Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit · Sermon No. 2532
“I have loved you, says the Lord. Yet you say, In what way have You loved us?” Malachi 1:2.
Man, by nature, is a lump of ingratitude. He is often ungrateful even to his earthly friends and he is invariably ungrateful to his Best Friend, above, until the Grace of God has changed his heart. Leave him alone and though he may be loaded with mercy, yet he will never bless the hand that gives him the favor. Should he even be allowed to survive so long as a hundred years, unless the Holy Spirit shall deal with him, he will not once remember his God in grateful thankfulness, but he will go on, from the beginning to the end of the century, always receiving, but never rendering back to the Lord anything like gratitude. We often say that ingratitude is one of the worst of sins—and we feel it so when it concerns ourselves. But we quite forget that it must be worse toward God than it is toward us, for, after all, whatever we may do for others, we are only like stepfathers to the blessings we bestow, for every good gift comes directly from the great Father of Lights, even from God, Himself! We may be the channels conveying comfort to others, but the blessing, itself, comes from Him. Shameful, then, is it that all good should come from God and yet that man should be ungrateful to Him who is the great Source of it all. The charge of ingratitude can be made against us all as we are by nature—it is not merely of some base, mean, groveling spirits that we are now speaking—but of mankind as a whole, looking at it on a broad scale.
Observe, next, from our text, that the Lord does not like that we should forget His love. He says here, by His servant Malachi, “I have loved you, says the Lord. Yet you say, In what way have You loved us?” And in the prophecy of Isaiah He says, “I have nourished and brought up children, and they have rebelled against Me.” Our ingratitude evidently grieves God’s heart—speaking after the manner of men. He cannot bear that we should forget His love—He presses it upon us as a great fact that He has loved us—and He seems astonished that we should, in our ingratitude, ask the shameful question, “In what way have You loved us?”
I am going to show you, dear Friends, that my text has a double bearing and, first, we will view this Truth of God as it relates to the bulk of men. There are some to whom God has been exceedingly kind, who are not yet converted. They do not even profess to be His people, yet He has dealt with them in such a way that He might truly say to them, “I have loved you,” in the sense in which we read that great Gospel text, “God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” When I have dealt with that point, as God shall help me, we will then view this Truth as it relates to the Lord’s people and notice that innermost kind of love of which they have tasted. Yet, though God has loved them emphatically, with a very peculiar kind of love, some of them may be in an ill-humor and may be saying, “In what way have You loved us?” An earnest word with them may not be out of place and may do them good.
I. First, then, take the broadest meaning of the text and view THIS TRUTH OF GOD AS IT RELATES TO THE BULK OF MEN.
God had a love to the nation of Israel, yet many in that nation loved Him not, but turned from Him with ingratitude. Even then He still had a benevolent’affection towards that nation, so that He favored them above all other people, and gave them the means of Grace—and sent to them the Light of God while the rest of the world remained in darkness. Still, I am not going to speak, just now, particularly concerning Israel, but to show the bearing of my text upon many who are living today, whether Jews or Gentiles.
Let us begin by considering the announcement of the text. ’ ‘I have loved you, says the Lord.” There are many who have very specially participated in God’s favor in the form of sparing love. They are yet alive—it is a wonder that they are, for they have passed through a great many accidents. Others have been killed by very small things, but, dear Friends, very greatthings have not killed you. You have been very sick. Disease has laid you low. Several times you have been on the very borders of the grave—the mold seemed to slip away from beneath your feet and you were almost entombed! The doctor thought that there was little hope of your recovery and others thought so, too. Yet here you are, still in the land of the living! You have had perils in rivers, perils on the deep, perhaps perils in battle. You have passed through all manner of perils, yet you have been kept alive with death so near! God has very graciously and mercifully preserved you. He has not allowed you to die in your sins. You are getting rather old, too. I perceive that your hair is pretty thickly sown with gray and from others it has almost gone. I see a bald head here and there, or else the snows of many winters lie white above your brow. Getting on to 70 and yet you have not yielded yourself to Christ—is it so with any whom I am now addressing?