Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit · Sermon No. 1160
“Therefore, as the Holy Spirit says, Today if you will hear His voice, harden not your hearts.” Hebrews 3:7.
THE peculiar circumstances in which we are now placed as a congregation demand of me that my discourses should be principally directed to the unconverted, that the awakened may be decided, that those may be awakened who as yet remain unmoved, and that a desire to seek the Lord may spread all around us. We may leave the 99 in the wilderness for a little while, just now, and go after that which has gone astray. It is our duty, usually, to feed the children, but for a while we may leave that to other agencies, and hand out food to those who are perishing of hunger. These seasons of revival do not last forever—they come and they go and, therefore—they must be taken advantage of while they are with us.
The farmer tells us that he must make hay while the sun shines and we, also, must attend, in the season, to the labor which it suggests—and that duty seems to me to look in the direction of the undecided. While God is speaking so mightily, we should plead with men to hear His voice! Clearly, it is our wisdom to say, “Amen,” to what the Lord is saying, for as His Word cannot return unto Him void, ours will be sure to be fruitful when it tallies with the Lord’s. Therefore the subject of my sermon this morning shall be that of our hymn writer—
“‘Hear God while He speaks,’ then hear Him today. And pray while you hear, unceasingly pray! Believe in Hispromise, rely on His Word, And while He commands you, obey your great Lord.” I have taken this text with the earnest hope that God may bless it and I look to the Lord’s people to baptize the text in floods of anxious tears for the unsaved.
I. The first point which it presents for serious consideration is this—THE SPECIAL VOICE OF THE HOLY SPIRIT. “As the Holy Spirit says, Today if you will hear His voice.” The Apostle is continually quoting from the Old Testament, but he does not often present his quotations in this peculiar fashion. In the very next chapter, when he is speaking of the same passage, he uses the expression, “Saying in David”—mentioning the human author of the Psalm. But in this case, to give full emphasis to the Truth of God, he quotes the Divine Author alone—“As the Holy Spirit says.”
These words, it is true, are applicable to every passage of sacred Scripture, for we may say of all the Inspired Books—“As the Holy Spirit says.” But it is designedly used here that the passage may have the greater weight with us. The Holy Spirit, in fact, not only speaks thus in the 95th Psalm, but it is His unvarying utterance. The Holy Spirit says, or continues, still, to say, “Hear you His voice today.” He has a certain doctrine upon one occasion and a still deeper Truth of God at another period, according as there was need, or as His people were prepared for it. But this particular utterance is for all time and for every day of Divine Grace. The Holy Spirit, by Paul, as before by David, says, “Today.”
Yes, that is still the burden which He lays upon His ministering servants—in every place they entreat and persuade men, saying, “Today if you will hear His voice, harden not your hearts.” How does the Holy Spirit thus speak? He says this first, in the Scriptures. Every command of Scripture calls for immediate obedience. The Law of God is not given to us to be laid by upon the shelf to be obeyed at some future period of life! And the Gospel of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ is not so intended for the 11th hour as to be lightly trifled with during the first ten. Wherever the Holy Spirit exhorts, He speaks in the present tense, and bids us now repent, or now believe, or now seek the Lord!
I pray you always remember, whenever you read the Bible, that it is the Spirit of the living God who there admonishes you to immediate obedience! The calls of the Inspired Word are not those of Moses, or David, or Paul, or Peter, but the solemn utterances of the Holy Spirit speaking through them. With what a dignity does this Truth invest Holy Scrip-
ture and with what solemnity does it surround our reading of it! Quibbling with Scripture, trifling with it, disputing its doctrines, or neglecting its admonitions we grieve the Spirit of God! And this is very dangerous ground to trespass on, for although He is long-suffering and pitiful, yet remember it is of the sin against the Holy Spirit that it is said, “It shall never be forgiven.”
Not every sin against the Holy Spirit is unpardonable—God be thanked for that! But there is a sin against the Holy Spirit which shall never be forgiven. Therefore do we tread, I say, on very delicate ground when we vex Him, as we do if at any time in reading His Word we count His teachings to be light matters. Beware, I say, you men of England, who have your Bibles in your houses among whom the Word of the Lord is common as wheat bread! Beware how you treat it, for in rejecting it you reject not only the voice of Apostles and Prophets, but the voice of the Holy Spirit Himself! The Holy Spirit says, “Today.” He bids His people make haste and delay not to keep the commands of God! And He bids sinners seek the Lord while He may be found—and call upon Him while He is near. Oh, may you hear His warning voice and live!