Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit · Sermon No. 891
Delivered by, the Metropolitan Tabernacle, Newington.
“Now, the just shall live by faith.”- Hebrews 10:38.
SEE here the germ of the Christian’s life! See, too, how it blooms, blossoms and bears! But observe it is not said the just shall live for his faith, or because of the merit of his believing in God. This were to place the Christian virtually under the Old Covenant of Law. To confuse faith with works would be, indeed, to bring us back to the old bondage of the first dispensation. It is no more true that the righteous man is saved because of the excellency of his faith, than that any man can be saved because of the excellency of his works. Neither does it say in the text that the just shall live upon his faith. Faith would make poor food for his soul! Small consolation may a man fetch from his faith, itself.
It was said of Esau, “By your sword shall you live,” and everyone knows that the intention of that sentence was— “By that which your sword shall capture and subdue.” He could not feed on the sword itself—that was mere hard, barren steel. So faith in itself can not feed a soul. It is that which faith brings, that which faith takes of the things of God and makes the soul own. I know it is very easy for us to degenerate into a congratulation of ourselves because of some quality of our faith. We may as easily make an Antichrist of our faith as of anything else, but this will never do. The Believer never stays upon his faith—it is in the Object of his faith that he finds rest!.
It is not the telescope which delights me, but the star which I see through it. It is not the mere hand of faith which feeds me, but the heavenly bread which faith’s hand uplifts and brings spiritually to my mouth. The text does say this, however, that the just shall live by his faith—and it seems to me that, without any straining of the text, we might find in it, first, a doctrine, secondly, a promise, and, thirdly, an indication of practice—I might almost have said a precept.
I. First, then, we descry here A DOCTRINE. “The just shall live by faith.” And that doctrine may be drawn out into distinct branches. Does not the text plainly teach us that faith is the continued act of the Christian? Some people seem to imagine that there is a kind of finality in each stage of religious experience, as though we are to repent in the first dawn of our spiritual life, but afterwards we may leave off repenting and account henceforth that this bitter cup of gall is emptied, no more to sting the conscience with remorse, or move the heart to godly sorrow. Whereas, I suppose we shall pass through the pearly gates brushing away the last tear of repentance—always, till then, having need to mourn past sins and grieve for present frailties in penitential showers of grief.
So it seems to have been the fancy of others that we are to stand as sinners once and for all at the foot of the Cross, look to Jesus and be lightened. But after that we are to press to something higher—something yet beyond, a repose calm and undisturbed, free from rough wields and rude alarms. Beloved, surely such people do not know what the Christian’s inner life is. Depend upon it, that as much at the last as at the first, “the just shall live by faith.” He that is ripest and nearest Heaven has no more ground of confidence than he who but five minutes ago, like the dying thief, received the assurance of his pardon. The ground of the sinner’s acceptance in the first moment of his faith is the finished work of Christ and, after 50 years of earnest service, that must still be the sole cause of his acceptance with God and the only rock upon which his soul must dare to build!
The act of simple faith, looking out of self and looking alone to Christ, is a thing for your penitent publican when first he beats on his breast—but it is also for your dying David—when he knows that the Covenant is ordered in all things and sure. Thus well it becomes the most mature saint, with his last breath, to express his confidence in the God that pardons sin through the application of the precious blood. Never imagine that the publican is to ripen into a Pharisee. Yet such would be our course were we to get off the rock of Christ’s finished work and rely with a foolish dependence upon our own graces and our attainments. Faith in Jesus Christ for salvation, then, is the continual act of the Believer’s life. Just as long as he lives here below, if he does live to God at all, he lives by faith.
We may further learn, therefore, that faith is a great practical virtue. The text does not say that the just man shall study the doctrine of faith in his retirement and be able to frame a correct definition of what faith is. It is true that the just man should be meditative, contemplative, studious—a man well instructed in the history of revelation and the mystery of the kingdom of God—but that is not what the text says. It does not say that the just man shall converse about faith and make the object of faith the constant theme of his discourse. It will be so—what is in the heart will be sure to come out in the tongue. But that is not the Truth of God taught here.