Character of Jesus

Making Light of Christ

Sherry Character of Jesus, salvation 10 Comments

But they made light of it, and went their ways, one to his farm, another to his merchandise – Matthew 22:5

Man is not much changed since the days of Adam…There are still men who answer the character given to others, in His day, by the Saviour, “They go their way, one to his farm, another to his merchandise,: making light of the glorious things of the gospel…I believe that to think lightly of Christ is a sin; and at all risks of being falsely called legalist, or free-willer, by those who are wise above what is written, I shall charge it upon you as such, for I hope I shall never belong to that class of Calvinists who do the devil’s work by excusing sinners in their sins.

These men refused to come; they went-“One to his farm, another to his merchandise,” and so made light of the messenger; and every sinner who neglects the great salvation of Jesus Christ, makes light of the gospel minister, which is no little insult in God’s esteem… Oh! to despise the gospel of the blessed God, how mad! how worse than folly! Despise the stars, and thou art a fool; despise God’s earth, with its glorious mountains, with its flowing rivers, and its fair meads, and thou art a maniac; but despise God’s gospel, and thou art ten thousand maniacs in one. Make light of that, and thou art far more foolish than he who sees no light in the sun, who beholds no fairness in the moon, and no brilliancy in the starry firmament. Trample, if you please, His lower works; but oh! remember, when you make light of the gospel, you are making light of the masterpiece of your great Creator-that which cost Him more than to create a myriad of worlds-the bloody purchase of our Saviour’s agonies. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/0098.cfm

Persecuted for Righteousness’ Sake

Sherry Character of Jesus, Christian Life, promises 4 Comments

Remember the word that I said to you, ‘A servant is not greater than his master.’ If they persecuted Me, they will also persecute you. If they kept My word, they will keep yours also. – John 15:20

As your Master was persecuted, you must expect to be the same. Some of you pity us when we are persecuted and despised. Ah! save your pity, keep it for those of whom the world speaks well; keep it for those against whom the woe is pronounced. “Woe unto you when all men shall speak well of you.” Save your pity for earth’s favorites; save your pity for this world’s lords, that are applauded by all men. We ask not for your pity; nay, sirs, in all these things we rejoice, and “glory in tribulations also, knowing that the things which happen unto us, happen for the furtherance of the gospel;” and we count it all joy when we fall into manifold temptations, for we rejoice that the name of Christ is known and His kingdom extended.

Look to it, Christian people, that if you are persecuted, it is for righteousness’ sake; for if you get any persecution yourself you must keep it yourself. The persecutions you bring on yourself for your own sins, Christ has nothing to do with them; they are chastisements on you. They hated Christ without a cause; then fear not to be hated. They hated Christ without a cause; then court not to be hated, and give the world no cause for it.~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/0089.cfm

 

Do You Hate Christ?

Sherry Character of Jesus, The Father 5 Comments

He who hates Me hates My Father also. -John 15:23

You are indifferent to Christ? Then you hate Him. And why is it that you hate Him? Many a time you have been wooed by the gospel; you have resisted appeals, many of them; come, now, for which of Christ’s works do you hate Him? Have I a persecutor here? Sinner! for what dost thou hate Christ? Dost thou curse Him? Tell me what He has done, that thou shouldst be angry with Him. Point to a single fault of His in His carriage towards thee. Has Christ ever hurt thee?

I tell thee, if thou hatest Christ, thou not only hatest Him without a cause, but thou hatest Him when thou hast simple cause to love Him. Come, poor sinner, what hast thou got by hating Christ? Thou hast stings of conscience. Many a sinner, by hating Christ, has been locked up in jail, has a ragged coat, a diseased body, a nasty filthy house, with broken windows, a poor wife, nearly beaten to death, and children that scamper out of the way as soon as father comes home. What hast thou got by hating Christ? Oh! if thou wert to estimate thy gains, thou wouldst find that getting Christ would be a gain, but that hating Him is a dead loss to thee. Now, if you hate Christ and Christ’s religion, I tell you that you hate Christ without a cause; and let me give you one solemn warning, which is this, that if you keep on hating Christ till you die, you will not hurt Christ by it, but you will hurt yourself most awfully. Oh! may God deliver you from being haters of Christ! ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/0089.cfm

Man Naturally Hates Goodness

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

If I had not done among them the works which no one else did, they would have no sin; but now they have seen and also hated both Me and My Father. -John 15:24

Ah! beloved, I will not tell you of man’s adulteries, and fornications, and murders, and poisonings, and sodomies. I will not tell you of man’s wars, and bloodsheds, and cruelties, and rebellions…that he put to death his God and slew his Saviour. Man outdid himself when he put his Saviour to death, and sin did out-Herod Herod when it slew the Lord of the universe, the lover of the race of man, who came on earth to die. Never does sin appear so exceedingly sinful as when we see it pointed at the person of Christ, whom it hated without a cause. In every other case, when man has hated goodness, there have always been some extenuating circumstances. We never do see goodness in this world without alloy; however great may be any man’s goodness, there is always some peg whereon we may hang a censure; however excellent a man may be, there is always some fault which may diminish our admiration of our love. But in the Saviour there was nothing of this. There was nothing that could blot the picture; holiness stood out to the very life; there was holiness-only holiness…There was nothing in Him but holiness: and any person with half an eye can see, that the thing men hated was simply that Christ was perfect; they could not have hated Him for anything else. And thus you see the abominable, detestable evil of the human heart-that man hates goodness simply because it is such. It is not true that we Christian people are hated because of our infirmities; men make our infirmities a nail whereon to hang their laughter; but if we were not Christians they would not hate our infirmities. They hold our inconsistencies up to ridicule; but I do not believe our inconsistencies are what they care about; we might be as inconsistent as all the rest of the world if we did not profess religion, or if they did not think we had any. But because the Saviour had no inconsistencies or infirmities, men were stripped of all their excuses for hating Him, and it came out that man naturally hates goodness, because he is so evil that he cannot but detest it. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/0089.cfm

They Hated Me Without A Cause

Sherry Character of Jesus, salvation, The Father 3 Comments

They hated Me without a cause.- John 15:25

It is usually understood, that the quotation our Saviour here refers to is to be found in the 35th Psalm, at the 19th verse, where David says, speaking of himself immediately and of the Saviour prophetically, “Let not them who are mine enemies rejoice over me, neither let them wink with the eye that hate me without a cause.” Our Saviour refers to that as being applicable to Himself, and thus He really tells us, in effect, that many of the Psalms are Messianic, or refer to the Messiah.

No being was ever more lovely than the Saviour; it would seem almost impossible not to have affection for Him. Certainly at first sight it would seem far more difficult to hate Him than to love Him. And yet, loveable as He was, yea, “altogether lovely,” no being so early met with hatred, and no creature ever endured such a continual persecution as He had to suffer.

And He came on earth to die, that sinners might not die. Was that a cause of hatred? Ought I to hate the Saviour, because He came to quench the flames of hell for me? Should I despise Him who allowed His Father’s flaming sword to be quenched in His own vital blood? Shall I look with indignation upon the substitute who takes my sin and griefs upon Him, and carries my sorrows? Shall I hate and despise the man who loved me better than He loved Himself-who loved me so much that He visited the gloomy grave for my salvation? Are these the causes of hatred? Surely His errand was one that ought to have made us sing His praise for ever, and join the harps of angels in their rapturous songs.

“They hated Me without a cause.”~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/0089.cfm

 

They Receive the Gospel

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

…and the poor have the gospel preached to them. – Matthew 11:5

I had an engraving sent to me the other day which pleased me beyond measure. It was an engraving simply but exquisitely executed. It represented a poor girl in an upper room, with a lean-to roof. There was a post driven in the ground, on which was a piece of wood, standing on which were a candle and a Bible. She was on her knees at a chair, praying, wrestling with God. Everything in the room had on it the stamp of poverty. There was the mean coverlet to the old stump bedstead; there were the walls that had never been papered, and perhaps scarcely whitewashed. It was an upper story to which she had climbed with aching knees, and where perhaps she had worked away till her fingers were worn to the bone to earn her bread at needlework. There it was that she was wrestling with God. Some would turn away and laugh at it; but it appeals to the best feelings of man, and moves the heart far more than does the fine engraving of the monarch on his knees in the grand assembly.

True it is, the gospel affects all ranks, and is equally adapted to them all; but yet we say, “If one class be more prominent than another, we believe that in Holy Scripture the poor are most of all appealed to.”…we think it rather to be an honour that the poor are evangelized, and that they listen to the gospel from our lips. I have never thought it a disgrace at any time.~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/0114.cfm

Oh! What a Blessed Thing It Is to Be Gospelized!

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

And He said to them, “Go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature. – Mark 16:15

Oh! how great a work it is to gospelize any man, and to gospelize a poor man. What does it mean? It means, to make him like the gospel. Now, the gospel is holy, just, and true, and loving, and honest, and benevolent, and kind, and gracious. So, then, to gospelize a man is to make a rogue honest, to make a harlot modest, to make a profane man serious, to make a grasping man liberal, to make a covetous man benevolent, to make the drunken man sober, to make the untruthful man truthful, to make the unkind man loving, to make the hater the lover of his species, and, in a word, to gospelize a man is, in his outward character, to bring him into such a condition that he labours to carry out the command of Christ, “Love thy God with all thy heart, and thy neighbour as thyself.” Gospelizing, furthermore, has something to do with an inner principle; gospelizing a man means saving him from hell and making him a heavenly character; it means blotting out his sins, writing a new name upon his heart-the new name of God. It means bringing him to know his election, to put his trust in Christ, to renounce his sins, and his good works too, and to trust solely and wholly upon Jesus Christ as his Redeemer. Oh! what a blessed thing it is to be gospelized! How many of you have been so gospelized? ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/0114.cfm