The Sieve and its Effects

Next Part The Sieve and its Effects 2

"And the Lord said, Simon, Simon, Satan has desired to have you, that he may SIFT you as wheat. But I have prayed for you, that your faith fail not—and when you are converted, strengthen your brethren." Luke 22:31-32

God's ways are not our ways; neither are his thoughts our thoughts. This is applicable to a variety of things. In fact, there is scarcely a single circumstance connected with the things of God to which these words do not apply. But there are two special instances to which, according to my mind, they apply particularly. One of these respects the growth in grace of the child of God; the other, the necessary qualifications for a minister of Christ.

If we were asked, (supposing that we were ignorant of the way, and that we had the educating of a Christian), what was most conducive to a growth in grace, and how we should set about it, perhaps some such scheme as this might occur to our mind. Place him in the country, in a quiet and retired spot, where he would have no business nor worldly anxieties to distract his mind; there let him read his Bible, be surrounded by religious friends, fix certain hours to meditate, watch, and pray. Such might be a faint sketch of what we would consider the right mode of educating a Christian in the things of God. This scheme has been acted upon. By it men have been driven into the cave of the hermit; monasteries and convents have been formed upon this plan; and instead of being the abodes of religion, they have eventually proved little else but dens of wickedness.

But suppose we were also called upon (I still presume we are ignorant of God's mode) to fit and educate a minister for the work of the ministry. We might propound some such scheme as this. Give him a good education; instruct him in the original languages; furnish him with a well-selected theological library; place him in a circle of brother ministers; let him spend his time in reading, meditation, watching, and prayer. Upon this scheme men have endowed Universities. Colleges, academies, and institutions of various kinds have sprung up on this system. And what is the result? Instead of nurturing servants for God, they have ended in bringing up servants for Satan. This is man's way. And we see the result; that instead of conducing to the growth of grace in a private Christian; instead of fitting a minister for the service of God, all ends in confusion, and a departing from the right ways of the Lord.

I have thus simply sketched out man's ways and man's thoughts. Let us now come to the fountainhead of all truth and all wisdom, and see whether God's ways do not differ from the ways of man, and the thoughts that dwell in the heart of the Creator from the thoughts that lodge in the bosom of the creature.

What those ways and what those thoughts are, I shall endeavor this evening to lay before you from the words of the text. "And the Lord said, Simon, Simon, Satan has desired to have you, that he may sift you as wheat; but I have prayed for you that your faith fail not; and when you are converted, strengthen your brethren."

We may observe three leading features in the words before us.

First, the sieve; "Satan has desired to have you that he may sift you as wheat."

Secondly, what it is that fails not in the sieve; "I have prayed for you that your faith fail not."

Thirdly, the benefits and blessings that spring out of the sieve; "When you are converted, strengthen your brethren."

I. The sieve– "Satan has desired to have you that he may sift you as wheat." The Lord was approaching the close of his sojourn upon earth; he was drawing near the solemn hour when he was about to be baptized with the baptism of suffering and blood. And it seems that Satan took this opportunity to see whether by his infernal arts he could not draw away his disciples. He was not ignorant that the Lord Jesus Christ was the Son of God, nor what he came upon earth to do. He knew that he came to build up a church against which the gates of hell should not prevail. But if he could succeed in drawing aside into temptation, or into perdition, any of the Lord's disciples, what a victory he would obtain! He, therefore, seems to have reserved his great strength for the last hour, and to have looked with a watchful eye upon every one of the Lord's followers. There is an expression in (Job 1:8), which, I think, throws great light upon the way in which Satan marks out his prey. The Lord said to him, "Have you considered my servant Job?" Now, if we look at the margin, we find it runs, "Have you set your heart on my servant Job?" The Lord saw that he had set his heart upon Job; not a heart of love, but a heart of enmity; that he was like a butcher fixing his eye upon a lamb, and saying, 'Here is one for my knife!' or like a wolf surrounding a flock of sheep, and singling out the fattest for his greedy throat. Therefore, God said to him, "Have you set your heart on my servant Job?" 'What! must he be your prey? Will nothing satisfy you but to glut your malice upon him?' But what was the reply of the adversary of God and man? "Have you not set a hedge about him?" He did not deny that his heart was set upon Job; that he longed to imbrue his hands in his heart's blood; but he complains that God had set a hedge round about him; that there was a fence through which he would, but could not break. Thus, though he could look over the hedge, the prey was safe from his infernal malice until God took the hedge away.

But the Lord did twice take the outer hedge away, and twice reserve the inner, saying, at last, "Behold, he is in your hand; but save his life." The Lord kept that; the rest he gave to Satan. And thus, when the outer hedge was taken away, we find Satan bursting in upon him, first stripping away his property and his family, then afflicting is body, and doing everything but what he was not allowed to do—to touch his life.

So it seems to me in these last days of the Lord's sojourn upon earth, this wolf was surrounding the pen in which the Lord had placed his sheep, setting his heart upon one and another, and desiring to glut upon them his infernal throat. And God permitted him in one instance; he allowed him not only to set his heart upon one, but to gratify his infernal malice upon Judas, the son of perdition, who not being kept by the mighty power of God, was allowed to fall into Satan's hands, and to be destroyed body and soul forever.

The Lord comprehends in our text all his disciples. It is a mistake to think it is only applicable to Peter. The words run thus—"Simon, Simon, Satan has desired to have you; not only you; (it is in the plural in the original;) "to have all of you that he may sift you as wheat." What follows is special—"but I have prayed for you that your faith fail not; that is you, Simon. As though Satan viewed them all, and longed to sift all in his sieve. And so he did to a certain extent. But there was one in particular. It is almost as though Satan spoke thus—'I have picked off one of the lieutenants; let me see if I cannot shoot down the colonel. I have got Judas; I will have Peter next.' And so he would, if the Lord had not prayed for him, and strengthened his faith. Judas he might have; he was one of his own. Peter he might not have; he was one of the Lord's. Encouraged by the fall of Judas, he was determined to have Peter next. But how the Lord overruled it all, and made it a blessing to Peter, and the rest of the disciples!

And this shows us that all must have the sieve. All professors—all that call themselves by the name of the Lord, and all that call upon the name of the Lord—all must be put into the sieve; and thus be proved who are God's and who are not.

But what is a sieve? First, let us view the figure literally and naturally; for unless we understand the figure literally, we cannot expect to understand its spiritual signification. What is the object of the sieve? It is to separate the grain upon the barn-floor, mingled as it is with dust and chaff, small seeds, and rubbish. It must be separated from all these before it is fit to make bread. And what is that instrument used for this purpose? A sieve. This is the leading idea represented. The sieve is shaken backwards and forwards to separate the sound grain from the unsound; dust and small seeds thereby drop through the meshes of the sieve, while the good grain remains behind. This agrees with the words of the Prophet, "Lo, I will command, and I will sift the house of Israel among all nations, like as grain is sifted in a sieve, yet shall not the least grain fall upon the earth." (Amos 9:9.)

Now to apply it, let us see its spiritual interpretation. It signifies, then, being put into those circumstances whereby our profession is tried to the utmost. Whatever it be whereby our profession is tried, our religion sifted, and the dust and dirt separated from it; whatever it be, whereby that process is performed, it may be called a sieve. And I would say, there are for the most part four sieves employed. There may be others; but there are four especially which occur to my mind—wherein professors of religion, and all who call themselves by the name of the Lord, are to be tried, sifted, and proved, whether they are the Lord's or not.

1. First, there is the sieve of PROSPERITY. The effects of this we read in the 73rd Psalm, and in the 21st chapter of Job, where we find the fruits of professors being in prosperous circumstances. This sieve we find also hinted at in the first epistle to Timothy, where the Apostle says, "The love of money is the root of all evil, which, while some coveted after, they have erred from the faith, and pierced themselves through with many sorrows (1 Tim. 6:10.) Who that has eyes to see, has not seen this plainly again and again? There shall be a member of a church, and he shall be, while in poor circumstances, a humble, contrite, broken-hearted character; his conversation shall be savory, sweet, and profitable; he shall be watching the hand of God in providence, and receiving many marks of God's favor, mercy, and love. But he shall have money left to him, business shall prosper, or he shall marry a rich wife. And what is the effect? He becomes lean, barren, dead, and unprofitable; and instead of his conversation being as before, savory and sweet, and upon the things of God, the world and the things of it seem to eat up every green thing in his soul. By this sieve God also sifts out professors, and often manifests whether there be the true life of God in the soul or not.

2. But again. There is the sieve of ADVERSITY. And the sieve of adversity tries some who have not been tried in the sieve of prosperity. Poverty, depressed circumstances, losses in business, a sinking trade, anxieties in the family, and sickness of the body, form a part of this sieve; and a very trying one it is.

3. Another sieve is the sieve of SOUL TRIBULATION. Exercises concerning our state before God; painful discoveries of the evils of our heart; the workings up of the unbelief and infidelity, rebellion, blasphemy, and obscenity of our depraved nature; no light upon our path, no sweet answers to prayer, no manifestations of mercy and love, no appearances of God to our heart; groans and cries, sighs and tears, exercises, burdens, afflictions, and sorrows—in this sieve how many of God's people are tried to the uttermost!

4. The fourth and last sieve I shall speak of, is the sieve of TEMPTATION; such as Peter was placed in, and such as all the people of God are more or less put into. For Satan desires to sift all as wheat; and there is not a child of God, nor a professor either, whom Satan does not desire, more or less, to sift with the sieve of temptation. Now of these temptations, some are very suitable and pleasing to our flesh, and some are very dreadful, cutting, piercing, and wounding to our spirit. For instance; look at the way in which Satan sifted the saints of old. Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, by the fear of man; and Aaron by the same temptation. Look how he sifted in his sieve Noah by strong drink; Rachel by envy and jealousy; David by lust; Hezekiah by pride; Asaph by fretfulness; Solomon by idolatry; and Moses by impatience. Look through the records of old, and see whether we can find a saint in God's word who has not been in some way or other sifted in the sieve of temptation.

But, besides those suitable and alluring to the flesh—besides the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eye, and the pride of life—besides ease, covetousness, worldly-mindedness, and a thousand alluring besetments, there are other temptations whereby Satan is allowed to sift the people of God. Temptations as to his very being; temptations as to the deity of the Lord Jesus Christ; temptations as to the inspiration of the Scriptures—temptations as to the efficacy of the blood of the Lamb; temptations as to whether God hears and answers prayer; whether we have a soul, or our souls exist after death; temptations about heaven and temptations to blaspheme, to give up all religion, and plunge headlong into the world; temptations to curse God and die; temptations to murmur, fret and repine under every painful dispensation; temptations to pray no more because God does not manifestly send an answer to prayer.

Who that knows anything of the things of God, or of his own heart, does not know what it is to be in one or other of these four sieves; sometimes elated by prosperity; sometimes depressed by adversity; sometimes exercised by tribulation; sometimes shaken backwards and forwards in the sieve of temptation?

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