Unpurchasable Love 2

II. My second remark is, that, IN OUR CASE, NOTHING CAN EVER SERVE

AS A SUBSTITUTE FOR LOVE.

If Christ has loved us, or if we are desirous of realizing that he has done so, 'the one thing needful and essential is that we have true love to him'. God's demand of each one who professes to be his child is, "My son, give me your heart." There are many who would like to be thought to be his sons, and therefore every morning they wickedly say, "Our Father which are in heaven," though God is not their Father. If they were to say, "Our father," to him who is their father, they would pray to the devil, for God is no father of theirs. Alas! there are many who want to be thought to be God's children and they will come and bring to him anything but love. Sad, sorrowful truth!

If God would but say to men, "I will accept unspiritual service," he might be the God of the whole earth at once; or rather, let me more truly say that he would be the demon of the whole earth, for men do not care what the religion is externally so long as it does not trouble their hearts. The last thing some people will do is to think. "Give you a guinea? Oh, certainly- Excellent is the charity for which you are pleading. A guinea for the hospital? Certainly. Five guineas for a new place of worship? Certainly.

When I have money, I am always glad to give it; but don't you come and bother me with any of your doctrines, for I don't want to hear about them.You religious people are so divided into sects and parties, and you are always controverting and contradicting one another, so I do not want to think about these things." That is a very poor excuse, is it not? Because this seems to be a matter which requires a great deal of thought, therefore this person will not give it any consideration at all; and because those who do think about it do not exactly agree on all points, therefore this man says, "I shall not think of it at all." Because all the charts of an intricate portion of the ocean may not happen to be exactly alike, therefore this man will not even study that part of the sea over which his own vessel must go,although there all the charts do agree! He makes an excuse upon some trivial matter to neglect altogether the steering of his vessel.

He will strike upon a rock one day, and he will have no one to blame for it but himself. "Oh!" says another person, "I don't mind saying prayers; or I will go to church and listen to the reading of prayers. I don't mind hearing sermons, but don't come and tell me that I have to repent of my sins. I cannot do it; I do not understand what you mean. I join in 'the General Confession' every Sunday; I say that I am a miserable sinner though I don't know that I am particularly miserable, and I don't know that I am particularly a sinner either; but still, I always say that, and I don't mind saying it. Yet if you come to me, saying, 'Repent,' I cannot do that."

Men will offer to God anything but that which has to do with the heart. You may call upon them to torment their bodies, as the priests of false religions have done; and they will not object to that. The fakir in Hindustan will pierce himself with knives, or lie upon a bed of spikes, or swing himself up by a hook in his back, and hang there by the hour together in all but mortal agony. A man will do almost anything except bow his heart before his God; he will not confess that Jehovah is Lord of all, and that he himself is a poor sinful creature who deserves to be punished; he will not obey a law that is spiritual, and demands the allegiance of the secret thoughts and intents of his heart; and he will not accept a faith which is so superlatively pure that it demands that sin be given up, and tells him that even when given up it must be washed out in the precious blood of Jesus, and that a man must exercise repentance towards God and faith in the Savior or he cannot be saved.

The most unpopular truth in the world is this sentence which fell from the lips of Christ, "You must be born again" and, consequently, there are all sorts of inventions to get the truth out of those words. "Oh, yes!" say some, "you must be born again, but that means the application of aqueous fluid to an infant's brow." As God is true, that teaching is a lie; there is no grain or shade of truth within it. "Except a man be born again" (from above), "he cannot see the kingdom of God." No operation that can be performed by man can ever regenerate the soul; it is the work alone of God the Holy Spirit, who creates us anew in Christ Jesus.

Men do not like that truth; the spiritual still displeases the natural man. They will profess to worship God in Jerusalem or at Gerizim, and fight about the place where he ought to be worshipped, to show how little good their religion has done them! They will not speak to each other, the Jew will have no dealings with the Samaritan, to prove how unlike he is to the God who makes his sun to shine both on the just and on the unjust! But when you utter this message, "God is a Spirit, and those who worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth," they are offended, and turn away.

Still the truth holds good, whatever men think of it. If you give not to God your heart, you have given him nothing. If you give not to God your soul, if you love him not, if you serve him not because you love him, if you come not to him, and surrender to him your inner self, you may have been baptised-- immersed or sprinkled-- you may have come to the communion table, you may have bowed your knees until your knees have grown horny, you may have prayed until you are hoarse, and wept until the fountains of your eyes are dry, you may have given all your gold, and lacerated every member of your body with mortifications, and starved yourself to a skeleton, but you have truly done nothing towards obtaining love to Christ. The substance of your house is utterly scorned if you offer it to the Lord in the stead of the love of your heart. Love he must have; this is his lawful demand. His people delight to render it; and if you do not, then you are none of his.

III. This takes us to a third truth, which is, that THE SAINTS' LOVE IS NOT

PURCHASED BY CHRIST'S GIFTS.

The love of saints to their Lord is not given to Christ because of his gifts to them; I must explain what I mean, lest at the very outset I am mistaken or misunderstood. We love our Lord, and we love him all the more because of the many gifts he bestows upon us; but 'his gifts do not win our love'. I will show you why. All that he has given me today, he gave me many years ago. The covenant of grace was always mine. I heard the preacher tell about it. He told how Christ had died for me; that he had loved me, and given himself for me. Truly, he had done so; he had poured out his blood for my redemption.

I would not believe it to be so, or, believing it, I did not think it was of any consequence to me. Then the preacher spread out the rare gifts of Christ before me, and I saw that he had given these to such as believed in him; but I did not think them worth examining, and I turned away from them. I should never have loved him if he had not given me much more than the substance of his house. I needed his blessed Spirit to show me the value of the substance of his house, and above all, to show me that for which this day I love my Savior best of all, namely, himself, HIMSELF.

Oh, it is "Jesus Christ himself" who wins the love of our hearts! If he had not given us himself, we should never have given to him ourselves. All else that may be supposed to be of the substance of his house would not have won his people's hearts, until at last they learned this truth, and the Spirit of God made them feel the force of it, "He loved me, and gave himself for me." "My Beloved is mine, and I am his," is now one of the sweetest stanzas in love's canticle. The spouse does not say, "His crown is mine, his throne is mine, his breastplate is mine, his crook is mine;" she delights in everything that Christ has as a King, and a Priest, and a Shepherd; but, above all else, that which wins and charms her heart is this, "He himself is mine, and I am his."

But I meant mainly to say, under this head, that 'there are some of Christ's gifts that do not win our hearts', that is to say, our hearts do not depend upon them. And they are, first, his temporal gifts. I am very thankful, and I trust that all God's people are also, for health and strength. I have lost these sometimes, but I did not love my Lord any the less then; neither do I love Christ this day because I am free from pain. If I were not free from pain, I would still love him. Christ has given to some of you a competence, you have all you want for this world; but is that why you love Christ? Oh, no, beloved! if he were to take all away, I know that you would love him in your poverty.

The devil was a liar when he said of Job, "Does Job fear God for nothing? Have not you made a hedge about him, and about his house, and about all that he has on every side? You have blessed the work of his hands, and his substance is increased in the land. But put forth your hand now, and touch all that he has, and he will curse you to your face." We do not love God altogether for what he gives us in this world; ours is not such poor cupboard-love as that. We love him because he first loved us, and we do not pretend to have climbed to that high state of disinterested love in which there is no gratitude mingled with it. We always must be grateful to him, and love him for that reason; but still, temporal things never win our heart's love to God.

There are numbers of you who have health, and wealth, and many other things that so many desire, but they never make you love God, and they never will. You love them, and make idols of them very readily, but they do not lead you to love the Lord; while the children of God, who love their dear Savior, can tell you that they do not love him because of what he gives them, for if he takes from them, they love him all the same. With Job, they say, "The Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord." They do not love him simply because he caresses them, for if he chastens them, they love him still, and kiss the rod with which he smites them. I meant also to say that 'we do not love Christ because of his temporary indulgence of us in spiritual things'. You know, beloved, our Savior very frequently favors us with manifestations of his presence.

We are overjoyed when he comes very near to us, and permits us to put our fingers into the prints of the nails. We have our high days and festivals when the Bridegroom is with us, emphatically with us. He takes all the clouds out of our sky, and gives us the bright shining of the sun; or he opens the lattices, and shows us himself in a way only second to that in which we shall see him when we behold him face to face. And oh, how we love him then! But, thank God, when he draws the lattice back again, and hides his face, we do not leave off loving him because of that. Our love to our Lord does not depend upon the weather. True, our love is not manifested to him so sweetly when we are in the dark as when he cheers us with his smile, but still it is there all the while. We could not let him go. "Though he slay me," -though HE slay me-- he who loves me, though he turn to be my enemy, and slay me-- "yet will I trust in him."

We will hold to him still, and love him still, not because of the substance of his house, but because of what he himself is. There are times when we are half inclined to say with the elder brother, "These many years have I been with you, privileged to serve you, and yet you have not given me so much as a kid that I might make merry with my friends." Perhaps we have been long without the light of his countenance, and have had no love-tokens from him; but for all that we will remain in his service, and abide in his house; and even if our Father should answer us roughly, we will tell him that he is our Father still. We do not love him merely for the substance of his house, but for himself, and because his Spirit has made love to him to be an instinct of our new nature, and has put within us such a principle that we cannot help loving him. Even if we should be called to pass through terrible trials and adversities, and should have to walk a long time in clouds and darkness, yet still would we love him and rejoice in him.

IV. The last observation I shall have to make upon our text is this, THE LOVE OF SAINTS CANNOT BE BOUGHT OFF FROM CHRIST AT ANY PRICE.

The love of some people to religion is very cheaply bought, and very speedily sold. It is very lamentable to notice the great numbers of people who are quite content to go and worship God with Christian brethren, and to hear the gospel preached, while they are themselves poor, or in middling circumstances, but who find, as soon as they have accumulated a little wealth, that the world has a church of its own, and they must go there, "because, you see, everybody goes there; and if you are cut off from Society, where are you?"

I have been asked that question, sometimes, and I have replied, "Where are you? Why, where Christ would have you to be-- outside the camp, bearing his reproach.'" But that place of separation, "outside the camp," is a position which is not always taken up cheerfully by professedly Christian people. It is very sorrowful to see how, because God has entrusted them with wealth, they get drawn away from the gospel,and from the Church of God; and though they are troubled a little at first, they soon get rid of one scruple after another, and subside altogether into worldliness.

Well, now, I am not altogether sorry that there is this test in the world. Every good husband man keeps a winnowing fan; of course, he that is foolish, when he sees a great heap lying on the barn door, says, "All this is my wheat that I have brought in." He does not want to have it diminished, for it is the result of his labor; -but if he is a wise husband man, he says, "Though I have brought in a great heap, I know that there is chaff with it," and he is glad to have the winnowing fan used, and the corn tossed up that the fresh breeze may blow through it. If the mere professors go, let them go. "They went out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would no doubt have continued with us."

There are some who go away from Christ's people, and renounce religion and love to Christ, because of business. It will pay better in certain lines not to be religious; and therefore, as the main thing with them is to get money-- religiously, if they can, but irreligiously, if need be-- therefore, by-and-by they are offended, and they sell Christ Jesus. I am pained to see the numbers of people who go and live in the suburbs of London, and who make that an opportunity for selling their religion, such as it is. It is not long ago that I stood at a dying bed, and a part of what I heard there was, "O sir, ten years ago, we used to be members of such a church; we came to live out here, but there was no place of worship handy, so we have not been anywhere." That person was dying without hope, after selling Christ for love of a little country air. That was about all it was, and little more was to be gained by it.

"Oh, but!" asks someone, "do saints sell Christ like that?" No, not they; these are only the 'professors' who have mingled with the saints. These are like the 'mixed multitude' that came out of Egypt with the children of Israel; howbeit they are not all Israel that are of Israel. The saints sell Christ? No, they are too much like their Master to do that. You recollect how Satan took their Master to the top of a high mountain, and showed him all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them, and said, "All these things will I give you, if you will fall down and worship me." Wicked thief! It was not his to give; yet he tempted Christ in that way, but Jesus answered, "Get you hence, Satan: for it is written, You shall worship the Lord your God, and him only shall you serve."

If any of Christ's followers are tempted in the same fashion, let them give the same reply. All the substance of the devil's house could not win the love of that man who has set his affection on Jesus. "Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?" The cruel Romanists have taken the martyrs into the lone dungeon of the Inquisition, and tormented them there in such a way that it pains us even to read or hear of what they suffered. But did they give up Christ? No, not they; they never would. At other times, they have taken the Christians into a palace, and said, "We will clothe you in scarlet and fine linen; you shall fare sumptuously every day; but you must give up Christ." Yet they would not.

All the substance of this world has been laid at the feet of holy men, and they have rejected the price with scorn. I know men today, and rejoice to know them, who have sacrificed honor and position among men, who have borne abuse and scorn, and have been glad to bear it, and counted it their privilege that they were not only permitted to have Christ as their Savior, but also that they were allowed to suffer for his sake. O brethren and sisters, may the Lord so clothe us with the whole armor of righteousness that no temptation may ever be able to wound our love to Jesus! Let us feel, "We can let all else go, but we can never let him go."

"If on my face for his dear name, Shame and reproaches be," there let them be for his sake. Give me but a vision of the Crucified, let me see that thorn-crowned brow, let me but gaze into his dear languid eyes so full of love for me, and I will then say, "My Master, through floods or flames, if you shall lead, I'll follow where you go. When the many turn aside, I will still cling to you, and witness that you have the living Word, and that there is none upon earth that I desire beside you. I will give up the treasures of Egypt, for I have respect unto the recompense of the reward.

I will let the ingots of gold go, every one of them, I will cast them into the sea without regret; but if you will abide in the vessel, my soul shall be content. Bind me to your altar, for I am but flesh and blood, and may start aside in the trial-hour. Cast the links of your love about me; chain me to yourself; ay, crucify me; nail me to your cross, and let me be dead to the world, for then the world will leave off tempting a corpse. Let me be dead with you, for then the world, that cast you out, may cast me out, too, and have done with me; and it were well then to be counted as the off scouring of all things for your dear sake, my Lord!" If a man should give all the substance of his house to bribe the saints to sell their Lord, it would utterly be scorned. By this test shall we prove you, O professors! By this trial shall it be known whether you can stand firm in the evil day. God grant that you may, for our Lord Jesus Christ's sake! Amen.

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