Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit · Sermon No. 2741
“By Grace you are saved.” Ephesians 2:5.
THE cardinal error against which the Gospel of Christ has to contend is the effect of the tendency of the human heart to rely upon salvation by works. The great antagonist to the Truth of God, as it is in Jesus, is that pride of man which leads him to believe that he can be, at least in part, his own savior. This error is the prolific mother of multitudes of heresies! It is through this falsehood that the pure stream of the Truth of God has been tainted so that, instead of flowing on in one clear pure river, it has been sadly polluted. There have been many who have sought to hinder the flowing of the Water of Life, or to divert the stream from its proper current. Many have tried to mingle the fancies and fallacies of men with the Truth as it is in Jesus, in order, thereby, to make it more palatable to poor, fallen, human nature.
It is my belief that all great reforms in the Church of Christ must have for their basis the declaration of the Doctrine revealed in my text—“By Grace you are saved.” The tendency of the Church, like that of the world, is to fly away from this Truth which is really the sum and substance of the Gospel. A departure from this Doctrine is, in my opinion, the essence of those many errors which, springing up from time to time, have troubled and divided the Church and marred the beauty of the spouse of Christ.
In all times, whenever this Doctrine has been obscured, the Church has become either heretical or Laodicean. She has either held some dangerous and damnable heresy, or she has held only a portion of the Truth and held it with so feeble a grasp that it has lost its ancient power in her hands—so that her enemies have prevailed against her. The mightiest men in all ages of the Church’s history—those who have been the means of bringing the greatest good into her midst, and the most usefulness into the world—have been those who, rising up like Samson when called to do valiant deeds on behalf of Israel, have made this the distinguishing characteristic of their ministry—the Doctrine of Salvation by Grace in contradistinction of salvation by works.
In Augustine’s day, there had been a grievous falling away from the simplicity of the Gospel. And when he arose and preached to the world this glorious Truth of God, there was an influence for good which, I believe, staved off the great Romish heresy, at least for a time. Had the Church and the world but listened to his voice and accepted his teaching, Popery would have been an impossibility! Then later, when Romanism had waxed exceedingly strong, the Lord raised up Martin Luther who taught this as the great central Truth of Christianity, that sinners are justified by faith—not by works. After Luther came another distinguished teacher of the Doctrine of Grace—John Calvin, a man far better instructed in the Truth of the Gospel than even Martin Luther was—and he pushed this grand Doctrine to its legitimate consequences. Luther had, as it were, undammed the stream of Truth by breaking down the barrier which had kept back the living waters in the great reservoir—but the stream was turbid and carried down with it much that ought to have been left behind. Then Calvin came and cast salt into the waters and purified them, so that they flowed on in a clear, sweet, pure stream to gladden and refresh the Church of God and to quench the thirst of poor parched sinners.
Calvin preached, as his great staple Doctrine, the great Truth in my text, “By Grace you are saved.” It is common, in these days, to call those ministers who dwell mainly upon this Doctrine, “Calvinists.” But we do not accept that title without qualification. We are not ashamed of it and we would rather be called “Calvinists” than have any other name
except that which is our true one. We hold and assert again and again, that the Truth of God which Calvin preached, the Truth of God which Augustine thundered out with all his might—was the very Truth of God which the Apostle Paul had long before written in his Inspired Epistles and which is most clearly revealed in the discourses of our blessed Lord Himself! We desire to preach the Truth of God, the whole Truth of God and nothing but the Truth of God! We are not the followers of any mere man—we do not derive our Inspiration from Calvin’s Institutes and Commentaries, but from the Word of God itself! Yet we hold the Doctrines commonly called, “Calvinism,” to be none other than the essential basement Doctrines of our holy faith. These were the truths that Whitefield preached and that produced the great revival in his days! And these must be the Doctrines to which the Church of God must again return, if the Church of Rome is to be razed to its deep foundations, or souls to be converted in great multitudes, or the Kingdom of Christ to come!
My text relates to the Doctrine of Salvation by Grace and, coming to it, I ask you to notice, first, that the Apostle addresses certain people who were saved. Next, I want you to notice the meanings of the term, “Grace,” as applied in the Scriptures. And I shall finish with some consolatory and practical inferences.