Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit · Sermon No. 1584
Delivered on Lord’s-Day-Morning, February 20, 1881
“For if you love them which love you, what credit is that to you? For sinners also love those that lo ve them. And if you do good to them which do good to you, what credit is that to you? For sinners also do even the same. And if you lend to them of whom you hope to receive, what credit is that to you? For sinners also lend to sinners, to receive as much again.” Luke 6:32-34.
BRETHREN in Christ, every Word which proceeds out of our Master’s lips is precious to us. We make no distinction between His promises and His precepts, but prize every syllable above rubies. A doctrine from Him we value beyond the much fine gold and a command is equally high in our esteem. Whether His teaching is practical or doctrinal, whether it is intended to guide the feet or to encourage the heart, we are equally rejoiced at it—
“All His words are music, though they make us weep; Infinitely tender, infinitely deep.” All the discourses of Jesus are the Words of God to our soul, whether they convey to us instruction, warning, rebuke, invitation or consolation. As all His garments smell of myrrh, aloes and cassia, so are all His words most sweet to our taste. We have not so learned Christ as to be pickers and choosers when the fruits of His lips are before us. Yet I have known professors of that sort, who would gladly tear the Master’s vesture that they might have only the softest part of it to be a pillow for their idle heads.
“That,” they say, “was a Gospel sermon, sweet food for our souls,” because it happened to tell of what Christ has done for us. But on the next occasion they cry out, “That was not a Gospel sermon! It was legal! It laid a burden upon our shoulders,” because it dared to tell of what Christ has commanded us to do for Him. Those men, it seems to me, accept Christ for a servant rather than for a Master! They are glad that He shall do this or that for them—that He shall, in fact, gird Himself and wait at their table while they sit down to meat. But if they had learned better, they would have chosen Christ for a Master and would have been willing to gird themselves at His command and wait on their Lord, counting it their honor to be servants of so Divine a Prince!
Feeling certain that you are not of that order of religious cavilers, but that you will accept anything that comes from Christ, I am glad to have a practical subject this morning. The Sermon on the Mount is as full of the Light of God to you as the Transfiguration on the Mount. You are as glad to hear what the Son of God has to say by way of precept as to hear what the Father had to say by way of recognition of His Son. As for this sermon in the plain, it was preceded by miracles, but it is as forcible to you as the signs and wonders could have made it had you seen them all! The sick touched His garment and were restored and those who were possessed of devils were healed—you rejoice at the miracles of Christ, but you see Him to be as mighty in word as in deed—and you adore Him for His gracious teachings which remain to us after His miracles have ceased.
Here you have certain of the Words of Christ and may His Spirit bless them to your hearts. Brothers and Sisters, in the matters of which I shall have to speak this morning in the name of the Lord, taken, as I am quite certain, from His own Words, there will be some things strange and unusual which may possibly sound harshly in your ears. Be not astonished, for the Gospel is one of those thoughts of God which is not our thought—the whole system which Christ has ushered in is foreign to men, being as far above them as the heavens are above the earth! Our Lord’s Kingdom is not of this world, otherwise His servants would do many things which now they forbear to do. The conduct of the subjects of that Kingdom must not be measured by the manners of others, for they are a people as peculiar as the Kingdom to which they belong.
We have heard persons say, “I do not see it to be my duty to be so precise; it is not customary.” What have you and I to do with custom? If things are right, but not in fashion, let us start the fashion! And when it is the fashion to do wrong, let us be desperately unfashionable! Our Master, evidently, from the verses before us, did not come into the world to teach us to conform to the ways of our fellow men! He would have us go far beyond the ordinary conduct of our fellows. He asked in His Sermon on the Mount, “What do you more than others?” He ordains a standard far above the common standard of mankind when He says, again and again, “What credit is that to you? For sinners also do even the same.”
“Oh,” one may say at the close of my sermon, “the preacher demands more of us than can reasonably be expected from flesh and blood.” Your charge is correct! But then, the preacher is not addressing himself to you as to flesh and blood, but as to those who are possessed of a far higher principle, namely, the indwelling Spirit of God! True Believers walk not after the flesh, nor do they mind the things of it, for they are clothed with the energy of the Spirit of God and by His power their lives are lifted above the common walks of men. If it is so that the Spirit of God dwells in you, you are of another nature than the men of this world—and it is to be expected that you should live after a nobler fashion.