promises

Let Faith Enable You

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, Christian Life, promises, salvation 4 Comments

Therefore we conclude that a man is justified by faith without the deeds of the law. – Romans 3:28

We want faith to have some works, some prayers, something or other of our own to help it. It is as if somebody were to try and help me to walk by giving me a big chair to carry. I should not walk so well with the burden, as without it. Have you ever heard this parable concerning faith? She had to cross a stream, and the current was strong, and there came one to her who said, “Faith, I will help thee! Come with me up the river till we can find a place where we can ford it.” Faith said, “No; I was bidden to cross the river here.” So another came, and said, “I will build a bridge for you, that you may go over the river with ease;” and he laid hold of a few stones, but not much ever came of it. Yet another said, “I will go and find a boat.” But there were no boats about; therefore they asked Faith to wait till they build a boat for her. What did she do? She took off her vestments, and plunged into the water. “Thanks be to God,” said she, “I can swim;” and so she swam across, and reached the other side without a boat, without a bridge, and without a ford. That is what I should like to see every sinner here do-begin to swim. Do not wait for help. Cast yourself into the stream of everlasting love. Believe in Christ Jesus, and have no more confidence in the flesh, with its bridges and boats. Commit thyself to the stream of eternal grace, and swim across. Faith can enable you to do it. Nothing else can. Take that lesson home to yourselves, you who are seeking the Saviour at this time.~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/2253.cfm

Faith Enlightens, Enlivens and Strengthens

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

“Wherefore, if God so clothe the grass of the field, which today is, and tomorrow is cast into the oven, shall He not much more clothe you, O ye of little faith?” – Matthew 6:30

It is written of some of old that “They looked unto Him, and were lightened.” Faith sheds a light upon many things, and lets us see that even if Christ has a frown on His face, He has love in His heart. Faith looks right into the heart of Christ, and helps us to perceive that He cannot mean anything but mercy to a seeking soul. Faith also enlivens, and when the heart begins to faint, faith brings its smelling bottle, and revives it. David said, “I had fainted, unless I had believed.” Believing is the cure for fainting, and you must do one of two things, either believe or faint. Faith is thus a great help to one who is seeking Christ, because it both enlightens and enlivens the soul. Faith also strengthens. It makes the lame take the prey. Beloved, it is because faith thus enlightens and enlivens and strengthens, that it is the grace most useful to a soul that is seeking to lay hold upon Christ, and yet cannot get a comfortable look at His blessed face.

Moreover, faith lays hold on Christ. It is like the Greek Antisthenes, who went to a philosopher to learn; but he was a dull scholar, and the philosopher bade him go away. The next time the class met, Antisthenes returned, and the philosopher thereupon sent for a man with a club to drive the stupid scholar away; but he was overcome by his scholar; for Antisthenes said, “There is no club that was ever made that is heavy enough to drive me away from you. Here I mean to stay, and learn whatever you can teach me.” Oh, may we have a faith like that, a faith that will say to Christ, “I will not go away from Thee. I can but perish if I stay with Thee, and if I go from Thee, I must perish; therefore I will abide with Thee evermore, and learn all Thou wilt teach me”! …Cling to Christ, and say to Him with that holy boldness that is the result of faith, “I will not let Thee go except Thou bless me.” Faith, then, holds on to Christ. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/2253.cfm

Faith is the Great Holdfast

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

“O woman, great is thy faith: be it unto thee even as thou wilt”…-Matthew 15:28

…and when He saw her, He said, “Daughter, be of good comfort; thy faith hath made thee whole.” …”According to your faith be it unto you.” – Matthew 9:22, 29

We may be quite sure that the one thing specially noteworthy in this woman’s case was her faith, first, because we have Christ’s word for it. He said unto her, “O woman, great is thy faith!” He did not say, “Great is thy love to thy child;” nor, “Great is thy earnestness;” nor, “Great is thy importunity;” but he put his finger on the power that had urged her forward, and he said, “O woman, great is thy faith!” And not in this case alone did Christ trace the blessing to faith, but in nearly every instance where a suppliant obtained favour from Him, faith was the medium of securing the mercy. Faith is mightier than all other available forces.

Besides this, we know that faith supports the other graces. If other graces can help a soul to plead with Christ, they all owe their power to faith. If it had not been for the faith which she had to support it, parental love would not have helped this woman much. If it had not been for faith, she would not have been earnest and importunate. Faith hangs on to Christ in the dark, it holds to a silent Christ, it holds to a refusing Christ, it holds to a rebuking Christ, and it will not let Him go. Faith is the great holdfast that hooks a soul on to the Saviour. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/2253.cfm

Faith Enough to Seek Jesus

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, Christian Life, prayer, promises Leave a comment

Then Jesus answered and said unto her, “O woman, great is thy faith: be it unto thee even as thou wilt.” And her daughter was made whole from that very hour.”- Matthew 15:28

This woman had come to her last word. I do not see what more she could have said. When Christ had likened her to a dog, she had consented to it, and said, “Truth, Lord: yet the dogs eat of the crumbs which fall from their masters’ table.” She had come to her last word, and now Christ gives her His best word. It is His way, sometimes, to make us wait till we are completely exhausted, and can say and do no more; then He comes in with the fullness of His divine power, and gives to us what we have importunately sought at His hands. Our extremity is His opportunity.

Faith alone can keep a soul seeking after Christ under discouragement. Other causes may send us a certain distance along the road, but only faith will bring us to the goal of assured rest… When she desired healing for her daughter, she meant what she said. When she cried, “Have mercy upon me, O Lord, Thou Son of David!” it was with a shrill and piteous voice. She could not bear to be refused. Nobody ever came to Christ who pleaded more from the heart than did this poor Canaanite. She was not an idle repeater of forms of prayer. Her prayer leaped, red-hot, from her soul-“Have mercy on me, O Lord, Thou Son of David!” But her earnestness alone would not have upheld her under the ordeal through which she was called to pass. It would have given way if she had not had the believing conviction that Christ could heal her daughter, and that He would do so. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/2253.cfm

 

Doubt and Saving Faith

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

“…Help Thou mine unbelief” – Mark 9:24

There are many true believers who at the first are tried with unbelief, because they have now, more than ever they had before, a sense of their past sins. Many a man receives a far deeper sense of sin after he is forgiven than he ever had before. The light of the law is but moonlight compared with the light of the gospel, which is the light of the sun. Love makes sin to become exceeding sinful.

“My Sins, my Sins, my Savior!
How sad on Thee they fall;
Seen through Thy gentle patience,
I tenfold feel them all.

I know they are forgiven,
But still their pain to me
Is all the grief and anguish
They laid, my Lord, on Thee.”

The light of the promise gleaming in the soul reveals the infinite abyss of horror which lies in indwelling sin. In the light of God’s countenance we discover the filthiness, the abomination, the detestable ingratitude of our past conduct…Oh, that we could blot out those evil days! We have said, “Cursed be the sun that it rose on such a day as that in which I so defiled myself with iniquity.” Thus, under a sense of sin, though there is the belief that we are pardoned, there may also arise the unbelief against which we need the Lord to help us…Learn from this that a measure of doubt is consistent with saving faith; that weak faith is true faith, and a trembling faith will save the soul. If thou believest, even though thou be compelled to say, “Help Thou mine unbelief,” yet that faith makes thee whole, and thou art justified before God. ` C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/1033.cfm

Trust God In Your Sore Trials

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, Christian Life, promises, salvation 6 Comments

And wheresoever he taketh him, he teareth him: and he foameth, and gnasheth with his teeth, and pineth away: and I spake to Thy disciples that they should cast him out; and they could not. – Mark 9:18

The spirit which possessed this poor child was accustomed to throw him sometimes into the fire, and sometimes into the water. Just our condition; for our spirit has sometimes been thrown into the very fire of presumption, and at another season into the floods of despair. We have alternated between the cold of melancholy and the heat of self-conceit. We have at one time cried, “I love pleasure, and after it I will go;” and at another time we have said, “My soul chooseth strangling rather than life; I would not live always.” At the moment while the father was speaking, the poor boy was on the ground wallowing in dreadful paroxysms of his disorder, foaming at the mouth, and gnashing with his teeth. Satan had great wrath, because he knew that his time was short. When the Savior spoke, and bade the devil come out of him, the fiercest struggle of all took place; for the unclean spirit rent the child, and the most terrible cries were heard. Still the father said, “Lord, I believe.” Now, it may be, dear hearer, you are yourself full of great trouble, vexed and tormented with innumerable fears of wrath to come; a little hell burns within your soul, anguish unutterable has taken hold upon you, your heart is like a battlefield torn by contending hosts, which rush hither and thither, destroying on every side. You are yourself an embodied agony; you are like David when he said, “The pains of hell get hold upon me, I found trouble and sorrow.” Can you now believe? Will you now accept the word of the Most High? …Surely Christ Jesus is fit to be believed at all times, for, like the pole star, He abides in His faithfulness, let storms rage as they may. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/1033.cfm

In Hope, Believe Against Hope

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

“Master, I have brought unto Thee my son, which hath a dumb spirit; And wheresoever he taketh him, he teareth him: and he foameth, and gnasheth with his teeth, and pineth away: and I spake to Thy disciples that they should cast him out; and they could not.”…”…bring  him unto Me.” Mark 9:17-19

This man had for a long time considered his son’s case to be hopeless. Well he might. In addition to the fact that the child was subject to attacks of epilepsy and to extreme fits of fury, he was deaf and dumb, so that no intelligent expression of feeling could come from him: if at any time he felt stronger and better, he could not give his father a word of hope, he could not utter his gratitude for the sympathetic care that watched over him, neither could he hear any word of consolation which his father addressed to him.

Peradventure, there is one here, this morning, who has grown hopeless of salvation; he has felt as if his case was one out of the catalogue of mercy; he has written bitter things against himself, and supposed that God has sealed those bitter things and made them true; but you see the father in the presence of Christ believed over the head of his despair, “in hope believing against hope,” and I pray that you may do the same. In the presence of Christ the man’s confidence came back to him. Hast thou, my hearer, a hope that can do the same?…With Him nothing can be impossible. I see His pierced hands and feet, and feel that if He stooped to suffer in the sinner’s stead, the merit of His sacrifice must be beyond conception great. In Jesus the hopeless one hath hope, he who had despaired else now bids his heart be of good cheer. Oh, that is true faith which will not suffer itself to be any longer the slave of doubt and despondency now that it sees Jesus the Lord drawing near. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/1033.cfm