Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit · Sermon No. 660
Delivered on Sunday Morning, November 12, 1865, by C. H. Spurgeon at Cornwall Road Chapel, Bayswater
Genesis 1:1-5.
THIS is, no doubt, a literal and accurate account of God’s first day’s work in the creation of the world, but the first creation is not the subject of this morning’s discourse—we would rather direct your minds to the second creation of God. Every man who is saved by Divine Grace is a new creation. The great work which Jesus Christ is accomplishing in the world, by the Holy Spirit through the Word, is the making all things new. We believe the old creation to have been typical of the new and we shall so use it. May we all be taught of the Lord while so doing.
Observe, dear Friends, the state of the world. It is said to have been “without form and void. And darkness was upon the face of the deep.” Such is the state of every human heart till God the Holy Spirit visits it. So far as spiritual things are concerned, the human heart is in a state of chaos and disorder. There is no thought of faith, of love, of hope, of obedience—it is a spiritually confused mass of dead sinfulness in which everything is misplaced. It is void or utterly empty. Search the human heart through and it is true of it as Paul says, “In me, that is, in my flesh, dwells no good thing.”
Over the whole, as in the old creation a thick darkness reigns, comparable to that of Egypt—a darkness that might be felt. This is true of all men—not of the ignorant in the lowest haunts of London, whose depraved parentage and education have prevented them from knowing Divine things—but this is true of those who are trained up under the sound of the Gospel and whose morals are good and exemplary. They are still darkness, naturally, until God the Holy Spirit comes to renew them.
In the whole world, whether it is among kings, statesmen, or Divines, there is not one who has so much as a spark of spiritual light unless he has received it from above. And he can only have received it from above through Him who is “the true Light which lights every man which comes into the world,” who is enlightened at all. Dark, dark, dark is the whole of humanity—it dwells in the black darkness of sin and must perish there unless the same Divine power which said, “Let there be light,” of old, shall bestow spiritual light. You observe that the first Divine action in connection with the formation and shaping of the world, was this—“The Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.”
The secret work of the Holy Spirit begins in the human heart—we cannot always say precisely when or how. “The wind blows where it wishes and you hear the sound of it, but cannot tell from where it comes and where it goes: so is everyone that is born of the Spirit.” In the hearts of God’s chosen ones this Spirit works mysteriously and silently, but most efficaciously. The expression translated, “moved upon,” conveys in the original the idea of a bird brooding over its nest. The Holy Spirit mysteriously quickens the dead heart, excites emotions, longings, desires.
It may be some of you are feeling His operations this morning. You have not yet received the Divine light, but there are workings of the Divine energy in your spirit. You are not easy in your present lost estate—you are discontented to be what you now are—you are desirous to enter into God’s marvelous light. For this I thank God and take it as a hopeful symptom. And I pray that He may, this morning, if it is His gracious will, lead you farther and make you feel today that early operation of Divine Grace by which light is given to the darkened soul.
I. In considering the text, we shall notice FIRST THE DIVINE FIAT. God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light. The Lord Himself needs no light to enable Him to discern His creatures—
“Darkness and light in this agree, Great God they’re both alike to You.”
He looked upon the darkness and resolved that He would transform its shapeless chaos into a fair and lovely world. We shall observe that the work of Grace by which light enters the soul is a needed work. God’s plan for the sustaining of vegetable and animal life rendered light necessary. Light is essential to life. There are few operations which can be carried on in the world without some degree of light and certainly no heart can be saved without spiritual light.
It is light, my Brethren, which first shows us our lost estate—for we know nothing of it naturally. We think that we are righteous, that all is well with our souls. But when the Divine light comes in, we discover that we are fallen in Adam and are terribly undone! Naturally we think that we are no worse than others, that if we have offended, our offenses are very venial and almost deserve to be pardoned. But when light enters, the exceeding sinfulness of sin is discovered. This causes pain and anguish of heart—but that pain and anguish are necessary in order to bring us to lay hold on Jesus Christ—whom the light next displays to us.