Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit · Sermon No. 620
Delivered on Sunday Morning, March 19, 1865
“But exhort one another daily, while it is called ‘Today,‘lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin.” Hebrews 3:13.
THE children of Israel, in their coming out of Egypt and in their forty years’ sojourn in the wilderness, represented the visible Church of the living God—not the secret and elect body of the redeemed—but the professing company of the outward Church. They were very prone to the great sin of unbelief. They believed in God after a fashion while they saw His wonders, but the moment they were brought into straits or difficulties, they at once began to doubt the power of Jehovah and to cast off all reverence for His authority. Therefore they fell into another sin which at last fastened on them so as to become a part of their nature—they became stiff-necked, obstinate, rebellious, perverse and hard of heart.
They would not learn, although their lesson-book had miracles for its pictures. Their hearts became so hard that albeit they saw all the great things which God did for them, they despised the pleasant land and were ready at times for the sake of the flesh-pots of Egypt, to wear again the yoke of Pharaoh and to die the inglorious death of slaves. Such, too, are the great sins of the Christian Church—unbelief the root—and obstinacy the fruit.
Brothers and Sisters, if we know our own hearts we must confess that unbelief is a sin which does very easily beset us and that our obstinacy may well provoke the Lord to anger. We rejoice in God while the rocks run with rivers and while the daily manna drops about our tents. But when the fiery serpent bites us, or the wells are bitter, or our comforts are in any way interfered with, we begin to distrust and to suspect the faithfulness of God. And as the result of this, there is an obstinacy about us which often inclines us to stand out against the plain precepts of God, because, in the judgment of our unbelief, obedience might lead us into trouble and disobedience might make our path smooth.
Oh that it were not so! It is sadly true that God’s people are liable to be overtaken by the worst of sins! Egypt itself did not produce worse sins than those which provoked the Lord to anger in the camp of Israel. And to this day the Church has some in it who defile her with all the sins of the world. I do not mean to insinuate that the Church of God is not infinitely to be preferred to the world in character—God forbid that I should slander the fair bride of Christ—she is as much superior to the world as the curtains of Solomon excel the smoke-blacked tents of Kedar!
But who dares deny that there are specimens to be found of the worst of sins occurring among the best of men? Just as in the most carefully tended garden there will spring up here and there some of the most noxious weeds—not that the weeds are permitted to smother the whole garden and kill the flowers—but that their coming while men sleep is an indication of what the soil is. And it is a plain manifestation that although the garden is very different from the piece of waste ground on the other side of the wall, yet it differs not in nature—but owes all its superiority to the culture of the farmer! Even so, the saints owe all their excellence above the very chief of sinners to the guardian care and Omnipotent Grace of the great lover of souls.
It seems, dear Friends, that it is really necessary to warn God’s people, although they have received the new nature and are partakers of the adoption, against being hardened in heart through the deceitfulness of sin. But there is a machinery provided by which the saints may be preserved from this great evil. “Exhort one another daily, lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin.”
We will talk together thus this morning. First, we shall dwell for a season upon the hardening effect of sin upon men, whether saints or sinners. Then we shall show the peculiar power by which sin hardens, namely, through its deceitfulness. Then we will consider the remedy which we are to use with others—“Exhort one another daily.” But what if we should be diseased ourselves with this same hardness of heart? Then it will be necessary for us to have a few words concerning what to do for ourselves if we have to complain of a growing insensibility of Spirit, as I am afraid some of us may most justly do.
I. First, then, dear Friends, THE HARDENING CHARACTER OF SIN. This is matter of experience. The first sin which came into the world hardened man’s heart in a most terrific manner so that he dared to excuse himself and even to charge God as being indirectly the author of his sin, by giving him the woman! No sooner had Adam tasted of the forbidden fruit than a stony hardness came upon his moral nature. The heart of sensitive flesh was suddenly petrified and became hard, unfeeling stone.