Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit, vols. 13–63

Verse 1. And it came to pass, when Jesus had made an end of commanding His twelve disciples, He departed thence to teach and to preach in their cities. Whatever He commanded, He Himself did. He was always the example as well as the legislator of His people. How well it will be for us who are called upon to teach others, if we can teach them as much by what we do as by what we say! "When Jesus had made an end of commanding His twelve disciples, He departed thence to teach and to preach in their cities."

2, 3. Now when John had heard in the prison the works of Christ, he sent two of his disciples. And said unto Him, Are You He that should come, or do we look for another?Poor John! His spirit was brave enough amid the wilds when he was by the riverside, but shut up in prison, it was probably otherwise with him. Those bold spirits, when they lose liberty, are apt to be depressed. Perhaps, too, John sent the disciples as much for their sakes as for his own. At any rate, what a question it was to put to our Lord, "Are You He that should come, or do we look for another?" I would call your attention to the quietness of our Savior's mind—the absence of anything like anger. See how He answers them.

4-6. Jesus answered and said unto them, Go and show John again those things which you do hear and see: The blind receive their sight, and the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, and the deaf hear, the dead are raised up, and thepoor have the Gospel preached to them. And blessed is he who is not offended because of Me. Now if it had been the very least of us who had been attempting to do such service for God, and we had been questioned about what we were doing, should we not have felt hurt and grieved? And maybe there are some who would not have given an answer, especially if they were dignified with the name of an office. But our blessed Lord does not take a huff at it. He is not vexed, but He answers with the utmost gentleness, not by a word of authority commanding John to believe, but by an exposition of those blessed seals of Grace which were the best evidence that He was, indeed, the Messiah. He pointed to the very miracles which prophecy declared the Messiah would perform—and He did this with that graciousness of temper which was always about our Divine Master, in which let us copy Him.

7-11. And as they departed, Jesus began to say unto the multitudes concerning John, What went you out into the wilderness to see? A reed shaken with the wind? But what went you out to see? A man clothed in soft raiment? Behold, they who wear soft clothing are in kings' houses. But what went you out to see? A Prophet? Yes, I say unto you, and more than a Prophet. For this is he of whom it is written, Behold, I send My messenger before Your face, which shall prepare Your way before You. Verily I say unto you, Among them that are born of women there has not risen a greater than John the Baptist notwithstanding he that is least in the Kingdom of Heaven is greater than he. Never did our Savior bear a more emphatic testimony to John than on this occasion! And it is remarkable that it should have followed upon the heels of John's doubt and John's question! How generously the Master repays His servant—not in his own coin, but in the heavenly coin of love! He seems to say, "Through the infirmity of your flesh you have been half-inclined to question Me, but through the strength of My Grace I turn round and extol you. Time was when you could say, 'He must increase, but I must decrease,' and now I turn round and say to those whom you have sent, and to those who saw your messengers, that there is none like you." Not even Moses, himself, is greater than John the Baptist! Though he who has entered into the Light and the Glory of the Kingdom of Grace since the coming of the Master is greater than he!

12-15. And from the days of John the Baptist until now the Kingdom of Heaven suffers violence, and the violent take it by force. For all the Prophets and the Law prophesied until John. And if you will receive it, he is Elijah, who is to come. He that has ears to hear, let him hear But how many there are that have ears and do not hear! The external organ is affected, but the internal ear of the soul is not reached at all! Blessed are they who, having ears, do in very truth, hear.

16, 17. But to what shall I liken this generation? It is like unto children sitting in the markets, and calling unto their fellows and saying, We have piped unto you, and you have not danced; we have mourned unto you, and you have not lamented. The children would not agree! Whatever game was proposed, some of them would not follow it. At one time they imitated the pipers, and then the others would not dance. Then they imitated the lamentations of a funeral, and then the others would not join them.

18, 19. For John came neither eating nor drinking, and they say, He has a devil The Son of Man came eating and drinking, and they say, Behold a man gluttonous, and a winebibber, a friend of publicans and sinners. There was no pleasing them! And there is no pleasing people, now, whoever it is that God sends. One man is much too homely. In fact, he is vulgar. Another is much too rhetorical. In fact, his rhetoric runs away with him. One man is doctrinal. Oh, he is dogmatic! Another man is practical. He is much too censorious. Another man is full of experience. He is mystical. Oh, surely God, Himself, cannot please the evil tempers of ungodly men! One thing is that He does not try to do so, nor do His servants, if they are truly sent of Him. That is a matter about which they have small concern.

19. But wisdom is justified of her children.Whoever Christ sends, He sends in wisdom, and there is an adaptation about each of His servants, even if men do not perceive it. The day shall come when wisdom shall be justified of her children.

20-24. Then began He to upbraid the cities wherein most of His mighty works were done, because they repented not Woe unto you, Chorazin! Woe unto you Bethsaida! For if the mighty works which were done in you had been done in Tyre and Sidon, they wouldhave repentedlong ago in sackcloth and ashes. But I say unto you, It shall be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon at the Day of Judgment than for you. And you, Capernaum, which are exalted unto Heaven, shall be brought down to Hell for if the mighty works which have been done in you, had been done in Sodom, it wouldhave remained until this day. But I say unto you, That it shall be more tolerable for the land of Sodom in the Day of Judgment, than for you.There was a tenderness about the tone of Christ when He spoke thus. The words are burning, but the eyes were full of tears. He could not contemplate the possibility of the Gospel being rejected without a broken heart. He sighed and cried as He bore testimony against those who refused Eternal Life. With what tenderness must Christ regard some that are present here tonight, whose privileges from their childhood until now have been so great that they could scarcely be greater—and yet they seem determined to reject the admonitions of love and trample over tenderness in their desperate resolve to perish! God have mercy upon such.

25. At that time Jesus answered He seemed to answer Himself. He answered to the thoughts that passed through His own mind. "At that time Jesus answered."

25-27. And said, I thank You, O Father, Lord of Heaven and earth, because You have hid these things from the wise and prudent, and have revealed them unto babes. Even so, Father: for so it seemed good in Your sight. All things are delivered unto Me of My father: and no man knows the Son, but the Father; neither knows any man the Father, save the Son, and he to whomever the Son will reveal Him. Did the Lord Jesus Christ, in His address to Bethsaida and Capernaum awaken in His own mind all those difficulties that hover round about the Doctrine of Predestination? Did it not seem strange that God should send the Gospel to people who rejected it, and did not send the Gospel to a people who would have received it? How can these things be? And the dear Savior answers the question to His own mind by falling back upon that other sublime Truth and to Him, full of thanksgiving—the Infinite Sovereignty of God! I do not know what some of us would do if we did not believe that Truth of God. There are so many things which puzzle us—so many questions, but the Judge of all the earth must be right. He must! He will do as He pleases with His own, and it is not for us to question the prerogatives of the Most High. Now the Savior at last seems to give vent to His soul in one grand burst of Gospel preaching! And whenever you and I get worried about any Doctrine, it is always well to come back to the simplicity of the Gospel and proclaim it again.

28. Come unto Me, all you that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. There is no rest in the difficulties of metaphysics! There is no rest in the labors of human merit! "Come unto Me, and I will give you rest."

29. Take My yoke upon you, and learn of Me: for I am meek and lowly in heart; and you shall find rest unto your souls. First He gives rest to all who come. But afterwards there is a second rest which they find who become obedient and bear His yoke. The rest that comes of pardoned sin is sweet, but the rest that comes of conqueredsin through obedience is sweeter still. The rest He gives is precious, but there is rest upon rest, as there is Grace upon Grace, and let us go in for the highest form of that rest! "You shall find rest unto your souls." The very innermost part of your being shall be full of peace.

30. For My yoke is easy, and My burden is light. Blessed be His name, we have found it so!

"Will you also go away?"

No mischief that ever befalls our Christian communities is more lamentable than that which comes from the defection of the members. The heaviest sorrow that can wring a pastor's heart is such as comes from the treachery of his most familiar friend. The direst calamity the Church can dread is not such as will arise from the assault of enemies outside, but from false Brothers and Sisters within the camp. My eminent predecessor, Benjamin Keach, though arrested, brought before the magistrates, imprisoned, pilloried and otherwise made to suffer by the Government of the times for the Gospel Doctrines that he preached and published, found it easier to brook the rough usage of open foes than to bear the griefs of wounded love, or sustain the shock of outraged confidence. I should not think his experience was very exceptional. Other saints would have preferred the rotten eggs of the villagers to the rooted animosities of slanderers! Troy could never be taken by the assaults of the Greeks outside her walls. Only when, by stratagem, the enemy had been admitted within the citadel, was that brave city compelled to yield. The devil, himself, is not such a subtle foe to the Church as Judas, when, after the supper, Satan entered into him. Judas was a friend of Jesus. Jesus addressed him as such. And Judas said, "Hail, Master," and kissed Him. And it was Judas who betrayed Him! That is a picture which may well appall you—that is a peril which may well admonish you! In all our churches, among the many who enlist, there are some who desert. They continue awhile, and then they go back to the world. The radical reason why they retract is an obvious disagreement. "They went out from us because they were not of us, for if they had been of us, doubtless they would have continued with us." The unconverted adherents to our fellowship are no loss to the Church when they depart. They are not a real loss, any more than the scattering of the chaff from the threshing floor is a detriment to the wheat. Christ keeps the winnowing fan always going. His own preaching constantly sifted His hearers. Some were blown away because they were chaff. They did not really believe. By the ministry of the Gospel, by the order of Providence, by all the arrangements of Divine Government, the precious are separated from the vile, the dross is purged away from the silver that the good seed and the pure metal may remain and be preserved! The process is always painful. It causes great searching of heart among those who abide faithful—and occasions deep anxiety to gentle spirits of tender, sympathetic mold.

I trust, dear Friends, that you will not think I harbor any ungenerous suspicions of your fidelity because my text contains so pointed and so personal an appeal to your conscience. There is more of pathos than of pardon in the question as our Lord put it, "Will you also go away?" He addressed the favored twelve. I put it to myself. I put it to those who are the officers of the Church. I put it to every member without exception—Will you also go away? But should there be one to whom it is peculiarly applicable, I do not desire to flinch from putting the question most personally to that one, "What? Are you going? Do you mean to turn back? Do you mean to go away?"

Let us approach the enquiry sideways. Will you alsogo away? "Also" means as well as other people. Why do others go? If they have any good reason, perhaps we may see cause to follow their example. Look narrowly, then, at the various causes or excuses for defection. Why do they renounce the religious profession they once espoused? The fundamental reason is lack of Grace, a lack of true faith, an absence of vital godliness. It is, however, the outward reasons which expose the inward apostasy of the heart from Christ of which I am anxious to treat. I. WHY SOME LEAVE CHRIST

Some there are in these days, as there were in our Lord's own day, who depart from Christ because they cannot bear His Doctrine. Our Lord had more explicitly than on any former occasion declared the necessity of the soul's feeding upon

Himself. They probably misunderstood His language, but they certainly took offense at His statement. Hence there were those who said, "This is a hard saying; who can hear it?" So they walked no more with Him.

There are many points and particulars in which the Gospel is offensive to human nature and revolting to the pride of the creature. It was not intended to please man. How can we attribute such a purpose to God? Why should He devise a Gospel to suit the whims of our poor fallen human nature? He intended to save men, but He never intended to gratify their depraved tastes. Rather does He lay the axe to the root of the tree and cut down human pride. When God's servants are led to set forth some humbling Doctrine, there are those who say, "Ah, I will not assent to that!" They kick against any Truth of God which wounds their prejudices! What say you, Brothers and Sisters, to the claims of the Gospel on your allegiance? Should you discover that God's Word rebukes your favorite pleasure, or contradicts your cherished convictions, will you forthwith take offense and go away? No, but if your hearts are right with Christ, you will be prepared to welcome all His teaching and yield obedience to all His precepts. Only prove it to be Christ's teaching and the right-minded professor is ready to receive it. That which is transparent on the face of Scripture, he will cordially accept, as he says, "To the Law and to the testimony! If they speak not according to this word, it is because there is no light in them." As for that which is merely inferred and argued from the general drift of Scripture, the true heart will not be hasty to reject, but patient to investigate, like the Bereans, who, "were more noble than the Jews of Thessalonica, because they searched the Scriptures to see whether these things were so." Oh, that the word of Christ may dwell in us richly! God forbid that any of us should ever turn aside offended because of Him—His blessed Person, His holy example, or His sacred teaching! May we be always ready to believe what He says and prompt to do what He commands!

Remember, Brothers and Sisters, that the Gospel commission has three parts to which the minister has to attend. We are first, to go and preach the Gospel. "Go you, and disciple all nations. "The second thing is "baptizing them." And the third thing is "teaching them to observe all things whatever I have commanded you." As willing disciples of Jesus, let us press forward, listening to His voice, following in His footsteps and accounting His revealed will as our supreme law! Far be it from us to go back, to repine, or to desert Him, then, because we are offended at His Doctrines!

Others there are who desert the Savior for the sake of gain. Many have been entangled in that snare. Mr. By-Ends originally went on pilgrimage because he thought it would pay. There was a silver mine on the road and he purposed to survey that and see whether silver might not be obtained, as well as the Golden City beyond! He came, if I remember rightly, of a family that got its living by the waterman's business—looking one way and pulling another. He was apparently striving for religion, though he had his eyes all the while on the world! He was for holding with the hare, and running with the hounds. So when he came to a point where he must part with one or the other, he considered upon which the whole would be most profitable—and he gave up that which appeared to involve loss and self-sacrifice—and kept to that which would, as he called it, help him in the "main chance," and assist him to get on in the present life. Sincerely do I trust there is no one among us but what despises Mr. By-Ends and all of his class! If you would make money—and there need be nothing sinful in that—do let it be made honestly! Never let riches be pursued under the pretence of religion! Sell your wares and find a market for your merchandise, but do not sell Christ, nor barter a heavenly birthright for a worthless bribe. Put what goods you please into your shop window, but do not put a canting, hypocritical expression on your face, or "wear a holy look," with a view of turning godliness into gain! God save us from that arrant villainy! May it never have a footing in our midst!—

"Neither man nor angel can discern Hypocrisy, the only evil that walks Invisible, except to God alone." Does any man join a church for the sake of the respectability it implies, or for the standing it may give him, or for the credit he may get? He will soon find that it does not answer his purpose. Then away he will go! But the graver probability is that he will be thrust out with shame!

Some leave Christ and go away terrified by persecution. Nowadays it is supposed that there is no such thing. But that is a mistake, for though martyrs are not burned at Smithfield, and the Lollards' Tower is now a place for show (a memorial of times long ago), the harass, the cruelty and the oppression are far enough from being obsolete! Godless husbands play the part of petty tyrants and will not permit their wives the enjoyment of religion, but make their lives bitter with a galling bondage. Employers full often wreak malice on servants whose piety towards God is their sole cause of offense. Worse still, there are working men who consider themselves intelligent who cannot allow their fellow workman liberty to go to a place of worship without sneers, jeers, and cruel mocking! In many cases the mirth of the workshop is never louder than when it is turned against a Believer in Christ. They count it rare fun to hunt a man who cares for the salvation of His soul. They call themselves, "Englishmen," but certainly they are no credit to their country! Look at the base-born, ill-bred cowards! Yonder is an atheist! He is raving about his rights because the magistrate will not believe him on his oath—he claims liberty of conscience to be a heathen, but denies his comrade's right to be a Christian! Look at that little party of British workmen—they belong to the Sabbath Desecration Society. They are petitioning Parliament to open museums and theaters on Sundays, and at the same time they are hounding to death a poor fellow who prefers going to Chapel. They air their own self-respect by the oaths they utter, while they betray their self-abasement by the scorn they vent on those who presume to sing a hymn! They hail the drunk as a chum and scorn the sober man as a fiend! I wonder that there is not more honorable feeling, more good faith and true fellowship among our skilled workmen than to allow of one man being made the butt of a whole community! God give you Grace to bear such persecutions as these! If they cut us to the quick, may we learn to bear them with equanimity, and even to rejoice that we are counted worthy to suffer for the Savior's sake!

Some of us have had to run the gauntlet for many years. What we have said has been constantly misrepresented. What we have endeavored to do has been misjudged and our motives have been misunderstood. Yet here we are, as happy as anybody out of Heaven! We have not been injured by any or all the calumnies that have been heaped upon us. Our foes would have crushed us but, blessed be God, He cheered us often when we were cast down. The Lord give you, in like manner, strength of mind and courage of heart to bear the trial manfully! Then you will care no more for the laughter and the sneers of men than you do for the noise of those migratory birds high overhead which you hear on an autumn evening as they are making their weary journey to a distant clime! Take heart, Brothers and Sisters! Fear God and face your accusers. True courage grows strong on opposition. Never think of deserting the army of Christ! Least of all should you play the coward because the insolence of some ill-mannered bully. Let not your faith be vanquished by such scoffing. Alas, that so many a cowardly spirit has gone away for the sake of carnal ease—and deserted Christ when His dear name had become the drunk's jest and the derision of fools!

And there are people who forsake true religion out of sheer levity. I know not how to account for some men's defections. If you take up the list of wrecks, you will notice some that have gone down through collisions, and others through striking rocks—but sometimes you meet with a vessel "foundered at sea." How it happened, no one knows. The owner, himself, cannot understand it. It was a calm day and there was a cloudless sky when the vessel sank. There are some professors who, concerning faith, have made shipwreck under such apparently easy circumstances, so free from trial, so exempt from temptation, that we have not seen anything to awaken anxiety on their behalf, yet all of a sudden they have foundered! We are startled and amazed. I remember one that fell into a gross sin, of whom a Brother unwisely said, "If that man is not a Christian, I am not." His prayers had certainly been sweet. Many a time they have melted me down before the Throne of Grace and yet the life of God could not have been in his soul, for he lived and died in flagrant vice— and was impenitent to the last! Such cases I can only attribute to a sort of levity which can be charmed with a sermon or a play. They can take a pew at the Chapel or a box at the opera with equal nonchalance and eagerly follow the excitement of the hour, "everything by turns, and nothing long." "Unstable as water, they shall not excel." At the spur of a moment they profess Christianity, they do not espouse it—and then, without troubling themselves to renounce it—they drop off into infidelity. They are soft and malleable enough to be hammered into any shape. Made of wax, they can be molded by any hand that is strong enough to grip them! The Lord have mercy upon any of you who may happen to be of that species! You spring up soon, and suddenly you wither! Hardly is the seed sown before the sprout appears. What a wonderful harvest you promise! But ah, no sooner has the sun risen with a burning heat than, because there is no earth, the good seed withers away! Pray God that you may be plowed deep, that the iron pan of rock underneath may be broken right up, that you may have plenty of subsoil and root—that the verdure you produce may be permanent! Want of principle is deadly, but the lack is far too common. Never cease to pray that you may be rooted and grounded, established and built up in Christ, so that when the floods come and the winds blow, you may not fall with a great destruction, as that house fell which was built upon the sand!

And, oh, how many leave Christ for the sake of sensual enjoyments! I will not enlarge upon this. Certain, however, it is that the pleasures of sin for a season fascinate their minds till they sacrifice their souls at the shrine of sordid vanity! For a merry dance, a wanton amusement, or a transient joy that would not bear reflection, they have renounced the pleasures that never pall, the immortal hopes that never fail—and turned their backs upon that blessed Savior who gives and feeds the tastes for unspeakable joys, for joys full of glory! In our pastoral oversight of a Church like this, we have painful evidence that a considerable number gradually grow cold. The Elders' reports of the absentees reiterate the vain excuses for nonattendance. One has so many children. The distance is too great for another. When they joined the Church their family was just as large, and the distance was just the same! But the household cares become more irksome when the concern for religion begins to flag—and the fatigue of travelling increases when their zeal for the House of God falters. The Elders fear they are growing cold. No actual transgression can we detect, but there is a gradual declension over which we grieve. I dread that cold-heartedness! It steals so insensibly, yet so surely over the entire frame. I do not say that it is worse than open sin. It cannot be. Yet it is more insidious. A flagrant delinquency would startle one as a fit does a patient, but a slow process of backsliding may steal like paralysis over a person without awakening suspicion. Like the sleep which comes over men in the frozen regions, if they yield to it, they will never wake again! You must be awakened, or else this supineness will surely end in death! "Gray hairs were upon him here and there, and he knew it not." Is it so with any of you, dear Friends? Are you going aside by slow degrees? He who loses his substance little by little presently becomes a bankrupt, and painful is the discovery when the end comes! How miserable must a spiritual bankruptcy be to him who wastes by degrees his heavenly estate, if he ever had any! No words can describe it. God preserve us from such a catastrophe!

Some have turned aside, who allege that they did so through change of circumstances. They were with us when their means of livelihood were competent, if not affluent. From reverses in business, they have sunk in their social position. Hence they do not like to come into fellowship with us as they were known to do. Now from my inmost soul I can say if there are any persons that grew poor, I, for one, do not think one atom the less of them, or hold them in less esteem, however impoverished they may have become! Do not tell me that you have no clothes fit to come in, for any clothes that you have paid for are creditable. If you have not paid for them, I cannot make excuses for you. Be honest. Wool or fustian need not shame you, but for fineness or fashion I should certainly blame you! I am always glad to see Brothers and Sisters sitting here, as I sometimes do, in their smock frocks. One good friend is rather conspicuous in that line. The wholesome whiteness of his rural garb is rather attractive. If he has paid for it, he is a far more respectable man than anyone that has run into debt for a suit of broadcloth that he cannot pay for! And I rejoice to think that I am not merely expressing my own feeling, but that which is shared by the whole community! We all delight to see our poor Brothers and Sisters. If there are any of you suffering from a sensitiveness of your own, or a suspicion of our reflections, the sooner you get rid of such foolish pride, the happier you will be! You are jealous of being thought respectable? Don't you know that a man is respectable for his character—not for the money he has got in his pocket?

Others forsake Christ because they have become rich and increased in goods. They did not scorn the little conventicle when they were plain, plodding people—but since fortune has smiled on them and they have moved their residence from a terrace to a mansion, and they have taken to keep a carriage—they feel bound to move in another circle! To the parish church, or to some ritualistic church in their neighborhood, they go once on the Sunday. They patronize the place by their presence—they show themselves among the elite of that locality. They bow and bend, and face about to the east, as though they had been to the manner born. They are too respectable to go into the little Baptist Chapel. They receive visitors in the afternoon, dine late, and dissipate Sabbath hours in the frivolous presence of showing off their gentility! Well, I think their departure is not to be lamented. When gone they are certainly no loss to anybody. We sigh for them as we would for Judas or Demas! They have fallen foul of what they thought their good fortune but of what has proved to be their ruin! Those who have true principles, when they rise in the world, see more reason why they should spend their wealth and their influence in aiding a good cause. Principle would prevail over policy to the end, if in their hearts they believed the Truth of God as it is in Jesus! It were no dishonor to a prince to go and sit down side by side with a pauper, were they both true followers of Jesus Christ! In old times, when our sires met in caves and dens of the earth, they met the liege and the lowly, the bond and free. Or when, in even earlier ages, the Christians gathered in the catacombs, men out of Caesar's household, now a chief, then a senator, soon a prince of the blood, came and sat down in those caves, lighted up with the dim candle, to listen while some unshod but Heaven-taught man declared the Gospel of Jesus with the power of the Holy Spirit! That they were illiterate, I am quite sure, for on looking over the monuments that are found in the catacombs, it is rare to find one inscription that is thoroughly well spelt. Though it is evident enough that the early Christians were an illiterate company of men, yet those that were great and noble did not disdain to join with them, nor will they if the light of Heaven shines and the love of God burns in their hearts!

Unsound Doctrine occasions many to apostatize. There is always plenty of that about. Deceivers will beguile the weak and some have been led aside by modern doubt—and modest infidelity has its partisans. They begin cautiously by reading works with a view to answer scientific or intellectual skepticism. They read a little more and dive a little deeper into the turbid stream, because they feel well able to stand against the insidious influence. They go on till, at last, they are staggered. They do not go to those who could help their scruples, but they continue to flounder on till at last they have lost their footing—and he that said he was a Believer has ended in stark atheism, doubting even the existence of a God! Oh, that those who are well taught would be content with their teaching! Why meddle with heresies? What can they do but pollute your minds? Were I to get black, I imagine that I could wash away all the soils, but I would be sorry to black myself for the sake of washing! Why should you be so unwise as to go through pools of foul teaching merely because you think it easy to cleanse yourself of its pollution? Such trifling is dangerous! When you begin to read a book and find it pernicious, put it aside. Someone may upbraid you for not reading it all through, but why should you? If I have a roast on my table of which the smell and the taste at once convince me that it is putrid and unwholesome, should I show my discretion by fairlyeating it all before giving my judgment that it is not fit for food? One mouthful is quite enough! And one sentence of some books ought to be quite enough for a sensible man to reject the whole mass! Let those who can relish such meat have it, but I have a taste for better food. If it is your duty to expose these evils, encounter them bravely, with prayer to God to help you. But if not, as a humble Believer in Jesus, what business have you to taste and test such noxious fare when it is exposed in the market? Keep to the study of the Word of God!

I will not continue in this strain. It is painful to me, if not to you. I will condense into a few sentences my answer to the second enquiry—

Those who go aside—what becomes of them? Well, if they are God's children, I will tell you what becomes of them, for I have seen it scores of times. Though they go aside, they are not happy. They cannot rest, for they are miserable even when they try to be cheerful. After a while they begin to remember their first Husband, for then it was better with them than now. They return, but there are scores and scores, to say nothing of the shame which they have to carry with them to their grave, who are never the men they were before! They have to take a second place among their comrades. And even should Sovereign Grace so wonderfully bless their painful experience that they are fully restored, they can never mention the past without bitter regret. Their by-path serving for others' beacon, they will say to young people, "Never do as I have done. Nothing good, all mischief, comes of it." In the vast majority of cases, however, they are not the Lord's people. So this is what comes of it. Those who prove traitors to a profession they once made are the hardest people in the world to impress. Doubtless some of you, when you lived in the country, used always to be punctual at your usual places of worship, but since you have come to London, where your absence from any sanctuary is unnoticed, you rarely enter the courts of the Lord's House—nor would you have been here tonight but for some special inducement—some country cousin or some particular friend having brought you. Though unknown to me, God scans your path. Well, here you are, and yet it may be to little profit. You have had counsels and cautions in such profusion that it is like pouring oil down a slab of marble to admonish you. May God in His Omnipotent Mercy break your stubborn heart, or there will be no hope for you! Such people frequently lose all conscience. They can go a deal further in talking against religion than anybody else. They will sometimes venture to say they know so much about it that they could expose it. Their boasts and their threats are alike unmeaning—but as boys whistle while they walk through the churchyard to keep their courage up, so do their vain talk and their senseless stories betray their stifled fear. They speak contemptuously of God while they justify themselves in a course of which their own conscience upbraids them! They go back—alas, some of them to prove themselves the most abandoned sinners in the world! The raw material out of which the devil constructs the deadliest fabric is that which was presumed to be the most saintly substance.

There could not have been a Judas to betray Christ had he not first been distinguished as an Apostle, who ventured to kiss his Master. You must pick him from among the Apostles to make an apostate. As the ringleaders of riotous transgression, when converted, often make the best revivalist preachers, so those who seem to be the most loyal subjects of Christ, when they become renegades, prove to be the bitterest foes and the blackest sinners! Painful reminiscences rush over one's mind. Standing here now in the midst of a great Church, I call to mind things that have harrowed up my soul. God grant I may not see the likes of them again! They go away! Ah, me, full many of them go away to die in blank despair. Did you ever read the life of Francis Spira? If you want to sleep tonight, do not take up that memoir! Did you ever read the life of John Child, a Baptist minister of about 200 years ago? Mr. Keach gives it in one of his works. He was a man who knew the Truth of God and, to a great extent, had felt its power. But he went aside from it and before he came to die, his expressions were too terrible to listen to. The remorse and despair of his spirit chased everyone away. At last he laid violent hands upon himself. For a man, after having once looked Christ in the face and kissed Him, to betray Him and crucify Him afresh, to hang himself is not to be wondered at! To eat at the Lord's Table, to drink of that cup of blessing, to mingle with the saints, join in their prayers and their hymns, professing to be a disciple of Christ and then to go back and walk no more with Him, is to venture on a course of no ordinary danger! The swing of the pendulum, if it has been lifted high and let go, is so much the greater on the other side. I marvel not that any man should be precipitated into flagrant sin who willfully renounces his vows of consecration to Jesus!

And oh, when his eyes are opened and his conscience is awakened, how he wishes that he had never been born! Could he terminate his existence and annihilate his anguish-smitten soul, then the direst act of desperation by which he could end a life he could not mend, might be accounted wise. But no, that is impossible! The relief he seeks, he cannot find when he takes the dreadful leap from suffering here to an aggravated form of misery hereafter, ten thousand times worse to endure! He seals his doom and makes his own damnation sure, as he raises against himself a murdering hand. Do I address anyone here bereft of every ray of hope and shivering on the brink of cold despair? Hold now, I would cry in your ears— do yourself no harm! You can do yourself no good! Think not to cure your woes by committing another crime—

"It were madness thus to shun the living light, And plunge your guilty soul in endless night."

While there is life there is hope! Jesus Christ can forgive you. Return to Him. He can wash you in His blood. He can make you clean, though your sin is as scarlet. But, oh, do not trifle, make no delay! Tarry no longer in your present condition, otherwise maybe you will fill up the measure of your iniquities before you are aware, and you may taste, even in this world, some beginning of the wrath to come! If not rescued as a trophy of Grace right speedily, you may become a monument of God's wrath—a beacon to deter others from daring to turn aside! I speak solemnly, but I cannot help it. So intensely do I feel the terror of that woe, and so confident am I that some of you are making light of it, that I would go down on my knees and entreat you with tears to remind you what you are doing. You are on a steep plane and you are going down, down, down! Your feet are even now on the slippery places from which multitudes have been cast down into destruction! How are they brought into desolation as in a moment! The Lord make haste to deliver you! May He stretch out His hand and receive you! I can only call out to you. You seem to have got where I cannot reach you. Do not venture a footstep further on that dangerous road. Look to Jesus, look to Jesus! He can redeem your life from the pit of Hell by His Sovereign Grace, but He alone! Then as a wandering sheep, brought back to the fold, you shall adore His name!

Our third point is this—

Were we left to ourselves, I cannot tell you any reason why we should not go as they have gone. Nor, indeed, could I tell you why the best man here would not be the worst before tomorrow morning, if the Grace of God left him. John Bradford, you know, as he saw the poor criminals taken away to Tyburn to be executed, used to say, "There goes John Bradford, but for the Grace of God." Verily each one of us might say the same! To abide with Christ, however, is our only security—and we trust we shall never depart from Him. But how can we make sure of this? The great thing is to have a real foundation in Christ to begin with—genuine faith, vital godliness. The foundation is the first matter to be attended to in building a house. With a bad foundation there cannot be a substantial house. You require a firm bottom, a sound groundwork, before you proceed to the superstructure. Do pray God that if your religion is a sham, you may find it out now! Unless your hearts are deeply plowed with genuine repentance, and unless you are thoroughly rooted and grounded in the faith, you may have some cause to suspect the reality of your conversion and the verity of the Holy Spirit's operation in you. May the Lord work in you a good beginning, and then you may rely upon it, He will carry it on to the day of Jesus Christ!

Then remember, dear Brothers and Sisters, if you would be preserved from falling, you must be schooled in humility and keep very low before the Lord. When you are half an inch above the ground, you are that half-inch too high. Your place is to be nothing! Trust Christ, but do not trust yourself. Rely on the Spirit of God, but do not rely on anything that is in yourself—no, not on a Grace you have received, or on a gift you possess! Those do not slide who walk humbly with God. They are always safe whose entire dependence is upon God. Be jealous of your obedience! Be circumspect! Be careful! Take heed to yourselves—your walk and conversation cannot be too cautious. Many are lost through being too remiss, but none through being too scrupulous. The statutes of the Lord are so right that you cannot neglect them without diverging from the path of rectitude. Watch and pray! God help you to watch, or else you will get drowsy. Never neglect prayer. That is at the root of every defection. Retrogression commonly begins at the closet. To restrain prayer is to deaden the very pulse of life! "Watch unto prayer."

And I beseech you, dear Friends, do shun that company which has led other people astray. Parley not with those whose jokes are profane. Keep right away from them. It is not for you to be seen standing, much less to be found sitting down with men of loose manners and lewd converse! They can do you no good, but the evil they can bring upon you, it would not be easy to estimate. You may have heard the story—but it is so good it will bear repeating—of the lady who advertised for a coachman, and was waited upon by three candidates for the situation. She put to the first one, this question, "I want a really good coachman to drive my pair of horses and, therefore, I ask you how near you can drive to danger and yet be safe?" "Well," he said, "I could drive very near, indeed! I could go within a foot of a precipice without fear of any accident so long as I had the reins." She dismissed him with the remark that he would not do. To the next one who came, she put the same question. "How near could you drive to danger?" Being determined to get the position, he said, "I could drive within a hair's breadth, and yet skillfully avoid any mishap." "You will not do," she said. When the third one came in, his mind was cast in another mold, so when the question was put to him, "How near could you drive to danger?" he said, "Madam, I never tried. It has always been a rule with me to drive as far off from danger as I possibly can." The lady engaged him at once!

In like manner, I believe that the man who is careful to run no risks and to refrain from all equivocal conduct, having the fear of God in his heart, is most to be relied upon. If you are really built upon the Rock of Ages, you may meet the question without dismay, "Will you also go away?" and you can reply without presumption, "No, Lord, I cannot, and I will not go, for to whom should I go? You have the words of eternal life." And may the very God of Peace wholly sanctify you! And I pray God your whole spirit, and soul, and body be preserved blameless unto the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. Faithful is He that calls you, who also will do it! Amen.