Character of Jesus

Recumbency on the Truth

Sherry Character of Jesus, Christian Life, promises, salvation 2 Comments

Trust in the LORD with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding. – Proverbs 3:5

Recumbency on the truth was the word which the old preachers used. You will understand that word. Leaning on it; saying, “This is truth, I trust my salvation on it.” Now, true faith, in its very essence rests in this-a leaning upon Christ. It will not save me to know that Christ is a Saviour; but it will save me to trust Him to be my Saviour. I shall not be delivered from the wrath to come by believing that His atonement is sufficient, but I shall be saved by making that atonement my trust, my refuge, and my all. The pith, the essence of faith lies in this-a casting one-self on the promise. It is not the lifebuoy on board the ship that saves the man when he is drowning, nor is it his belief that it is an excellent and successful invention. No! He must have it around his loins, or his hand upon it, or else he will sink. To use an old and hackneyed illustration: suppose a fire in the upper room of a house and the people gathered in the street. A child is in the upper story: how is he to escape? He cannot leap down-that were to be dashed to pieces. A strong man comes beneath, and cries, “Drop into my arms.” It is a part of faith to know that the man is there; it is another part of faith to believe that the man is strong; but the essence of faith lies in the dropping down into the man’s arms. That is the proof of faith, and the real pith and essence of it. So, sinner, thou art to know that Christ died for sin; thou art also to understand that Christ is able to save, and thou art to believe that; but thou art not saved, unless in addition to that, thou puttest thy trust in Him to be thy Saviour, and to be thine for ever. As Hart says in his hymn, which really expresses the gospel-

“Venture on Him, venture wholly;
Let no other trust intrude;
None but Jesus
Can do helpless sinners good.”

~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/0107.cfm

True Faith Gives Full Assent to the Scriptures

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, Christian Life, promises, salvation 2 Comments

We having the same spirit of faith, according as it is written, I believed, and therefore have I spoken; we also believe, and therefore speak; _ 2 Corinthians 4:13

I may know a thing, and yet not believe it. Therefore assent must go with faith: that is to say, what we know we must also agree unto, as being most certainly the verity of God. Now, in order to faith it is necessary that I should not only read the Scriptures and understand them, but that I should receive them in my soul as being the very truth of the living God, and I should devoutly with my whole heart receive the whole of the Scripture as being inspired of the Most High, and the whole of the doctrine which He requires me to believe to my salvation. You are not allowed to halve the Scriptures, and to believe what you please; you are not allowed to believe the Scripture with a half-heartedness, for if you do this wilfully, you have not the faith which looks alone to Christ. True faith gives its full assent to the Scriptures; it takes a page and says, “No matter what is in the page, I believe it;” it turns over the next chapter and says, “Herein are some things hard to be understood, which they that are unlearned and unstable do wrest, as they do also the other Scriptures, to their destruction; but hard though it be, I believe it.” It sees the Trinity; it cannot understand the Trinity in Unity, but it believes it. It sees an atoning sacrifice; there is something difficult in the thought, but it believes it; and whatever it be which it sees in revelation, it devoutly puts its lips to the book, and says, “I love it all; I give my full, free and hearty assent to every word of it, whether it be the threatening or the promise, the proverb, the precept, or the blessing. I believe that since it is all the Word of God it is all most assuredly true.” Whosoever would be saved must know the Scriptures, and must give full assent unto them.~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/0107.cfm

An Acceptable Offering

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, Christian Life 3 Comments

But without faith it is impossible to please Him: for he that cometh to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of them that diligently seek Him. – Hebrews 11:6

This is an old law; it is as old as the first man. No sooner were Cain and Abel born into this world, and no sooner had they attained to manhood, than God gave a practical proclamation of this law, that “without faith it is impossible to please Him.” Cain and Abel, one bright day, erected an altar side by side with each other. Cain fetched of the fruits of the trees and of the abundance of the soil, and placed them upon his altar; Abel brought of the firstlings of the flock, and laid it upon his altar. It was to be decided which God would accept. Cain had brought his best, but he brought it without faith; Abel brought his sacrifice, but he brought it with faith in Christ. Now, then, which shall best succeed? The offerings are equal in value; so far as they themselves are concerned that are alike good. Upon which will the heavenly fire descend? Which will the Lord God consume with the fire of His pleasure? Oh! I see Abel’s offering burning, and Cain’s countenance has fallen, for unto Abel and unto his offering the Lord had respect, but unto Cain and his offering the Lord had no respect. It shall be the same till the last man shall be gathered into heaven. There shall never be an acceptable offering which has not been seasoned with faith. Good though it may be, as apparently good in itself as that which has faith, yet, unless faith be with it, God never can, and never will, accept it, for He here declares, “Without faith it is impossible to please God.”~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/0107.cfm

“This is the Way, This is the Way!”

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, Christian Life, prayer, promises, salvation 5 Comments

…This is the way, walk ye in it… _ Isaiah 30:21

Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by Me. – John 14:6

Definite instruction is given. This may not suit the Broad School, but it is exactly what the anxious seeker needs. This definite instruction may also be said to be a special correction. When the voice behind says, “This is the way,” it does as good as say that the opposite path is not the way; for there is only one way to heaven, and there never will be two; and when men hear a voice saying, “This is the way,” it does in effect remind them that the opposite is not the way. If ye are going the reverse of the right way, turn ye from it, and ye shall live. How much we ought to bless God that the gospel comes in as a corrective, kills the false and introduces us to the true. May falsehood be slain within us, and truth reign there for ever. May we leave all other roads, since the Lord has said of one road only, “This is the way.”

if we have already believed it to be the way we are strengthened in that conviction. Hearing the mysterious word declaring again and again, “This is the way,” men grow to believe the truth of God’s word, and out of that by-and-by there is begotten a living faith in a living Saviour. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/1672.cfm

The Choicest of Favour

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, promises, salvation 5 Comments

For when we were yet without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly. -Romans 5:6

Some men have right-hand sins, respectable iniquities which challenge little censure from their fellows; not black, but whitewashed sins. Such men are not thieves, they are not licentious, they are not drunkards, but their sins take a quieter form; they mock God with their self-righteousness, and insult Him with their prayers, which are no prayers, but only pretenses and fictions, and not the real prayers of God’s elect ones. Others have left-hand sins; they plunge into the sins of the flesh; no vice is too black for them. Only propose to have a little pleasure and they will plunge into any vice to gain it: ay, and almost without pleasure, altogether without present profit, they will sin, as if for sin’s own sake. When they have burned their finger in the candle they will after that hold their arm in the fire; when they have brought disease into their bodies by sin they will return to the evil which caused it; when they have beggared their purse by their extravagant lusts yet still they will go on playing the profligate; when they have filled themselves with despair till they are as a bucket running with gall and wormwood, and this has been emptied out for them by God’s grace, they will fill it up again, for they are infatuated with sin; they find a delight in it and they will not, they cannot give it up.

Tell it, tell it, tell it; sound it forth beneath the sky for ever and ever, that the Lord does call to Himself such wanton wanderers…Oh, the pity of God, not only for the miserable, but for the wicked; it surpasses thought. “In due time Christ died for the ungodly.” Favour to the guilty is the choicest of favour. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/1672.cfm

When The Two Determinations Meet

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, Christian Life, promises, salvation, The Father Leave a comment

Return, ye backsliding children, and I will heal your backslidings. Behold, we come unto thee; for thou art the LORD our God.- Jeremiah 3:22

Sinners are eager and quick to escape from their own mercy. Like the prodigal, they are not satisfied till they get into “a far country”: they cannot rest in the same land with their God: they journey with all speed away from the Lord, and the greater the distance that they can set between themselves and their Father the more are they at ease. In forgetting God they find a horrible peace: the peace of death, a peace which will stupefy them into eternal destruction.

I admire the overflowing riches of the grace of God, that He should call men to Himself when they are altogether taken up with other things, when every thought, and every word, and every act is in rebellion against Him…The two determinations meet, and we shall see which of the two will prove itself the stronger one. We soon find that the determination of God overcomes the determination of man. The iron breaks the northern iron and the steel. “Thus saith the Lord; your covenant with death is broken, and your league with hell is disannulled:” for there was a prior covenant, a covenant of grace made by God Himself, which stands fast for ever; and there was a prior league which God made with His Son on our behalf, and that league shall overthrow our league with death and hell. Glory be to God that even when the sinner is still rebellious, and shows no signs of repentance, nor is conscious of any wish to turn from the error of his ways, even then, while his heart is black as night, and his spirit is choke-full with rebellion, God calls to him, “Return, O backsliding children.” ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/1672.cfm

Yet the Lord Follows the Lost Sinner

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, promises, salvation, The Father, The Holy Spirit 1 Comment

…thine ears shall hear a word behind thee…-Isaiah 30:21

…for they have turned their back unto me, and not their face: but in the time of their trouble they will say, Arise, and save us. – Jeremiah 2:27

How does God find men when He declares that they shall hear a word behind them? First, He finds them with their backs turned to Him. This is clear enough, if you remember that the word is to be heard “behind” them. The sinner has gone away from God, and God calls after him from behind. He has turned his back upon his true Friend, his best Friend, his only capable Friend, but that Friend does not therefore change His temper and resent the insult; nay, He is provoked to a love more pleading and persuasive than ever, and calls to him to come into the right way. After having transgressed wilfully and wickedly, the rebel now distinctly turns his back on God and truth; according to the Lord’s complaint, “they have turned unto Me the back, and not the face.” He turns his back on the law, on the gospel, on mercy, on eternal life. He turns his back on the adoption of the great Father, on pardon bought with the blood of Jesus, on regeneration which can alone be wrought by the Holy Spirit: he turns his back upon holiness, happiness, and heaven. He turns away from sunlight, and wanders down into deeper and yet deeper night, striving to get away from God and holy influences. Yet the Lord follows him, and with a voice of touching love and tender compassion He calls to him, “This is the way, walk ye in it.” The word of warning, instruction, and entreaty follows the wanderer, and with ever-increasing pathos beseeches him to turn and live. Again and again the wise, earnest, personal voice assails his ear, as if love resolved that he should not perish if wooing could win him to life. The wanderer seeks not God, but his God seeks him. Man turns from the God of love, but the love of God turns not away from him.~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/1672.cfm