
be a dark saying; it may seem to be too good to be true; but what of
that? Do we dare to question the Lord? He is not a man that he should
he, nor the Son of man that he should repent. He has said that
whosoever believeth in Jesus shall not perish, but have everlasting
life; and if we have so believed, eternal life is ours.

The next thing that the Spirit of God helps us to see is the
applicability of that record to ourselves: that is to say, we read, "
Jesus Christ came into the world to save sinners," and we conclude that
as we are just such, we may look to him to save us. We read, "Come unto
me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest."
We labor and are heavy laden, and therefore we come, and he gives us
rest. We read that "in due time Christ died for the ungodly"; and
knowing that we are ungodly, we yet take heart and come to him who
justifies the guilty through his righteousness. We read again,
"Whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely." We feel that
to will is present with us, and therefore we freely take the living
water. We read once more, "Go ye into all the world, and preach the
gospel to every creature;" and as we are creatures, we conclude that
the gospel has something to say to us. On one or other of these
accounts we see that the gospel is directed to us, and so we receive
it. It is better for us that the promise should be directed to us in
terms of character than that it should mention our actual names. Is
your name John Brown? "Well, if the gospel came in a letter to you,
directed to John Brown, what might you not say if you were tempted to
doubt? You would think to yourself that there are many more John Browns
besides yourself, and therefore the message might not be for you. If it
was directed to your address, you might then fear that another John
Brown once lived at that house, before you were born, and so you would
fear to appropriate the message lest it should prove to be out of date.
Even supposing that your name was there, and the address, and the date,
you might be mistrustful enough to fancy that there was a mistake, or
that some other person of your name had used your address for the day.
If you mean to ride on the back of unbelief any fancy will do for a
saddle. But when the promise comes "to him that believeth in Jesus,"
there can be no question that it is ours if we believe. We read, "If we
confess our sins, God is faithful and just to forgive us our sins;" is
it not clear that if we have confessed our sins, mercy is ours? It is a
blessed thing for us when the Spirit of God leads us to see that the
gospel is free to all who are made willing to receive it.

Another thing that makes faith easy is when the Spirit of God shows us
the glory of Christ's person. Our Savior is truly God, and this fact
helps us to believe in him. It strikes me that the poor anxious father
may have been much helped to believe in our Lord by that peculiar
majesty which shone about him through his having just come down from
the mount of transfiguration. It was a very hard case which exercised
the poor man's mind, and therefore our Lord appeared to him with an
unusual splendor—a splendor of which we read—"when they saw him they
were amazed." A sight of our Savior's face helped the trembler to cry,
"Lord, I believe." Oh, if the Spirit of God will lead you to read the
Scriptures till you get a clear idea of the Godhead and perfect manhood
of the Lord Jesus, you will feel that everything is possible with an
Almighty Savior. "Is anything too hard for the Lord?" Our Lord is gone
up unto his glory, and he is able to save unto the uttermost them that
come unto God by him. Oh, could you but grasp the idea that he who asks
your trust is the Son of the Highest, who has all power in heaven and
in earth, you could not, you would not withhold your confidence! As for
myself, knowing beyond all doubt my Lord's divinity it seems easy
enough to rely upon him. I have told you before what John Hyatt said on
his dying bed, when his deacons said, "Mr. Hyatt, can you trust your
soul with Christ now?" "One soul!" said he, "I could trust a million
souls with him if I had them." Even so could I trust the Lord Jesus not
only with my soul, but with all the destinies of earth and heaven, time
and eternity. Every child of God may safely say that. I could trust
Jesus with all the souls that ever lived or shall live, if they were
all mine. Surely, he is able to keep that which we have committed to
him.

Another great help to faith is to perceive the completeness of the
divine work and sacrifice of the Lord Jesus. He took our sin upon
himself, and in his own body on the tree was made sin for us, that we
might be made the righteousness of God in him. Only let your eyes
behold the Son of God suffering the death-agony for guilty man, and you
must believe in his power to redeem. I have thought that if men had
been more sinful than they are, and if they were a million times as
numerous as they are, and if every star that studs the midnight sky
were a world, and all crowded full of sinners, yet the sacrifice of God
himself must from the glory of his nature be such a vindication of the
law that it might well suffice as a reason for forgiving a rebel
universe! Shall the infinitely holy suffer for the guilty? Shall the
Eternal take upon himself humanity, and bow his head to death? Then the
sacrifice must possess such boundless efficacy that none may fear that
it will fall short of their need. No limit can be set to the power,
which lies in the divine expiation. My God, I see that thou hast given
thine own Son to die, and surely in his precious blood there is more
than sufficient reason for my faith in thee.

If that does not lead you to believe perhaps the Spirit of God will go
to work in another way. Some have been helped to believe in Jesus by
the sight of others converted, justified and made happy. When someone
like yourself is saved you take courage. "I have been a thief," says
one.

"The dying thief rejoiced to see
That fountain in his day
And there may you, though vile as he,
Wash all your sins away."

"I have been an adulterer," saith one. Alas! so was David, but he said,
"Wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow." "I have been a murderer,"
sobs a third. So was Manasseh, who shed innocent blood very much. "But
I have been a persecutor and a blasphemer." So was Saul of Tarsus, yet
he obtained mercy. "But I seem to have far more of the devil in me than
anybody else." So had Mary Magdalene, out of whom Christ cast seven
devils. You think you are a sinner all by yourself, but there have been
others like you, and the door through which others have passed into
mercy is open for you. If I had been a little rabbit in the day when
Noah brought the living creatures into the ark, I do not think I should
have been troubled about whether there was room for me to enter the
ark; but if I had been so timid I should have forgotten all my fears
when I saw the elephant come up and his mate with him, and had seen
them go tramping through the doer. Then I should have known assuredly
that there was room for me. Oh, you who have been kept moral and
upright, and therefore are not outwardly great sinners, surely you may
enter where the chief of sinners have found ready admission. The
salvation of others is often a sweet encouragement to sinners to trust
in Christ.

Lastly, I will tell you one thing, which will make you trust him, and
that is, desperation as to all other hopes. It is a singular thing that
despair is often the mother of faith, but the mother dies when the
child is born. We were many of us led to believe in Jesus because we
had nothing else to trust in. When we are driven to the last extremity,
then it is we come to Jesus, and take him to be our all in all. A boy
was awakened in a house, which had taken fire. He could be seen from
the street, poor child, and his danger was great indeed, He rushed to
the window: his father stood below and called to him to drop into his
arms; but it was a long way down, and the child was afraid. He clung to
the window, but dared not drop. Do you know what made him let go his
hold and fall into his father's arms? There came a burst of fire out of
the window and scorched him and then he dropped directly. I wish that
some of you would get just such a touch of the fires of despair as to
compel you to say:

"I can but perish if I go;
I am resolved to try,
For if I stay away I know
I must for ever die."

Years ago one of our students was greatly emaciated with what seemed to
be consumption. He had heard of a certain medicine, which was said to
be useful in such cases, but he had no faith in it. When he was growing
worse and worse I said, "Brother, you are at death's door; try that
man's stuff. There may he something in it. At any rate, nothing else
does you any good." He took the medicine through sheer despair, of all
other prescriptions, and God blessed it to him so that he is alive at
this day. He would never have tried the remedy if he had not felt that
there was no other hope. Even so, it will be well for you to be driven
into a corner as to your soul's estate, that you may believe in Christ
Jesus and say within his disciples in old time, "To whom shall we go?
Thou hast the words of eternal life." Here is a closing verse for you
to sing at home by yourself

"A guilty, weak, and helpless worm,
On Christ's kind arms I fall
He is my strength and righteousness,
My Jesus and my all."

PORTION OF SCRIPTURE READ BEFORE SERMON— Mark 9:2-29.

HYMNS FROM "OUR OWN HYMN BOOK"—249, 498 551.