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Salvation is the work of God. It is he alone
who quickens the soul
"dead in trespasses and sins," and it is he also who
maintains the soul in its spiritual life. He is both
"Alpha and Omega."
"Salvation is of the Lord." If I am prayerful, God makes me prayerful; if I
have graces, they are God's gifts to me; if I hold on in a consistent life,
it is because he upholds me with his hand. I do nothing whatever towards my
own preservation, except what God himself first does in me. Whatever I have,
all my goodness is of the Lord alone. Wherein I sin, that is my own; but
wherein I act rightly, that is of God, wholly and completely. If I have
repulsed a spiritual enemy, the Lord's strength nerved my arm. Do I live
before men a consecrated life? It is not I, but Christ who liveth in me. Am
I sanctified? I did not cleanse myself: God's Holy Spirit sanctifies me. Am
I weaned from the world? I am weaned by God's
chastisements sanctified to my good. Do I grow in knowledge? The great
Instructor teaches me. All my jewels were fashioned by heavenly art. I find
in God all that I want; but I find in myself nothing but sin and misery.
"He
only is my rock and my salvation." Do I feed on the Word? That Word would be
no food for me unless the Lord made it food for my soul, and helped me to
feed upon it. Do I live on the manna which comes down from heaven? What is
that manna but Jesus Christ himself incarnate, whose body and whose blood I
eat and drink? Am I continually receiving fresh increase of strength? Where
do I gather my might? My help cometh from heaven's hills: without Jesus I
can do nothing. As a branch cannot bring forth fruit except it abide in the
vine, no more can I, except I abide in him. What Jonah learned in the great
deep, let me learn this morning in my closet: "Salvation is of the Lord." |
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Strange enough this regulation appears, yet
there was wisdom in it, for the throwing out of the disease proved that the
constitution was sound. This evening it may be well for us to see the
typical teaching of so singular a rule. We, too, are lepers, and may read
the law of the leper as applicable to ourselves. When a man sees himself to
be altogether lost and ruined, covered all over with the defilement of sin,
and in no part free from pollution; when he disclaims all righteousness of
his own, and pleads guilty before the Lord, then he is clean through the
blood of Jesus, and the grace of God. Hidden, unfelt, unconfessed iniquity
is the true leprosy; but when sin is seen and felt, it has received its
deathblow, and the Lord looks with eyes of mercy upon the soul afflicted
with it. Nothing is more deadly than self-righteousness, or more hopeful
than contrition. We must confess that we are "nothing else but sin," for no
confession short of this will be the whole truth; and if the Holy Spirit be
at work with us, convincing us of sin, there will be no difficulty about
making such an acknowledgment — it will spring spontaneously from our
lips. What comfort does the text afford to truly awakened sinners: the very
circumstance which so grievously discouraged them is here turned into a sign
and symptom of a hopeful state! Stripping comes before clothing; digging out
the foundation is the first thing in building — and a thorough sense of sin
is one of the earliest works of grace in the heart. O thou poor leprous
sinner, utterly destitute of a sound spot, take heart from the text, and
come as thou art to Jesus —
For
let our debts be what they may, however great or small,
As soon as we
have nought to pay, our Lord forgives us all.
'Tis perfect
poverty alone that sets the soul at large:
While we can
call one mite our own, we have no full discharge. |
