Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit · Sermon No. 2221
“But many who are first will be last, and the last, first.” Matthew 19:30.
“So the last will be first, and the first, last.” Matthew20:16.
We must be saved if we would serve the Lord. We cannot serve God in an unsaved condition. “They that are in the flesh cannot please God.” It is vain for them to attempt service while they are still at enmity against God. The Lord wants not enemies to wait upon Him, nor slaves to grace His Throne. We must first be saved—and salvation is all of Grace. “By Grace are you saved through faith.” After we are saved and as the result of salvation, we serve. Saved—we serve! He that is saved becomes a child of God and then he renders a child-like service in his Father’s house. That service is also all of Grace! He serves not under the Law of the old commandment, “This do, and you shall live,” for he is not under the Law, but under Grace. Therefore, sin shall not have dominion over him, but Grace shall have dominion over him— and he shall seek to serve the Lord and please Him all the days of his life. When we are saved, we must never forget that we are saved that we may serve—made free from sin, that we may become servants of God. David says, “O Lord, truly I am Your servant; I am Your servant and the son of Your handmaid: You have loosed my bonds.” Because our bonds are loosed, we are under new bonds, bonds of love which bind us to the service of the Most High.
Now, when we come thus to be servants, we must not forget that we are saved men and women, for if we begin to fancy that while we serve, we are working to win life by our merits, we shall get upon legal ground. And a child of God on legal ground is going backwards—he is departing from his true standing before God. But remember, “You are not under the Law, but under Grace.” But if you begin to forget your indebtedness to your Savior, not only for eternal life, but for everything you are, have and do, you will be like the Galatians who began in the Spirit, but sought to be made perfect by the flesh. You will be like the young man whose question we have just read—“What do I lack?” You will be like Peter, who puts in a sort of claim for reward—“Behold, we have forsaken all, and followed You; what shall we have therefore?” You will be like the men who had worked in the vineyard from early morning and who murmured because the penny was given to those who had only worked for a single hour.
Christ will not have His servants under bondage to a legal spirit! Wherever He spies it out, He strikes it on the head, for both the service and the reward are all of Grace. The service, itself, is given us of God and God rewards the service which He, Himself, has given! We might almost speak of this as an eccentricity of Grace. God gives us good works and then rewards us for the works which He, Himself, has given! So all is of Grace from first to last and must never be viewed with a legal eye. Into this subject I want, on this occasion, to conduct you.
I dare say that you have heard sermons from this text, but probably not preached from it in its connection. I like to take the text as it stands and get from it a bit of exposition for my own heart, which I may pass on to you, for, remember, although the text away from its connection may be true, yet it is not the truth which God there intended to teach us and it becomes us to look about us to see what comes before the text and what comes after, in order that we may catch the exact meaning of the Holy Spirit in giving the words.
I. I shall begin by dwelling upon this remark—IN THE SERVICE OF OUR LORD FREE GRACE IS MANIFESTED. It may not strike you as being upon the surface of the text, but it lies on the very surface of the whole connection—in the service of our Lord, Free Grace is manifested. Think that over.
It must be so, in the first place, because, although it is rewarded, all our service is already due to God. Under the Law of God we are bound to love the Lord with all our heart, with all our soul, with all our mind and with all our strength. There can be nothing beyond that. All that we can do, we are already bound to do under the Law. Works of supererogation must be impossible, since the Law comprehends all holiness and condemns every form of sin. When we have done all, we are unprofitable servants—we have done no more than it was our duty to do. Therefore, Brothers and Sisters, if there is a service to which we are called, and for which a reward is promised, it must be a service of Grace. It cannot be any other. Under the Gospel, the same thing is true—all that we can do is already due. “You are not your own; for you are bought with a price.” There is no faculty, there is no capacity, there is no possibility of your nature which is not redeemed and which does not belong to Christ by virtue of the ransom price which He has paid for it!
You will gladly and gratefully acknowledge the obligation to do all that lies in you for Him who loved you and bought you with His precious blood—