promises

The Two Covenants Compared

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

…which things are symbolic. For these are the two covenants: the one from Mount Sinai which gives birth to bondage, which is Hagar—…but the Jerusalem above is free, which is the mother of us all. -Galatians 4: 24, 26

The first covenant for which Hagar stands, is the covenant of works, which is this: “There is my law, O man; if thou on thy side wilt engage to keep it, I on my side will engage that thou shalt live by keeping it. If thou wilt promise to obey my commands perfectly, wholly, fully, without a single flaw, I will carry thee to heaven. But mark Me, if thou violatest one command, if thou dost rebel against a single ordinance, I will destroy thee for ever.” …The Sarah covenant is the covenant of grace, not made with God and man, but made with God and Christ Jesus, which covenant is this: “Christ Jesus on His part engages to bear the penalty of all His people’s sins, to die, to pay their debts, to take their iniquities upon His shoulders; and the Father promises on His part that all for whom the Son doth die shall most assuredly be saved; that seeing they have evil hearts, He will put His law in their hearts, that they shall not depart from it, and that seeing they have sins, He will pass (these sins) by and not remember them any more for ever.”…There are no conditions whatever in the covenant of grace, or if there be conditions, the covenant gives them. The covenant gives faith, gives repentance, gives good works, gives salvation, as a purely gratuitous unconditional act; nor does our continuance in that covenant depend in the least degree on ourselves. The covenant was made by God with Christ, signed, sealed, and ratified, in all things ordered well.~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/0069.cfm

 

Learning the Difference

Sherry Attributes of God, Christian Life, promises, The Holy Spirit 3 Comments

For it is written, that Abraham had two sons, the one by a bondmaid, the other by a freewoman. But he who was of the bondwoman was born after the flesh; but he of the freewoman was by promise. -Galatians 4:22, 23

There cannot be a greater difference in the world between two things than there is between law and grace. And yet, strange to say, while the things are diametrically opposed and essentially different from each other, the human mind is so depraved, and the intellect, even when blessed by the Spirit, has become so turned aside from right judgment, that one of the most difficult things in the world is to discriminate properly between law and grace. He who knows the difference, and always recollects it-the essential difference between law and grace-has grasped the marrow of divinity. He is not far from understanding the gospel theme in all its ramifications, its outlets, and its branches, who can properly tell the difference between law and grace. There is always in a science some part which is very simple and easy when we have learned it, but which, in the commencement, stands like a high threshold before the porch. Now, the first difficulty in striving to learn the gospel is this. Between law and grace there is a difference plain enough to every Christian, and especially to every enlightened and instructed one; but still, when most enlightened and instructed, there is always a tendency in us to confound the two things. They are as opposite as light and darkness, and can no more agree than fire and water; yet man will be perpetually striving to make a compound of them-often ignorantly, and sometimes willfully. They seek to blend the two, when God has positively put them asunder.~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/0069.cfm

 

A Mixed Multitude

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

And the children of Israel journeyed from Rameses to Succoth, about six hundred thousand on foot that were men, beside children. And a mixed multitude went up also with them; and flocks, and herds, even very much cattle. – Exodus 12:37, 38

O ye mixed multitude! ye are the ruin of the churches; ye set us a lusting; the pure Israelite’s blood is tainted by union with you; you sit as God’s people sit, and yet you are not His people; you hear as God’s people hear, and yet you are “in the gall of bitterness and in the bonds of iniquity.”

My dear hearers, do try yourselves, to see whether you are real Israelites. Oh! could Christ say to you, “Behold an Israelite indeed, in whom there is no guile.” Have you the blood on your door-post? Have you eaten of Jesus? Do you live on Him? Do you have fellowship with Him? Has God the Holy Ghost brought you out of Egypt? or have you come out yourself? Have you found refuge in His dear cross and wounded side? If you have, rejoice, for Pharaoh, himself, cannot bring you back again; but if you have not, I pray my Master to dash your peace into atoms, fair and lovely as it may be; I beseech Him to send the winds of conviction and the floods of His wrath, that your house may fall now, rather than it should stand to your death, and then, in the last solemn hour, the edifice of your own hands should totter. Mixed multitude! hear ye this! ye assembled gatherings of professors! “Examine yourselves, whether ye be in the faith; prove your-own selves. Know ye not your own selves, how that Jesus Christ is in you, except ye be reprobates?” But if He be not in you, then are ye reprobates still, whom God abhorreth. The Lord bring all His people out of Egypt, and deliver all His children from the house of bondage.~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/0055.cfm

 

Safely and Securely Delivered

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

It came to pass at the end of the four hundred and thirty years, even the selfsame day it came to pass, that all the hosts of the Lord went out from the land of Egypt.” -Exodus 12:51

Our dear Arminian friends think that some of the Lord’s people will not come out of Egypt, but will be lost at last. Ah! well, as good Hart says-

“If one poor saint may fall away,
It follows so may all;”

and none of us are safe and secure. Therefore, we do not give way to that. But all the hosts came out of Egypt, every one of them; not a soul was left behind…They all came out, every one of them; there was not one left behind…So beloved, if you are “the meanest lamb in Jesus’ fold,” you are “one in Jesus now;” though you have very little learning, and very little common sense, you will come out of Egypt. If the Lord has put you there in bondage, and you have been made to groan there, He will make you sing by-and-by, when you are redeemed from it. There is no fear of your being left behind; for if you were, Pharoah would say, “He delivered the strong ones, but He was not able to fetch out the weak;” and then there would be laughter in hell against the might and omnipotence of God. They all came out… He hath not only delivered His people, but they have gone out with flying colours, taking their shields with them. Stand and admire and love the Lord, who thus delivers all His people. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/0055.cfm

 

Saved Through One Passover

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

And it came to pass the selfsame day, that the LORD did bring the children of Israel out of the land of Egypt by their armies. -Exodus 12:51

“Ask them whence their victory came,
They with united breath
Ascribe their victory to the Lamb,
Their triumph in His death.”

One agonizing sacrifice, one death on Calvary, one bloody sweat on Gethsemane, one shriek of “It is finished.” consummated all the work of redemption. Oh! the precious blood of Christ! I love it when I think it saves one sinner; but oh! to think of the multitude of sinners that it saves! Beloved, we do not think enough of our Lord Jesus Christ; we have not half such an estimation of His precious person as we ought to have. We do not value His blood at the right price. Why, poor sinner, thou art saying this morning, “This blood cannot save me.” What! not save thee, when it is engaged to save thousands upon thousands, and myriads of myriads? Shall the shepherd who gathereth the whole flock together, and leadeth them unto the pastures lose a single lamb? Thou sayest, perhaps, “I am so little.” For that very reason then, thou dost not want so much of His power to take care of thee. “But,” says one, “I am so great a sinner.” Aye, then, so much the better, for He “came to save sinners, of whom I am chief,” said Paul; and He came to save thee. Ah! do not fear, ye sons of God; He who brought the Israelites all out in one night can bring you all out, though you are in the veriest bondage…this unworthy hand shall take the hand of the blessed St. Paul; they shall all be in heaven, shall all be redeemed, shall all be saved; but, mark you, through one sacrifice, one covenant, one blood, one Passover. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/0055.cfm

Bondage Before Liberty

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

And it came to pass at the end of the four hundred and thirty years, even the selfsame day it came to pass, that all the hosts of the Lord went out from the land of Egypt.- Exodus 12:41

All those whom God means to give an inheritance in Canaan, He will first take down into Egypt. Even Jesus Christ Himself went into Egypt before He appeared publicly as a teacher before the world, that in His instance, as well as in that of every Christian, the prophecy might be fulfilled-“Out of Egypt have I called my Son.” Every one who enjoys the liberty wherewith Christ doth make us free, must first feel the galling bondage of sin. Our wrists must be made to smart by the fetters of our iniquity, and our backs must be made to bleed by the lash of the law-the taskmaster which drives us to Jesus Christ. There is no true liberty which is not preceded by true bondage; there is no true deliverance from sin, unless we have first of all groaned and cried unto God, as did the people of Israel when in bondage in Egypt. We must all serve in the brick-kiln; we must all be wearied with toiling among the pots; or otherwise we could never realize that glorious verse-“Though ye have lien among the pots, yet shall ye be as the wings of a dove covered with silver, and her feathers with yellow gold.” We must have bondage before liberty; before resurrection there must come death; before life there must come corruption; before we are brought out of the horrible pit and the miry clay we must be made to exclaim, “I sink in deep mire, where there is no standing;” and ere, like Jonah, we can be fetched out of the whale’s belly, and delivered from our sin, we must have been taken down to the bottoms of the mountains, with the weeds wrapped about our heads, shuddering under a deep sense of our own nothingness and fearing that the earth with her bars was about us for ever. Taking this as key, you will see that the deliverance out of Egypt is a beautiful picture of the deliverance of all God’s people from the bondage of the law and the slavery of their sins.~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/0055.cfm

God Loveth Crying-Out Prayers

Sherry Attributes of God, Christian Life, prayer, promises, salvation, The Holy Spirit 4 Comments

Arise, cry out in the night…-Lamentations 2:19

Trust in Him at all times; ye people, pour out your heart before Him: God is a refuge for us. Selah. -Psalm 62:8

God loves earnest prayers. He loves impetuous prayers-vehement prayers. Let a man preach if he dare coldly and slowly, but never let him pray so. God loveth crying-out prayers. There is a poor fellow who says-“I don’t know how to pray. Why, sir,” he says, “I could not put six or seven words together in English grammar.” Tush upon English grammar! God does not care for that, so long as you pour out your heart. That is enough. Cry out before Him…When you go to mercy’s gate, let me give you a little advice. Do not go and give a gentle tap, like a lady; do not give a single knock, like a beggar; but take the knocker and wrap hard, till the very door seems to shake. Rap with all your might! and recollect that God loveth those who knock hard at mercy’s gate. “Knock, and it shall be opened unto you.”

Just hear how the Psalmist has it: “pour out your hearts before Him.” Not “pour out your fine words,” not “pour out your beautiful periods,” but “pour out your hearts.”… Pour out your heart like water; pour it out by confessing all your sins; pour it out by begging the Lord to have mercy upon you for Christ’s sake; pour it out like water. And when it is all poured out, He will come and fill it again with “wines on the lees, well refined.”

Thus do I speak to all who will acknowledge themselves to be sinners in the sight of God, but even these must have the assistance of the Holy Spirit to enable them to cry out. O my Lord, grant it. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/0059.cfm