Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit · Sermon No. 1490
Delivered on Lord’s-Day Morning, August 17, 1879
“For I will not contend forever, neither will I always be angry; for the spirits would fail before Me, and the souls which I have made. For the iniquity of his covetousness was I angry, and smote him: I hid and was angry, and he went on backsliding in the way of his heart. I have seen his ways, and will heal him: I will also lead him, and restore comforts to him and to his mourners.” Isaiah 57:16-18.
The high and holy One that inhabits eternity is here speaking with Himself concerning Israel. The Lord is holding high soliloquy. He is not so much addressing the sons of men, bidding them do this or that, as speaking to Himself of what He intends to do among them. He allows His Prophet to stand where he can hear the sacred soliloquy of the great Supreme. And he hears it and then, under the dictate of the Divine Spirit, he records it in the Inspired Book where it remains to this day for our instruction. Hear, then, these words of the living God and let your hearts be satisfied concerning the secret purposes of Jehovah!
Although the Lord may say many things to Himself which we do not hear and which it were not well that we should hear, yet He never retracts in secret what He has spoken in public! So we may rest assured that He never speaks in the dark places of the earth concerning the house of Jacob, “Seek you My face in vain.” No decree of God is contrary to the Gospel—we may always be sure of that. Whenever He unveils before us His private thoughts, we never find them to be less gracious than His published Words. The same love which spoke itself through Prophets and Seers dwells in the silent heart of God and abides forever at the fullest even when it finds no voice.
In the verses before us we find words of exceedingly great mercy and special tenderness. And we see moving before our adoring eyes the eternal Wisdom, the infinite Patience and the immutable Love of the great Father. May it please the Lord, in very truth, to restore comforts unto His mourners by the subject which shall now engage our attention, for under the blessing of the Holy Spirit it is in every way calculated to cheer the contrite heart.
I. The first Truth of God to which I call your attention is that God contends with men and that THE DIVINE CONTENTION IS WELL DESERVED on their part. He says, “I will not contend forever,” in which it is implied that He does contend sometimes. Where He has purposes of eternal Grace, the Lord, at the opening of His saving work, comes into contention with men. Smiting comes before saving. He bends His bow and points His arrow against the heart’s sin before He pours out His balm for the heart’s wound. He usually gives the spirit of bondage before He sends the spirit of sonship—He thunders by the Law before He waters the soul with the soft shower of the Gospel. Nor need we wonder at this, for there is so much in man that is altogether opposed to the Divine Nature and alien to the object and design of God, that there must be a conflict till the opposing principle is overcome and removed. The strong man will not go out except by force and neither will the Lord enter the soul except as a Conqueror.
First I would speak of this to the seeking sinner. It may be that there are, in this house, anxious persons who were once careless and at ease, but now there is a striving within them and a conflict which rages terribly. The Lord has a controversy with them. However unhappy it makes them, I am right glad that they are feeling the inward strife. Anything is better than the horrible calm of the dead sea of spiritual indifference! My Friend, your deadly peace is broken; your fatal sleep is ended; the magic spell of Satan has lost all its power; you are awakened and sadness rules the hour. Your wisest friends are glad of this—they welcome your return to feeling even as we rejoice to discover signs of life in one who has been snatched from a watery grave!
There is now some hope for you. The Spirit of God has come to you as a spirit of bondage and this makes you fear, but fear is often the outrider of faith. The Lord’s design in contending with you is to convince you of your sin. You will never see sin to be exceedingly sinful unless the Holy Spirit throws His own light upon it. You love sin too much to deal with it impartially—you are so tainted by it in your nature that your conscience by no means censures you so much as your iniquity deserves. Though some say that conscience is the vicegerent of God, there is nothing in the Scriptures to prove that statement, neither is it true. Conscience is an imperfect guide and monitor—and like all the other faculties, it is weakened and vitiated by the Fall so that it is a very prejudiced judge of right and wrong—and too often it puts bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter.
Conscience is often blinded by self-love and at all times apt to slumber. Until the Holy Spirit quickens your conscience, you will never discover the enormity of sin. You may know it to be evil as a matter of dogma, but you will not feel it to be evil as a matter of experience, nor will you see how greatly, how continually, how wickedly you have offended the Law of God unless the Lord opens your eyes. This He intends to do and He will not cease to strive with you till His purpose is performed! My dear Friend, the Lord will probably keep up the controversy in your soul until your beauty consumes away and, instead of admiring yourself, you come to loathe yourself! Though you wash yourself with snowwater and make yourself ever so clean, yet will He plunge you in the ditch till your own clothes shall abhor you. You shall see your righteousness to be filthy rags and your person to be under the curse—and then part of the Lord’s design will be accomplished!