A Sermon Delivered on Sabbath Morning, December 2, 1855, by
the
Rev. C.H. SPURGEON
At New Park Street Chapel, Southwark.
"And ye will not come to me, that ye might have life."—John 5:40.
This is one of the great guns of the Arminians, mounted
upon the top of their walls, and often discharged with terrible noise against
the poor Christians called Calvinists. I intend to spike the gun this morning,
or, rather, to turn it on the enemy, for it was never theirs; it was never cast
at their foundry at all, but was intended to teach the very opposite doctrine to
that which they assert. Usually, when the text is taken, the divisions are:
First, that man has a will. Secondly, that he is entirely free. Thirdly, that
men must make themselves willing to come to Christ, otherwise they will not be
saved. Now, we shall have no such divisions; but we will endeavour to take a
more calm look at the text; and not, because there happen to be the words
"will," or "will not" in it, run away with the conclusion that it teaches the
doctrine of free-will. It has already been proved beyond all controversy that
free-will is nonsense. Freedom cannot belong to will any more than ponderability
can belong to electricity. They are altogether different things. Free agency we
may believe in, but free-will is simply ridiculous. The will is well known by
all to be directed by the understanding, to be moved by motives, to be guided by
other parts of the soul, and to be a secondary thing. Philosophy and religion
both discard at once the very thought of free-will; and I will go as far as
Martin Luther, in that strong assertion of his, where he says, "If any man doth
ascribe aught of salvation, even the very least, to the free-will of man, he
knoweth nothing of grace, and he hath not learnt Jesus Christ aright." It may
seem a harsh sentiment; but he who in his soul believes that man does of his own
free-will turn to God, cannot have been taught of God, for that is one of the
first principles taught us when God begins with us, that we have neither will
nor power, but that he gives both; that he is "Alpha and Omega" in the salvation
of men.
Our four points, this morning, shall be: First—that every man is dead,
because it says: "Ye will not come to me, that ye might have life."
Secondly—that there is life in Jesus Christ: "Ye will not come to me,
that ye might have life." Thirdly—that there is life in Christ Jesus for
every one that comes for it: "Ye will not come to me, that ye might have
life;" implying that all who go will have life. And fourthly—the gist of the
text lies here, that no man by nature ever will come to Christ, for the
text says, "Ye will not come to me, that ye might have life." So far from
asserting that men of their own wills ever do such a thing, it boldly and flatly
denies it, and says, "Ye WILL NOT come to me, that ye might have life."
Why, beloved, I am almost ready to exclaim, Have all free-willers no knowledge
that they dare to run in the teeth of inspiration? Have all those that deny the
doctrine of grace no sense? Have they so departed from God that they wrest this
to prove free-will; whereas the text says, "Ye WILL NOT come to me that
ye might have life."
I. First, then, our text implies THAT MEN BY NATURE ARE DEAD.
No being needs to go after life if he has life in himself.
The text speaks very strongly when it says, "Ye will not come unto me, that ye
might have life." Though it saith it not in words, yet it doth in effect affirm
that men need a life more than they have themselves. My hearers, we are all dead
unless we have been begotten unto a lively hope. First, we are all of us, by
nature, legally dead—"In the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt die
the death," said God to Adam; and though Adam did not die in that moment
naturally, he died legally; that is to say death was recorded against him. As
soon as, at the Old Bailey, the judge puts on the black cap and pronounces the
sentence, the man is reckoned to be dead at law. Though perhaps a month may
intervene before he is brought on the scaffold to endure the sentence of the
law, yet the law looks upon him as a dead man. It is impossible for him to
transact anything. He cannot inherit, he cannot bequeath; he is nothing—he is a
dead man. The country considers him not as being alive in it at all. There is an
election—he is not asked for his vote because he is considered as dead. He is
shut up in his condemned cell, and he is dead. Ah! and ye ungodly sinners who
have never had life in Christ, ye are alive this morning, by reprieve, but do ye
know that ye are legally dead; that God considers you as such, that in the day
when your father Adam touched the fruit, and when you yourselves did sin, God,
the Eternal Judge, put on the black cap and condemned you? You talk mightily of
your own standing, and goodness, and morality—where is it? Scripture saith, ye
are "condemned already." Ye are not to wait to be condemned at the
judgment-day—that will be the execution of the sentence—ye are "condemned
already." In the moment ye sinned; your names were all written in the black book
of justice; every one was then sentenced by God to death, unless he found a
substitute, in the person of Christ, for his sins. What would you think if you
were to go into the Old Bailey, and see the condemned culprit sitting in his
cell, laughing and merry? You would say, "The man is a fool, for he is
condemned, and is to be executed; yet how merry he is." Ah! and how foolish is
the worldly man, who, while sentence is recorded against him, lives in merriment
and mirth! Do you think the sentence of God is of no effect? Thinkest thou that
thy sin which is written with an iron pen on the rocks for ever hath no horrors
in it? God hath said thou art condemned already. If thou wouldst but feel this,
it would mingle bitters in thy sweet cups of joy; thy dances would be stopped,
thy laughter quenched in sighing, if thou wouldst recollect that thou art
condemned already. We ought all to weep, if we lay this to our souls: that by
nature we have no life in God's sight; we are actually, positively condemned;
death is recorded against us, and we are considered in ourselves now, in God's
sight, as much dead as if we were actually cast into hell; we are condemned here
by sin, we do not yet suffer the penalty of it, but it is written against us,
and we are legally dead, nor can we find life unless we find legal life in the
person of Christ, of which more by-and-by.
But, besides being legally dead, we are also spiritually dead. For not
only did the sentence pass in the book, but it passed in the heart; it entered
the conscience; it operated on the soul, on the judgment, on the imagination,
and on everything. "In the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die,"
was not only fulfilled by the sentence recorded, but by something which took
place in Adam. Just as, in a certain moment, when this body shall die, the blood
stops, the pulse ceases, the breath no longer comes from the lungs, so in the
day that Adam did eat that fruit his soul died; his imagination lost its mighty
power to climb into celestial things and see heaven, his will lost its power
always to choose that which is good, his judgment lost all ability to judge
between right and wrong decidedly and infallibly, though something was retained
in conscience; his memory became tainted, liable to hold evil things, and let
righteous things glide away; every power of him ceased as to its moral vitality.
Goodness was the vitality of his powers—that departed. Virtue, holiness,
integrity, these were the life of man; but when these departed man became dead.
And now, every man, so far as spiritual things are concerned, is "dead in
trespasses and sins" spiritually. Nor is the soul less dead in a carnal man,
than the body is when committed to the grave; it is actually and positively
dead—not by a metaphor, for Paul speaketh not in metaphor, when he affirms, "You
hath he quickened who were dead in trespasses and sins." But my hearers,
again, I would I could preach to your hearts concerning this subject. It was bad
enough when I described death as having been recorded; but now I speak of it as
having actually taken place in your hearts. Ye are not what ye once were; ye are
not what ye were in Adam, not what ye were created. Man was made pure and holy.
Ye are not the perfect creatures of which some boast; ye are altogether fallen,
ye have gone out of the way, ye have become corrupt and filthy. Oh! listen not
to the siren song of those who tell you of your moral dignity, and your mighty
elevation in matters of salvation. Ye are not perfect; that great word, "ruin,"
is written on your heart; and death is stamped upon your spirit. Do not
conceive, O moral man, that thou wilt be able to stand before God in thy
morality, for thou art nothing but a carcass embalmed in legality, a corpse
arrayed in some fine robes, but still corrupt in God's sight. And think not, O
thou possessor of natural religion! that thou mayest by thine own might and
power make thyself acceptable to God. Why, man! thou art dead! and thou mayest
array the dead as gloriously as thou pleasest, but still it would be a solemn
mockery. There lieth queen Cleopatra—put the crown upon her head, deck her in
royal robes, let her sit in state; but what a cold chill runs through you when
you pass by her. She is fair now, even in her death—but how horrible it is to
stand by the side even of a dead queen, celebrated for her majestic beauty! So
you may be glorious in your beauty, fair, and amiable, and lovely; you put the
crown of honesty upon your head, and wear about you all the garments of
uprightness, but unless God has quickened thee, O man! unless the Spirit has had
dealings with thy soul, thou art in God's sight as obnoxious as the chilly
corpse is to thyself. Thou wouldst not choose to live with a corpse sitting at
thy table; nor doth God love that thou shouldst be in his sight. He is angry
with thee every day, for thou art in sin—thou art in death. Oh! believe this;
take it to thy soul; appropriate it, for it is most true that thou art dead,
spiritually as well as legally.
The third kind of death is the consummation of the other two. It is eternal
death. It is the execution of the legal sentence; it is the consummation of
the spiritual death. Eternal death is the death of the soul; it takes place
after the body has been laid in the grave, after the soul has departed from it.
If legal death be terrible, it is because of its consequences; and if spiritual
death be dreadful, it is because of that which shall succeed it. The two deaths
of which we have spoken are the roots, and that death which is to come is the
flower thereof. Oh! had I words that I might this morning attempt to depict to
you what eternal death is. The soul has come before its Maker; the book has been
opened; the sentence has been uttered; "Depart ye cursed" has shaken the
universe, and made the very spheres dim with the frown of the Creator; the soul
has departed to the depths where it is to dwell with others in eternal death.
Oh! how horrible is its position now. Its bed is a bed of flame; the sights it
sees are murdering ones that affright its spirit;. the sounds it hears are
shrieks, and wails, and moans, and groans; all that its body knows is the
infliction of miserable pain! It has the possession of unutterable woe, of
unmitigated misery. The soul looks up. Hope is extinct—it is gone. It looks
downward in dread and fear; remorse hath possessed its soul. It looks on the
right hand—and the adamantine walls of fate keep it within its limits of
torture. It looks on the left—and there the rampart of blazing fire forbids the
scaling ladder of e'en a dreamy speculation of escape. It looks within and seeks
for consolation there, but a gnawing worm hath entered into the soul. It looks
about it—it has no friends to aid, no comforters, but tormentors in abundance.
It knoweth nought of hope of deliverance; it hath heard the everlasting key of
destiny turning in its awful wards, and it hath seen God take that key and hurl
it down into the depth of eternity never to be found again. It hopeth not; it
knoweth no escape; it guesseth not of deliverance; it pants for death, but death
is too much its foe to be there; it longs that non-existence would swallow it
up, but this eternal death is worse than annihilation. It pants for
extermination as the laborer for his Sabbath; it longs that it might be
swallowed up in nothingness just as would the galley slave long for freedom, but
it cometh not—it is eternally dead. When eternity shall have rolled round
multitudes of its everlasting cycles it shall still be dead. Forever knoweth no
end; eternity cannot be spelled except in eternity. Still the soul seeth written
o'er its head, "Thou art damned forever." It heareth howlings that are to be
perpetual; it seeth flames which are unquenchable; it knoweth pains that are
unmitigated; it hears a sentence that rolls not like the thunder of earth which
soon is hushed—but onward, onward, onward, shaking the echoes of eternity—making
thousands of years shake again with the horrid thunder of its dreadful
sound—"Depart! depart! depart! ye cursed!" This is the eternal death.
II. Secondly, IN CHRIST JESUS THERE IS LIFE,
for he says: "Ye will not come to me that ye might have life." There is
no life in God the Father for a sinner; there is no life in God the Spirit for a
sinner apart from Jesus. The life of a sinner is in Christ. If you take the
Father apart from the Son, though he loves his elect, and decrees that they
shall live, yet life is only in his Son. If you take God the Spirit apart from
Jesus Christ, though it is the Spirit that gives us spiritual life, yet it is
life in Christ, life in the Son. We dare not, and cannot apply in the first
place, either to God the Father, or to God the Holy Ghost for spiritual life.
The first thing we are led to do when God brings us out of Egypt is to eat the
Passover—the very first thing. The first means whereby we get life is by feeding
upon the flesh and blood of the Son of God; living in him, trusting on him,
believing in his grace and power. Our second thought was—there is life in
Christ. We will show you there are three kinds of life in Christ, as there are
three kinds of death.
First there is legal life in Christ. Just as every man by nature
considered in Adam had a sentence of condemnation passed on him in the moment of
Adam's sin, and more especially in the moment of his own first transgression, so
I, if I be a believer, and you, if you trust in Christ, have had a legal
sentence of acquittal passed on us through what Jesus Christ has done. O
condemned sinner! Thou mayest be sitting this morning condemned like the
prisoner in Newgate; but ere this day has passed away thou mayest be as clear
from guilt as the angels above. There is such a thing as legal life in Christ,
and, blessed be God! some of us enjoy it. We know our sins are pardoned because
Christ suffered punishment for them; we know that we never can be punished
ourselves, for Christ suffered in our stead. The Passover is slain for us; the
lintel and door-post have been sprinkled, and the destroying angel can never
touch us. For us there is no hell, although it blaze with terrible flame. Let
Tophet be prepared of old, let its pile be wood and much smoke, we never can
come there—Christ died for us, in our stead. What if there be racks of horrid
torture? What if there be a sentence producing most horrible reverberations of
thundering sounds? Yet neither rack, nor dungeon, nor thunder, are for us! In
Christ Jesus we are now delivered. "There is therefore NOW no
condemnation unto us who are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but
after the Spirit."
Sinner! Art thou legally condemned this morning? Dost thou feel that? Then, let
me tell thee that faith in Christ will give thee a knowledge of thy legal
acquittal. Beloved, it is no fancy that we are condemned for our sins, it is a
reality. So, it is no fancy we are acquitted, it is a reality. A man about to be
hanged, if he received a full pardon would feel it a great reality. He would
say, "I have a full pardon; I cannot be touched now." That is just how I feel.
"Now freed from sin I walk at large,
The Saviour's blood's my full discharge,
At his dear feet content I lay,
A sinner saved, and homage pay."
Brethren, we have gained legal life in Christ, and such
legal life that we cannot lose it. The sentence has gone against us once—now it
has gone out for us. It is written, "THERE IS NOW NO CONDEMNATION," and
that now will do as well for me in fifty years as it does now. Whatever
time we live it will still be written, "There is therefore, now no
condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus."
Then, secondly, there is spiritual life in Christ Jesus. As the man is
spiritually dead, God has spiritual life for him, for there is not a need which
is not supplied by Jesus, there is not an emptiness in the heart which Christ
cannot fill; there is not a desolation which he cannot people, there is not a
desert which he cannot make to blossom as the rose. O ye dead sinners!
spiritually dead, there is life in Christ Jesus, for we have seen—yes! these
eyes have seen—the dead live again; we have known the man whose soul was utterly
corrupt, by the power of God seek after righteousness; we have known the man
whose views were carnal, whose lusts were mighty, whose passions were strong,
suddenly, by irresistible might from heaven, consecrate himself to Christ, and
become a child of Jesus. We know that there is life in Christ Jesus, of a
spiritual order; yea, more, we ourselves, in our own persons, have felt that
there is spiritual life. Well can we remember when we sat in the house of
prayer, as dead as the very seat on which we sat. We had listened for a long,
long while to the sound of the gospel, but no effect followed, when suddenly, as
if our ears had been opened by the fingers of some mighty angel, a sound entered
into our heart. We thought we heard Jesus saying, "He that hath ears to hear,
let him hear." An irresistible hand put itself on our heart and crushed a prayer
out of it. We never had a prayer before like that. We cried, "O God! have mercy
upon me a sinner." Some of us for months felt a hand pressing us as if we had
been grasped in a vice, and our souls bled drops of anguish. That misery was a
sign of coming life. Persons when they are being drowned do not feel the pain so
much as while they are being restored. Oh! we recollect those pains, those
groans, that living strife that our soul had when it came to Christ. Ah! we can
recollect the giving of our spiritual life as easily as could a man his
restoration from the grave. We can suppose Lazarus to have remembered his
resurrection, though not all the circumstances of it. So we, although we have
forgotten a great deal, do recollect our giving ourselves to Christ. We can say
to every sinner, however dead, there is life in Christ Jesus, though you may be
rotten and corrupt in your grave. He who hath raised Lazarus hath raised us; and
he can say, even to you, "Lazarus! come forth."
In the third place, there is eternal life in Christ Jesus. And, oh! if
eternal death be terrible, eternal life is blessed; for he has said, "Where I am
there shall my people be." "Father, I will that they also, whom thou hast given
unto me, be with me where I am, that they may behold my glory." "I give unto my
sheep eternal life, and they shall never perish." Now, any Arminian that would
preach from that text must buy a pair of India rubber lips, for I am sure he
would need to stretch his mouth amazingly; he would never be able to speak the
whole truth without winding about in a most mysterious manner. Eternal life—not
a life which they are to lose, but eternal life. If I lost life in Adam I gained
it in Christ; if I lost myself for ever I find myself for ever in Jesus Christ.
Eternal life! Oh blessed thought! Our eyes will sparkle with joy and our souls
bum with ecstasy in the thought that we have eternal life. Be quenched ye stars!
let God put his finger on you—but my soul will live in bliss and joy. Put out
thine eye O sun!—but mine eye shall "see the king in his beauty" when thine eye
shall no more make the green earth laugh. And moon, be thou turned into
blood!—but my blood shall ne'er be turned to nothingness; this spirit shall
exist when thou hast ceased to be. And thou great world! thou mayest all
subside, just as a moment's foam subsides upon the wave that bears it—but I have
eternal life. O time! thou mayest see giant mountains dead and hidden in their
graves; thou mayest see the stars like figs too ripe, falling from the tree, but
thou shalt never, never see my spirit dead.
III. This brings us to the third point: that ETERNAL LIFE IS GIVEN TO ALL WHO
COME FOR IT.
There never was a man who came to Christ for eternal life, for legal life, for
spiritual life, who had not already received it, in some sense, and it was
manifested to him that he had received it soon after he came. Let us take one or
two texts—"He is able to save to the uttermost them that come unto him."
Every man who comes to Christ will find that Christ is able to save him—not able
to save him a little, to deliver him from a little sin, to keep him from a
little trial, to carry him a little way and then drop him—but able to save him
to the uttermost extent of his sin, unto the uttermost length of his trials, the
uttermost depths of his sorrows, unto the uttermost duration of his existence.
Christ says to every one who comes to him, "Come, poor sinner, thou needst not
ask whether I have power to save. I will not ask thee how far thou hast gone
into sin; I am able to save thee to the uttermost." And there is no one on earth
can go beyond God's "uttermost."
Now another text: "Him that cometh to me, [mark the promises are nearly
always to the coming ones] I will in no wise cast out." Every man that comes
shall find the door of Christ's house opened—and the door of his heart too.
Every man that comes—I say it in the broadest sense—shall find that Christ has
mercy for him. The greatest absurdity in the world is to want to have a wider
gospel than that recorded in Scripture. I preach that every man who believes
shall be saved—that every man who comes shall find mercy. People ask me, "But
suppose a man should come who was not chosen, would he be saved?" You go and
suppose nonsense and I am not going to give you an answer. If a man is not
chosen he will never come. When he does come it is a sure proof that he was
chosen. Says one, "Suppose any one should go to Christ who had not been called
of the Spirit." Stop, my brother, that is a supposition thou hast no right to
make, for such a thing cannot happen; you only say it to entangle me, and you
will not do that just yet. I say every man who comes to Christ shall be saved. I
can say that as a Calvinist, or as a hyper-Calvinist, as plainly as you can say
it. I have no narrower gospel than you have; only my gospel is on a solid
foundation, whereas yours is built upon nothing but sand and rottenness. "Every
man that cometh shall be saved, for no man cometh to me except the Father draw
him." "But," says one, "suppose all the world should come, would Christ receive
them?" Certainly, if all came; but then they won't come. I tell you all that
come—aye, if they were as bad as devils, Christ would receive them; if they
had all sin and filthiness running into their hearts as into a common sewer for
the whole world, Christ would receive them. Another says, "I want to know about
the rest of the people. May I go out and tell them—Jesus Christ died for every
one of you? May I say—there is righteousness for everyone of you, there is life
for every one of you?" No; you may not. You may say—there is life for every man
that comes. But if you say there is life for one of those that do not believe,
you utter a dangerous lie. If you tell them Jesus Christ was punished for their
sins, and yet they will be lost, you tell a wilful falsehood. To think that God
could punish Christ and then punish them—I wonder at your daring to have the
impudence to say so! A good man was once preaching that there were harps and
crowns in heaven for all his congregation; and then he wound up in a most solemn
manner: "My dear friends, there are many for whom these things are prepared who
will not get there." In fact, he made such a pitiful tale, as indeed he might
do; but I tell you who he ought to have wept for—he ought to have wept for the
angels of heaven and all the saints, because that would spoil heaven thoroughly.
You know when you meet at Christmas, if you have lost your brother David and his
seat is empty, you say: "Well, we always enjoyed Christmas, but there is a
drawback to it now—poor David is dead and buried!" Think of the angels saying:
"Ah! this is a beautiful heaven, but we don't like to see all those crowns up
there with cobwebs on; we cannot endure that uninhabited street: we cannot
behold yon empty thrones." And then, poor souls, they might begin talking to one
another, and say, "we are none of us safe here for the promise was—"I give unto
my sheep eternal life," and there is a lot of them in hell that God gave eternal
life to; there is a number that Christ shed his blood for burning in the pit,
and if they may be sent there, so may we. If we cannot trust one promise we
cannot another." So heaven would lose its foundation, and fall. Away with your
nonsensical gospel! God gives us a safe and solid one, built on covenant doings
and covenant relationship, on eternal purposes and sure fulfillments.
IV. This brings us to the fourth point, THAT BY NATURE NO MAN WILL COME TO
CHRIST,
for the text says, "Ye will not come to me, that ye might have life." I assert
on Scripture authority from my text, that ye will not come unto Christ, that ye
might have life. I tell you, I might preach to you for ever, I might borrow the
eloquence of Demosthenes or of Cicero, but ye will not come unto Christ. I might
beg of you on my knees, with tears in my eyes, and show you the horrors of hell
and the joys of heaven, the sufficiency of Christ, and your own lost condition,
but you would none of you come unto Christ of yourselves unless the Spirit that
rested on Christ should draw you. It is true of all men in their natural
condition that they will not come unto Christ. But, methinks I hear
another of these babblers asking a question: "But could they not come if they
liked?" My friend, I will reply to thee another time. That is not the question
this morning. I am talking about whether they will, not whether they
can. You will notice whenever you talk about free-will, the poor Arminian,
in two seconds begins to talk about power, and he mixes up two subjects that
should be kept apart. We will not take two subjects at once; we decline fighting
two at the same time, if you please. Another day we will preach from this
text—"No man can come except the Father draw him." But it is only the
will we are talking of now; and it is certain that men will not come unto
Christ, that they might have life. We might prove this from many texts of
Scripture, but we will take one parable. You remember the parable where a
certain king had a feast for his son, and bade a great number to come; the oxen
and fatlings were killed, and he sent his messengers bidding many to the supper.
Did they go to the feast? Ah, no; but they all, with one accord, began to make
excuse. One said he had married a wife, and therefore he could not come, whereas
he might have brought her with him. Another had bought a yoke of oxen, and went
to prove them; but the feast was in the night-time, and he could not prove his
oxen in the dark. Another had bought a piece of land, and wanted to see it; but
I should not think he went to see it with a lantern. So they all made excuses
and would not come. Well the king was determined to have the feast; so he said,
"Go out into the highways and hedges, and" invite them—stop! not invite—"compel
them to come in;" for even the ragged fellows in the hedges would never have
come unless they were compelled. Take another parable:—A certain man had a
vineyard; at the appointed season he sent one of his servants for his rent. What
did they do to him? They beat that servant. He sent another; and they stoned
him. He sent another and they killed him. And, at last, he said, "I will send
them my son, they will reverence him." But what did they do? They said, "This is
the heir, let us kill him, and cast him out of the vineyard." So they did. It is
the same with all men by nature. The Son of God came, yet men rejected him. "Ye
will not come to me that ye might have life." It would take too much time to
mention any more Scripture proofs. We will, however, refer to the great doctrine
of the fall. Any one who believes that man's will is entirely free, and that he
can be saved by it, does not believe the fall. As I sometimes tell you, few
preachers of religion do believe thoroughly the doctrine of the fall, or else
they think that when Adam fell down he broke his little finger, and did not
break his neck and ruin his race. Why, beloved, the fall broke man up entirely.
It did not leave one power unimpaired; they were all shattered, and debased, and
tarnished; like some mighty temple, the pillars might be there, the shaft, and
the column, and the pilaster might be there; but they were all broken, though
some of them retain their form and position. The conscience of man sometimes
retains much of its tenderness—still it has fallen. The will, too, is not
exempt. What though it is "the Lord Mayor of Mansoul," as Bunyan calls it?—the
Lord Mayor goes wrong. The Lord Will-be-will was continually doing wrong. Your
fallen nature was put out of order; your will, amongst other things, has clean
gone astray from God. But I tell you what will be the best proof of that; it is
the great fact that you never did meet a Christian in your life who ever said he
came to Christ without Christ coming to him. You have heard a great many
Arminian sermons, I dare say; but you never heard an Arminian prayer—for the
saints in prayer appear as one in word, and deed and mind. An Arminian on his
knees would pray desperately like a Calvinist. He cannot pray about free-will:
there is no room for it. Fancy him praying, "Lord, I thank thee I am not like
those poor presumptuous Calvinists. Lord, I was born with a glorious free-will;
I was born with power by which I can turn to thee of myself; I have improved my
grace. If everybody had done the same with their grace that I have, they might
all have been saved. Lord, I know thou dost not make us willing if we are not
willing ourselves. Thou givest grace to everybody; some do not improve it, but I
do. There are many that will go to hell as much bought with the blood of Christ
as I was; they had as much of the Holy Ghost given to them; they had as good a
chance, and were as much blessed as I am. It was not thy grace that made us to
differ; I know it did a great deal, still I turned the point; I made use of what
was given me, and others did not—that is the difference between me and them."
That is a prayer for the devil, for nobody else would offer such a prayer as
that. Ah! when they are preaching and talking very slowly, there may be wrong
doctrine; but when they come to pray, the true thing slips out; they cannot help
it. If a man talks very slowly, he may speak in a fine manner; but when he comes
to talk fast, the old brogue of his country, where he was born, slips out. I ask
you again, did you ever meet a Christian man who said, "I came to Christ without
the power of the Spirit?" If you ever did meet such a man, you need have no
hesitation in saying, "My dear sir, I quite believe it—and I believe you went
away again without the power of the Spirit, and that you know nothing about the
matter, and are in the gall of bitterness and the bond of iniquity." Do I hear
one Christian man saying, "I sought Jesus before he sought me; I went to the
Spirit, and the Spirit did not come to me"? No, beloved; we are obliged, each
one of us, to put our hands to our hearts and say—
"Grace taught my soul to pray,
And made my eyes to o'erflow;
'Twas grace that kept me to this day,
And will not let me go."
Is there one here—a solitary one—man or woman, young or old, who can say, "I sought God before he sought me?" No; even you who are a little Arminian, will sing—
"O yes! I do love Jesus—
Because he first loved me."
Then, one more question. Do we not find, even after we have
come to Christ, our soul is not free, but is kept by Christ? Do we not find
times, even now, when to will is not present with us? There is a law in our
members, warring against the law of our minds. Now, if those who are spiritually
alive feel that their will is contrary to God, what shall we say of the man who
is "dead in trespasses and sins"? It would be a marvelous absurdity to put the
two on a level; and it would be still more absurd to put the dead before the
living. No; the text is true, experience has branded it into our hearts. "Ye
will not come to me, that ye might have life."
Now, we must tell you the reasons why men will not come unto Christ. The first
is, because no man by nature thinks he wants Christ. By nature man conceives
that he does not need Christ; he thinks that he has a robe of righteousness of
his own, that he is well-dressed, that he is not naked, that he needs not
Christ's blood to wash him, that he is not black or crimson, and needs no grace
to purify him. No man knows his need until God shows it to him; and until the
Holy Spirit reveals the necessity of pardon, no man will seek pardon. I may
preach Christ for ever, but unless you feel you want Christ you will never come
to him. A doctor may have a good shop, but nobody will buy his medicines until
he feels he wants them.
The next reason is, because men do not like Christ's way of saving them. One
says, "I do not like it because he makes me holy; I cannot drink or swear if he
saved me." Another says, "It requires me to be so precise and puritanical, and I
like a little more license." Another does not like it because it is so humbling;
he does not like it because the "gate of heaven" is not quite high enough for
his head, and he does not like stooping. That is the chief reason ye will not
come to Christ, because ye cannot get to him with your heads straight up in the
air; for Christ makes you stoop when you come. Another does not like it to be
grace from first to last. "Oh!" he says, "If I might have a little honor." But
when he hears it is all Christ or no Christ, a whole Christ or no Christ, he
says, "I shall not come," and turns on his heel and goes away. Ah! proud
sinners, ye will not come unto Christ. Ah! ignorant sinners, ye will
not come unto Christ, because ye know nothing of him. And that is the third
reason.
Men do not know his worth, for if they did they would come unto him. Why did not
sailors go to America before Columbus went? Because they did not believe there
was an America. Columbus had faith, therefore he went. He who hath faith in
Christ goes to him. But you don't know Jesus; many of you never saw his
beauteous face; you never saw how applicable his blood is to a sinner, how great
is his atonement; and how all-sufficient are his merits. Therefore, "ye will not
come to him."
And oh! my hearers, my last thought is a solemn one. I have preached that ye
will not come. But some will say, "it is their sin that they do not come." IT
IS SO. You will not come, but then your will is a sinful will. Some think
that we "sew pillows to all armholes" when we preach this doctrine, but we
don't. We do not set this down as being part of man's original nature, but as
belonging to his fallen nature. It is sin that has brought you into this
condition that you will not come. If you had not fallen, you would come to
Christ the moment he was preached to you; but you do not come because of your
sinfulness and crime. People excuse themselves because they have bad hearts.
That is the most flimsy excuse in the world. Do not robbery and thieving come
from a bad heart? Suppose a thief should say to a judge, "I could not help it, I
had a bad heart." What would the judge say? "You rascal! why, if your heart
is bad, I'll make the sentence heavier, for you are a villain indeed. Your
excuse is nothing." The Almighty shall "laugh at them, and shall have them in
derision." We do not preach this doctrine to excuse you, but to humble you. The
possession of a bad nature is my fault as well as my terrible calamity. It is a
sin that will always be charged on men; when they will not come unto Christ it
is sin that keeps them away. He who does not preach that, I fear is not faithful
to God and his conscience. Go home, then, with this thought; "I am by nature so
perverse that I will not come unto Christ, and that wicked perversity of my
nature is my sin. I deserve to be sent to hell for it." And if the thought does
not humble you, the Spirit using it, no other can. This morning I have not
preached human nature up, but I have preached it down. God humble us all. Amen.