Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit · Sermon No. 2691
“For godly sorrow works repentaance to salivation not to be repented of: but the sorrow of the world works death.” 2 Corinthians 7:10.
MANY years ago and, indeed, in some measure to a later date, preachers of the Word seemed mainly to dwell upon the inner experience of men. They both preached sermons and wrote books in which they set forth the condition of convinced sinners, describing what they usually felt before they found peace with God. They were very strict in their search for the genuine tokens of true repentance and the internal evidences of regeneration. They preached continually upon the work of the Spirit of God in convincing sinners of their lost condition, but they were not accustomed to say to them so baldly and so boldly as we do now, “Believe, and live.” And the consequence was that a large number of truly awakened persons were kept in bondage and did not come into the liberty wherewith Christ makes Believers free—at least, not so soon as they do nowadays. I believe that under God’s blessing, those experimental preachers were the means of producing very sturdy Christians. They did a great deal of deep plowing with a very sharp plowshare before they began to sow the good Seed of the Kingdom of God. They took care to use the pointed needle of the Law of God to make a way for the silken thread of the Gospel, so that what they did sew was well sewn—and the garments which they made did not tear quite so easily as much of the spiritual raiment does which is made in these days of more showy, but less substantial, labor.
Still, there was this defect about that style of preaching—it led men to look too much within instead of looking away from self to Christ. No matter how faithfully they proclaimed the Grace of God, they preached some sort of preparation for the reception of that Grace and, therefore, sinners often looked to themselves to see whether they had that preparation rather than to the Grace of God which it was most desirable that they should seek. I believe you may say so much about the disease of sin, that instead of leading the sinner in despair to turn his gaze to Christ, as the bitten Israelites looked to the brazen serpent as the only remedy—you may merely make him sit down and study the disease—and look, and look, and look again for the various symptoms you have described. And though he will be well acquainted with the disease, he will not, in that way, find a cure for it. You may dive as far as you like into the sea, but you will not find any fire there. You may rake as long as you please in the burning fiery furnace, but you will never reach any cooling blocks of ice. You may hunt, for many a day, in the human heart’s natural death, but you will not there discover any signs of life. And, within the morgue of man’s corruption, you shall never be able to discern any remedy for a sin-sick soul. It was in that particular that the experimental preaching lacked an important element.
But now, times have changed and many of us who are ministers of the Gospel, do very plainly proclaim to sinners the message, “Believe, and live.” This plain declaration rings out from almost every part of our land—not yet quite in every place—I would that it were so—but still, there is a large company of Evangelical preachers continually repeating the Apostolic message, “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and you shall be saved.” I am sure that much good must result from this proclamation of the Truth of God, for this is God’s ordained way of blessing the souls of men. And yet—and yet—I sometimes fear lest there should be all sowing and no plowing—lest there should be the preaching only of the remedy, with almost an entire ignoring of the disease—and lest the message, “Believe, and live,” should take the place of that other great Truth of God, “You must be born again.”
It will never do for men to be led to think that they are healed before they know that they are sick unto death, or to imagine that they are clothed before they see themselves to be naked, or to be taught to trust Christ before they are aware that they have anything for which they have need to trust Him! It would be a happy circumstance if, in our preaching, we could have a blending of these two elements so that we could have somewhat of our forefathers’ deep experimental teaching and, with it, and growing out of it a plain, unfettered delivery of the Gospel declaration, “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and you shall be saved.”
“How are the two things to be reconciled?” someone asks. My dear Brother, I have long ago given up trying to reconcile friends who never fell out. These two Truths of God are both taught in Scripture and, therefore, they cannot be at variance with one another. You would be as much puzzled to prove where they differ as I would be to show that they agree. I am confident that they do agree because I find them both in the Book. Therefore, let them both be preached. Somehow, we are constantly coming across Truths that lie side by side, like the metals on which the railway carriages run. If we only preach one of them, it will be like trying to run the train on a single rail. You know that there are often two Truths, if not three, closely connected with one another. I am frequently led to see that there is a trinity of Truths as there is a Trinity in the Godhead—and if they are all preached, in due proportion, they will balance one another and prevent any one Truth of God from being too prominent. Luther, with his free justification by faith, is apt to go too far unless there shall come in Calvin and Zwingli, with their balancing Truths, to set him right. Even Paul’s Inspired Words might have been the means of leading some men astray unless James had also been inspired to write on the practical side of the Truth of God so that Paul’s meaning could be the better understood. There is nothing wrong in the teaching of either Paul or James—they are both right—the two together bring out both aspects of Truth.
I am going to preach tonight about sorrow for sin. I hope it has not yet quite gone out of the world. I trust that sorrowful penitence still exist, though I have not heard much about it lately. People seem to jump into faith very quickly nowadays. I do not disapprove of that happy leap, but still, I hope my old friend, Repentance, is not dead! I am desperately in love with repentance—it seems to me to be the twin sister to faith. I do not, myself, understand much about dry-eyed faith—I know that I came to Christ by the way of Weeping-Cross. I did not come to shelter beneath His blood immediately when I heard of it, as I now wish that I had done, but when I did come to Calvary, by faith, it was with great weeping and supplication, confessing my transgressions and desiring to find salvation in Jesus, and in Jesus only.
Now, concerning this sorrow for sin, I want, first, to remove certain erroneous ideas with regard to it Secondly, to distinguish between the two sorrows mentioned in the text—the godly sorrow which works repentance to salvation, and the sorrow of the world which works death. And then, thirdly, we will indulge ourselves in sorrow for sin. We will finish up with some happy sorrow, that blessed, godly sorrow which is never to be repented of or regretted!
I. First, then, I want to try to REMOVE CERTAIN ERRONEOUS IDEAS WITH REGARD TO SORROW FOR