THE PLEA IS ITSELF EVIDENCE AGAINST THE PLEADER.
III. THE PLEA IS ITSELF EVIDENCE AGAINST THE PLEADER.
There is an unregenerated man here, who says, "Am I blind also?" I answer in the words of Jesus, "But now you say we see, therefore your sin remains." You have proved by your plea, in the first place, that you have never been enlightened of the Holy Spirit — but that you remain in a state of ignorance. A deaf man may declare that there is no such thing as music. A man who has never seen the stars, is very likely to say that there are no stars. But what does he prove? Does he prove that there are no stars? He only proves his own folly and his own ignorance.
That man who can say half a word about his own righteousness has never been enlightened of God the Holy Spirit; for one of the first signs of a renewed heart is, that it abhors itself in dust and ashes. If you do today feel yourself to be guilty, and lost, and ruined, there is the richest hope for you in the gospel; but if you say, "I am good, I have merits," the law condemns you, and the gospel cannot comfort you; you are in the gall of bitterness and in the bonds of iniquity, and you are ignorant that all the while you are talking thus, the wrath of God abides on you. A man may be a true Christian, and may fall into sin — but a man cannot be a true Christian and boast in his self-righteousness.
A man may be saved, though infirmity may bespatter him with much mire; but he cannot be saved who does not know that he has been in the filth, and is not willing to confess that he is guilty before God. There are, in one sense, no conditions of salvation on our part, for whatever may be conditions God gives; but thus I know, there never was a man yet who was in a state of grace who did not know himself, in himself, to be in a state of ruin, a state of depravity and condemnation. If you do not know this, then I say your plea of self-righteousness condemns you for ignorance.
But then again, inasmuch as you say that you are not guilty, this proves that you are impenitent. Now the impenitent can never come where God is. "If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins;" "but if we say that we have no sins, we make God a liar, and the truth is not in us." God will pardon all men who confess their iniquity. If we weep and lament, and take with us words, and say, "We have grievously sinned, forgive us — we have greatly erred, have mercy upon us, through Jesus Christ," God will not refuse the cry; but if we, out of our impenitent and hard hearts, put ourselves upon God's justice, God will give us justice — but not mercy, and that justice shall be the meting out to us of the full vials of his indignation, and of his wrath forever and ever. He who is self-righteous is impenitent, and therefore he is not, and cannot be saved.
Further than this, the self-righteous man, the moment that he says he has done anything which can recommend him to God, proves that he is not a believer. Now, salvation is for believers, and for believers only. "He who believes and is baptized shall be saved; he who believes not shall be damned." Sir, you will be damned with all your self-righteousness, and your self-righteousness shall be like Dejanira's tunic, which she gave to Hercules, and which he put upon him, and, as the old fable has it, it became a robe of fire to him; he tried to drag it away — but he pulled away pieces of his living, quivering flesh each moment, and perished miserably. Such shall your self-righteousness be to you.
It seems a pleasant draught, and intoxicates for the moment; it is deadly and damnable as the venom of asps, and as the wine of Gomorrah. O soul! would that you would flee, above all things, from self-righteousness; for a self-righteous man does not and cannot trust Christ, and therefore he cannot see the face of God. None but the naked man will ever go to Christ for clothing; none but the hungry men will ever take Christ to be his food; none but thirsty souls will ever come to this well of Bethlehem to drink. The thirsty are welcome; but those who think they are good, are welcome neither to Sinai nor to Calvary. They have no hope of Heaven, no peace in this world, nor in that which is to come.
Ah! soul, I know not who you are; but if you have any righteousness of your own, you are a graceless soul. If you have given all your goods to feed the poor; if you have built many and many a sanctuary; if you have gone about with self-denial among the houses of poverty to visit the sons and daughters of affliction; if you have fasted thrice in the week; if your prayers have been so long that your throat has become hoarse through your crying; if your tears have been so many that your eyes have become blinded through your weeping; if your readings of Scripture have been so long that the midnight oil has been consumed in abundance — if, I say, your heart has been so tender towards the poor and the sick and the needy that you would have been willing to suffer with them, to bear all their loathsome diseases, nay, if adding all this you could give your body to be burned, yet if you trusted in any one of these things your damnation would be as sure as though you were thief or drunkard. Understand me, I mean what I say. I want you not to think I speak unguardedly now. Christ said of the Pharisees of old the very thing that I have said of you.
They were good and excellent in their way; but, said he, the publicans and harlots enter the kingdom of God before you, because they would go the wrong way, while the poor publicans and harlots were led to go the right way. The Pharisee who went about to make a righteousness of his own, did not submit to the righteousness of Christ; the publican and the harlot, knowing that they had nothing whereof to glory, came to Christ and took him as he was, and gave their souls up to be saved by his grace. Oh! that we may do the same; for until we get rid of self-righteousness we are in a state of condemnation, and dying, the sentence must be executed upon us forever and ever.
Next part I close now upon the last point