repentance

Let the Lord Do His Work in His Own Way

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

… I will pardon all their iniquities … – Jeremiah 33:8

A great many persons are guilty of thinking the Spirit of God to be straitened when they fancy that He must always work in one way. When I am seeing persons who come forward to confess their faith, I find they often begin by telling me how they were brought low under a sense of sin; and I like that old-fashioned way of conversion. But when I find one beginning by saying, “The Lord met me, and filled my heart with joy and gladness under a sense of pardon, almost before I had any sense of sin, and the sense of sin followed after,” I say to myself, “Let the Lord do His work in His own way.” I am not going to make a pattern, and lay them all on it, and say that they must all be just that length, or else be stretched out a bit, or be cut shorter. No; let the Lord save His own people in His own way; and if one is made to go down to the dark dungeon of law-work, and gets whipped till he has not a bit of whole skin in his soul, I hope that it will do him good. But if another is gently led to Christ, and does not know that there is a rod, but through love and kindness is led to rejoice in his Savior, I trust that he will remember it, and be glad all his days. Conversions are not run into moulds. You cannot get a gross of conversions like a gross of steel pens. Each living child is different from any other living child. A great painter never paints exactly the same picture twice. There is always a difference somewhere, be it ever so slight; and when there is a work for eternity done in a church, it is done in very varied ways. If we begin to tie the Lord down to one way of work, we shall make a great mistake.~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/2218.cfm

 

Look Upward!

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, Christian Life, promises, repentance, salvation, Sovereignty of God, The Holy Spirit 3 Comments

But Jesus beheld them, and said unto them, With men this is impossible; but with God all things are possible. – Matthew 19:26

I address some man, so far ungodly that he has no hope of salvation, yet still is anxious to be saved. Perhaps he says, “How can I ever become a Christian? How can I have a new heart and a right spirit?” Is the Spirit of the Lord straitened? Cannot He give you the tenderness you desire? Cannot He give you the desire that seems to be lacking? Cannot He give you faith in Christ, at this very moment? Cannot He breathe into you now that breath of spiritual life that shall make you a living soul, looking up to the cross, and finding life in the Crucified? I pray you, dear friend, if you are under a horrible sense of sin, if you think yourself the worst wretch that ever poisoned the air, if you feel unfit to live as well as unfit to die; yet believe that the Holy Ghost can renew you, and can turn the sinner into a saint, and make you to glorify God even now, this instant. If not, you limit the power of the Holy Ghost; and I come to you with this question, “Is the Spirit of the Lord straitened?” The case is desperate, if it were not for the divine hand; it is beyond all hope, if there were no God. There is no balm in Gilead; there is no physician there; if there had been, the health of the daughter of God’s people would long ago have been recovered. Where, then, is the balm? Look upward for it. Where is the physician? Look upward for Him. There is the Christ of God, “mighty to save,” and there is the living Father Himself, and there is the almighty Spirit. Oh, that you would no longer be filled with suspicions as to the power of God! for with God all things are possible. “Is anything too hard for the Lord?” Is the Lord’s arm waxed short? Trust thou that He can do all things, and do all things for thee whether thou art a saint or a sinner.~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/2218.cfm

Take Christ to Thyself

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, prayer, promises, repentance, salvation Leave a comment

And it shall come to pass, that whosoever shall call on the name of the Lord shall be saved. – Acts 2:21

Here is a text for you: “Whosoever shall call on the name of the Lord shall be saved.” Is not that a wonderful “whosoever”? “Whosoever shall call on the name of the Lord” in believing prayer, asking mercy, trusting Christ for mercy, “shall be saved.” “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved.” “He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life.” Most of you know these texts by heart; grip them as with hooks of steel. If you say that you are hungry, and I put a loaf of bread in front of you, will you sit and look at it all night? If I meet you in a week’s time, will you still complain that you are hungry, while there is the bread in front of you still untouched? You deserve to be hungry if that is the case, you deserve to be famished to death if, the bread being there, you will not have it. Take it, and eat it. “May I have it?” asks one. Thou art commanded to have it; this is not a matter that is left to thy option. “The times of this ignorance God winked at; but now commandeth all men everywhere to repent.” Our Lord Himself said, “Repent ye, and believe the gospel.” It is, therefore, a gospel command that thou shouldest repent and believe, and truly thou mayest obey a command given by the Lord Himself. There is no question about thy permission to obey it; then, obey it at once, and take Christ to thyself… Ye guiltiest of the guilty, you most condemned of all the condemned, for whom the hottest hell would be your due place, yet come away, and look to Christ, and you shall live, for none are too vile for Him to cleanse, none are too guilty for Him to pardon. Oh, that you would believe in Jesus while yet the gospel bell rings out, “mercy, mercy, mercy!”! God help you to do so, for the Lord Jesus Christ’s sake! Amen. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/2404.cfm

Convinced of Sin and Led to Repentance

Sherry Character of Jesus, Christian Life, promises, repentance, salvation 1 Comment

Repent ye: for the kingdom of heaven is at hand… and He will throughly purge His floor, and gather His wheat into the garner; but He will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire.- Matthew 3:2, 12

“Repent! Repent ! Repent!” was John’s continual cry. This awakened the consciences of his hearers concerning their sin. Preaching repentance meant, “You have sinned; change your mind in reference to that sin. You have sinned; quit the sin, mourn over it, ask forgiveness for it. Repent ye!” Whenever a man brings to the minds of others their sins, when he so does it that they begin to feel that they have sinned, then they are being prepared for the Lord, for no man will come to the Saviour unless he knows that he needs a Saviour; and no man will feel that he needs a Saviour until he feels that he is a sinner. Hence it is a real preparation of men for Christ to convince them of sin.

The preacher who would “make ready a people prepared for the Lord” must come out with his axe, and lay it to the root of the trees; he must be definite and distinct in indicating this sin and that sin, and crying to all men, “Repent of these sins. Give them up. Get clear from them. Be washed from them; or else, as God lives, when the Christ Himself comes, it will not be to save you, but to blow you away with His winnowing fan as the chaff is blown into the fire.”

This is “to make ready a people prepared for the Lord” by their being convinced of sin and led to repentance. Hence it is a real preparation of men for Christ to convince them of sin. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/2404.cfm

The Power to Precipitate Decision

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, repentance, salvation Leave a comment

And he shall go before Him in the spirit and power of Elias, to turn the hearts of the fathers to the children, and the disobedient to the wisdom of the just; to make ready a people prepared for the Lord. – Luke 1:17

In those days came John the Baptist, preaching in the wilderness of Judaea, And saying, Repent ye: for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. – Matthew 3:1, 2

John cried, “Repent ye: for the kingdom of heaven is at hand,” that is to say, he put a pressure of presentness upon the people. A brother, who is an eminent preacher, but who uses rather long words, was explaining to me the benefit of the preaching of Mr. Fullerton and Mr. Smith in his place of worship. He said, “I do not know exactly why these brethren were the means of the conversion of many in my place whom I had never reached, but I perceived that they had the power to precipitate decision.” It sounded rather strange, but when I thought it over a little while, I rather liked the expression, “the power to precipitate decision.” That is the power that leads men to make up their minds, and say “Yes,” or “No,” to feel that the decision has to be made at once, and that the putting off of it is impossible because it would be a kind of insanity. Now that is the meaning of what John said, “The kingdom of heaven is at hand! Repent ye! He is coming who wields the axe of divine Justice; bear fruit, or else be cut down. He is coming who uses the great winnowing fan; be the true wheat, or else be blown away.” He put the truth so pointedly, and so earnestly, that he did by that means make ready “a people prepared for the Lord.”~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/2404.cfm

God’s Workmanship

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, Christian Life, promises, repentance, salvation, Sovereignty of God, The Holy Spirit 1 Comment

…behold, all things are become new.- 2 Corinthians 5:17

In the creation of the old world God first gave light, and afterwards He created life-the life that crept, the life that walked, the life that dived, the life that flew in the midst of heaven. So hath He wrought in our hearts; He hath given us the life that creeps upon the ground in humiliation for sin; the life that walks in service, the life that swims in sacred waters of repentance, the life that flies on the wings of faith in the midst of heaven; and, as God separated the light from the darkness, and the dry land from the sea, so in the new creature He hath separated the old depravity from the new life. He hath given to us a holy and incorruptible life which is for ever separated from, and opposed to, the old natural death; and at last, when the old creation was all but finished, God brought forth man in His own image as the topstone. A like work He will do in us as His new creatures. Having given us light, and life, and order, He will renew in us the image of God. Yea, that image is in every man who is in Christ Jesus at this hour.

Dost thou know what it is to be under God’s hand, and to be wrought by God’s workmanship? Strangers to God must be strangers to heaven. Beloved, if you have no more religion than you have worked out in yourself, and no more grace than you have found in your nature, you have none at all. A supernatural work of the Holy Ghost must be wrought in every one of us, if we would see the face of God with acceptance… I pray God His truth may go right through and through your souls like refining fire, and may you not be satisfied unless a true new birth, the work of the living God, be really in your possession even now. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/0881.cfm

A Prayerless Soul is a Christless Soul

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, Christian Life, prayer, promises, repentance, salvation 1 Comment

…we pray you in Christ’s stead, be ye reconciled to God. – 2 Corinthians 5:20

Now, with all the solemnity that man can summon, let me say that a prayerless soul is a Christless soul. As the Lord liveth, you who never prayed are without God, without hope, and strangers from the commonwealth of Israel. You who never know what a groan is, or a falling tear, are destitute of vital godliness. Let me ask you, sirs, whether you have ever thought in what an awful state you are? You are far from God, and therefore God is angry with you; for “God is angry with the wicked every day.” O, sinner! Lift thine eyes and behold the frowning countenance of God, for he is angry with you. And I beseech you, as you love yourselves, just for one moment contemplate what will become of you, if living as you are, ye should at last die without prayer. Don’t think that one prayer on your deathbed will save you. Deathbed prayer is a deathbed farce generally, and passes for nothing; it is a coin that will not ring in heaven, but is stamped by hypocrisy, and made of base metal. Take heed sirs. Let me ask you, if you have never prayed, what will you do? It were a good thing for you, if death were an eternal sleep; but it is not. If you find yourself in hell, oh, the racks and pains! But I will not harrow up your feelings by attempting to describe them. May God grant you never may feel the torments of the lost…Let us go unto Him and say, “He shall heal our backslidings, He shall love us freely and forgive us graciously, for His Son’s name’s sake.” ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/0016.cfm