PEOPLE in general are very fond of news. Most people know more about their newspapers than their Bibles. They spend more of their precious time in reading the newspapers than the Bible. Hence it is that people are so ignorant of the Word of God. This is one of Satan’s devices to make people spend their precious time. My friends, heaven is a far-off country, but there is good news from it, which is “as cold water to a thirsty soul.”
The news is from the Lord, but the people of the world never hear the Lord speaking to them any more than the beasts of the field.
I intend, as the Lord may aid, to show :—
1. What the good news from heaven is.
2. In what it may be said that heaven is a far-off country.
3. How this good news from a far-off country is “as cold waters to a thirsty soul.”
The name of Jesus is so often sounded in our ears that it has become old, but there are some souls in this world that have found the name of Jesus good news. And those who do not find this will burn in hell as sure as the devils. It is this name that has brought any kind of comfort into the world. This world would only be a nursery for nursing souls for eternal burnings, unless for this name.
There are three Persons in the Godhead, and each Person has His particular work to do in the salvation of the soul, and one does not get the glory more than another. But whosoever keeps one of them out of his creed, that Person will keep you out of heaven.
To find out a Saviour in any other way than has been found (if that were possible), would not be an evidence of God’s love to sinners. It is far easier to believe that there is a God than a Saviour. In the works of nature, we know that there is a God. We may say that none but God Himself could reveal the Saviour to the soul, for it is written, “ye are dead and your life is hid with Christ in God.” There are very few that think of appearing before God, but “it is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.” The reason why Christ came into the world was to make reconciliation between God and man. There are many that can trifle with the name of God. The reason is because God is at a distance from them. God and man disputed. God became an enemy to man. Why? Because God hates sin. He cannot love Himself without hating sin. When Cain killed his brother, at that moment he was branded a murderer. Judas when he betrayed his Master, was written a traitor. You murderer, you Sabbath breaker, you harlot, the moment you commit those sins, of which you are guilty, you are written down before God as murderer, Sabbath-breaker, harlot. Oh, you whole-hearted sinners, the hardness of your hearts is seen in your very eyes.
“This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased,” was said before the world. What was the Saviour then? He was the Surety of His people. There was a purpose in the Father from eternity regarding sinners, and the same love was in the three Persons of the Godhead. Oh, poor sinners, you think if you will simply get the pardon of sin, you will get to heaven, but you will not. The soul must get new furniture. Oh, you are poor creatures indeed, that reject the Lord, and are content with a form of prayer.
I observe that heaven is literally a far-off country. We read in the Bible of these heavens. The heaven that we see is far-off. We might ascend this heaven and see another. We might ascend the second and see a third. Where God personally dwells with the angels and redeemed spirits is described in the Bible as the third heaven.
The moment that Adam gave his assent to the eating of the forbidden fruit, justice gave him over to the devil as a punishment for his sin, and when any unregenerate sinner commits sin, justice gives him over to the devil as a punishment. Nothing but the fruit of the Blood of the Lamb can bring him back. Man fell from the very perfection of holiness to the very perfection of wickedness.
Heaven is so far-off a country that man by his natural understanding cannot have the least conception of it. There is nothing so easy to the unregenerate man as thoughts of heaven. But when the poor sinner begins to seek after it, he feels it a far-off country. I have asked the drunkard, the swearer, the Sabbath-breaker, what will you do when you come to die? They answer, “Oh, the Lord is merciful, I hope to get to heaven.” Oh, the vile creatures, to think that God is at their command! But the poor creature that is brought to follow Him sees somewhat of His sovereignty. There are two experiences that will do a soul good when he comes to Jordan. The one is that he saw himself shut-out by the Law, and the other that he saw himself brought in by the Gospel.
When you come to die, your attendance on the means of grace will not be sufficient for you. But if you can put your finger on a passage of Scripture or an ordinance in which you had communion with God, although it was as small as a single thought, the Lord will not lose sight of His own work. We cannot blame God or the devils if we go to hell, but our own two hands. Hence, David says, “The sinner’s hands have made the cords wherewith themselves are bound.” There are many in hell who are saying, “If we knew that our actions would have brought us here, we would not have done them.” There are some who pray morning and evening, but they never miss God out of their hearts, and never mourn an absent God. There are other poor creatures who say, “Oh, if I were free of vain thoughts on the Sabbath, in praying and singing.” There are some poor souls crying, “I am lost,” but you are not lost, you are leaning on the arm of the Second Person of the glorious Godhead, and although you are lost you will be found. I was thinking upon that Scripture which says that “Jacob worshipped leaning on the top of his staff.” We do not read of Jacob’s having a staff until he was lame. And what made him lame? Wrestling with the angel of the covenant. He was leaning on his staff, and the staff was the promise. O, sinner, when you come to grapple with death, praying for pardon will not be enough, but the enjoyment of it. When the unregenerate sinner is grappling with death the devil and his angels are as thick about him as flies ready to get the beckon of God to take him to hell.
My friends there is nothing in glory, but the seed of it is in this world. O, sinner, if you were in the company of two or three of the Lord’s people who were speaking about the concerns of their eternal state, or reading a chapter of the Bible, you would be sitting on nettles! How would you feel in glory? You would rather be among the devils.
I debar, in the name of the Lord, from His Table those that have no concern about their eternal state. You may go, but you may be a child of hell seven times more than you were before. I debar in the name of the Lord, those that do not keep the worship of God in their families, morning and evening. I debar in the name of the Lord, parents who will allow their children to walk about on Sabbath and not tell them of the concerns of their souls. I debar in the name of the Lord, you that shun the people of God for your companions, and choose vain company on Sabbath and through the week. There are some people, when anything goes against their natures, whose hearts send up the rotten savour of hell, just as when one puts a grape into a dunghill, a rotten smell arises. O, my friends, “be not overcome of evil but overcome evil with good.” You are there with your grey hairs that never believed that you had an immortal soul, that never felt anything in the means of grace. O you are going to the table with your heart on your idols and vain companions! Everything in the creation cries, “Set not your heart on me. I will not go far with you. I am not God. I cannot save you. Observe that it is a merciful One who is concerned about your salvation.”
TABLE SERVICE.
Well, you are now at the Lord’s Table seeking Jesus who was crucified. Do not be ashamed of His name. You that received something that made you forsake your idols, will not be ashamed to confess Him before an assembled world. The Lord loves the broken heart for sin. It was sin that made Christ go through the ocean of God’s wrath that He might redeem the objects of His love. Sin is the only thing in the world that the Lord hates. On the night on which He was betrayed He took bread. That night will never be forgotten. It has sent forth a savour that will never pass away through eternity. He will come again and finish His work. He finished a great part of it upon the Cross, but He has a great deal yet to do. A good woman said, “If ever I get to heaven, He has much yet to do in my soul. If I would be taken to heaven in my sins I would turn a serpent and would sting the Lord of Glory.” Mary washed His feet with her tears, and wiped them with the hair of her head. That was the fruit of pardon. The Lord never gives a token of the pardon of sin, but He gives a token of the sanctification of the soul.
My friends, if ever you get a drop of grace, when you come to Jordan, you will see that you had need of every cross and every trial to draw the soul from its idols. Remember, poor sinner, that one vain thought will do more harm to your soul than all the devils in hell. Poor creature, do they call you a hypocrite? What will they do when the Lord will acknowledge you to be His own before an assembled world.
Many poor sinners are contented with a form of godliness. But there is nothing in the world one should be so much afraid of as starving one’s soul. There is nothing so near the Lord as the death of His Son. It is the death of the Saviour that lifted the glory and cause of God in the world.
We read that the Lord’s eyes are as flames of fire. This means that His secret eye observes the actings of the souls of men. “God is a Spirit, and they that worship Him must worship Him in spirit and in truth.” For my part, I would prefer one spiritual thought to a million of prayers. The secret eye will pierce through the soul. Don’t look about you at the Lord’s Table. You don’t know how near you are to consuming fire.
My friends, a person might go so far in religion that the Lord’s people, and even the angels and saints in heaven might think he was a gracious person, when the secret eye sees in him nothing but emptiness to the very bottom. Did you ever see the mercy of God? Did you see it in the death of the Saviour? If not, you never tasted of the mercy of God. O what love shall be seen, when He will say concerning some, “Behold me and the children whom thou hast given me.” The Lord will not break one of your bones, He will not give you one stroke, but what you will bless Him for through eternity. O poor worldling, you will yet see all the world burning. All that took away your heart from God you will see in flames, and you will then say, “O that I had thought more of the world to come.” One said in speaking of Jacob, “It is written, fear not, thou worm Jacob, for I am thy God.” “When Jacob was a worm he thrashed the mountains, but when he was a mountain the worms thrashed him.”
An old divine once said that man was a ring which dropped from the finger of God into hell, and the Second Person of the Godhead stooped down into hell and lifted the ring, and put it on the hand of God, I hope there are none here whose soul never kept them five minutes from the world. If there are, they are miserable creatures. If the greatest sinner here should get a drop of repentance, he would be eternally saved, but it is not every late repentance that ends in glory. It is an awful thing to see a sinner going to eternity without repentance, like the beasts that perish.
“Do this in remembrance of Me.” He asked no more from the objects of His love than to remember Him. When He had supped, He gave the bread and wine to His disciples as I now give them to you, in the name of a Triune God, on condition that you will be His through time and through eternity.