Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit · Sermon No. 2354
“Come, now, and let us reason together, says the LORD: though your sins are as scarlet, they shallbe as white as snow; though they are redlike crimson, theyshallbe as wool.” Isaiah 1:18.
THERE is a quarrel between man and his Maker. It is a sad thing that the creature should have fallen out with his Creator. It is a pitiful business that those who are dependent upon the bounty of God should have rebelled against the hand that has fed them, yet it is so. Man has turned aside from the way of God’s Commandments—he will not submit to Jehovah’s sway.
Under such circumstances, it is an amazing instance of Divine Compassion that God should be willing to hold a conference with man. Of course the first person to ask for such a conference ought to have been the offending party. It is man who has offended, it is man who will have to suffer the consequence of his offenses. But, instead of man seeking God, and pleading with bitter tears, “Lord, pitifully hear me; graciously listen to me and forgive me!” It is God who comes seeking man—the offended One is first in the effort to make up the quarrel! It is He who says, “Come, now, and let us reason together.” He proposes to confer with man about the question in dispute. Admire much the freeness of God’s mercy, that, after you have transgressed against Him and provoked Him again and again, He still hesitates to hurl the thunderbolts of His Justice at you! Instead, thereof, He invites you to talk with Him as to the cause of your quarrel, to reason with Him about your war against your Maker.
Surely, dear Friends, it would be a great joy to a man to hear that God invites him to a conference! He would take heart of hope from that fact. He would say, “If God had meant to destroy me, He would not have said, ‘Come, now, and let us reason together.’” When the One who possesses all power and who could, in a single moment, crush those who have sinned against Him, yet says, “Come, let us talk this matter over,” it must mean that He is moved by love and mercy. It must mean that there is yet hope for the guilty—an opportunity of man, the enemy—being reconciled to his offended
God!
I think it will be wisdom on our part, sinful creatures that we are, to accept the conference that God proposes. Anyhow, we cannot lose anything by it. If the Lord says, “Come, now, and let us reason together,” He must have some design of love in it. Therefore, let us come and return to our God, and reason with Him. I would invite any man here who is at all desirous to be right with God, to begin to think about his God and about his own ways. Surely, it is high time with some of you that you should turn to Him whom you have so long provoked! There is His Book, for instance—do you read it? Does not the dust upon it witness against you? You do not think it worth while to know what God has revealed in His Word! You treat your Maker and your Friend as if His letters were not worth even an hour’s reading! You leave them utterly neglected. Is this as it should be? If you want to get right with God, should not the first step be to obey that command, “Thus says the Lord of Hosts, consider your ways”? And should not the next step be obedience to that other word, “Acquaint, now, yourself with Him, and be at peace: thereby good shall come unto you”? I cannot see how it can be wise for a man to neglect his God and to despise what his Maker has to say to him. It must be wise for us to confer with the Lord about this matter. If, after the conference, we should come to a decision contrary to what is to be desired, yet we shall at least have given a fair consideration to the subject. Let us listen, then, to the gentle yet powerful voice of God, which says to us, “Come, now, and let us reason together, says the Lord.”
2 Scarlet Sinners Pardoned and Purified Sermon #2354
You all know what the quarrel is about, for you heard the chapter read. You love sin—and God cannot and will not bless you until you have parted with it. The greatest blessing that God can give you is to part you and your sins. The salvation which we so freely proclaim is not, as some suppose, salvation at the last for those who continue in sin—it is deliverance from sin. The salvation which we continually preach, as the work of the Free Grace of God, is salvation from the reigning power, the raging lust of sin. Free pardon for all past offenses is presented to everyone who believes in Jesus, but the grand aim is to set you free from the love of evil and from taking any delight in sin.
Now, evil is evil—that which is evil towards God is also evil towards yourself. It cannot work your happiness to do what is wrong. You may think it will, but God’s judgment is clearer than yours, and His Laws may be viewed as plain directions as to how you can be happy. When He forbids you anything, it is simply a warning against that which is dangerous to your soul. He has denied us no pleasure which can be called a real pleasure. He has given to us everything that is truly good for our immortal spirits and, if we follow in the way that He maps out, it shall be not only for our eternal profit, but also for our present enjoyment.