Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit · Sermon No. 2867
“Look unto Me, and be you saved, all the ends of the earth: for I am God, and there is no other.” Isaiah 45:22.
I HAVE preached a good many times from this text. [The following sermons by Mr. Spurgeon upon this passage, have been previously published—No. 60, Volume 2—Sovereignty and Salvation and No. 2805, Volume 48—Life for a Look]. I hope to do so, if life is spared, many more times. It was about 26 years ago—twenty-six years exactly last Thursday—that I looked unto the Lord and found salvation through this text. You have often heard me tell how I had been wandering about, seeking rest and finding none, till a plain, unlettered lay preacher among the Primitive Methodists stood up in the pulpit and gave out this passage as his text—“Look unto Me, and be you saved, all the ends of the earth.” He had not much to say, thank God, for that compelled him to keep on repeating his text and there was nothing needed—by me, at any rate—except his text! I remember how he said, “It is Christ that speaks. ‘I am in the garden in an agony, pouring out My soul unto death. I am on the tree, dying for sinners— look unto Me! Look unto Me!’
“That is all you have to do! A child can look! One who is almost an idiot can look! However weak, or however poor a man may be, he can look! And if he looks, the promise is that he shall live.” Then, stopping, he pointed to where I was sitting under the gallery and he said, “That young man there looks very miserable.” I expect I did, for that is how I felt. Then he said, “There is no hope for you, young man, or any chance of getting rid of your sin but by looking to Jesus.” And he shouted, as I think only a Primitive Methodist can, “Look! Look, young man! Look now!” And I did look and when they sang a hallelujah before they went home, in their own earnest way, I am sure I joined in it. It happened to be a day when the snow was lying deep and more was falling, so, as I went home, those words of David kept ringing through my heart, “Wash me and I shall be whiter than snow”—and it seemed as if all Nature was in accord with that blessed deliverance from sin which I had found in a single moment by looking to Jesus Christ!
I have always felt inclined, when this time of the year comes round, to preach from this text. I have sometimes thought—“They will suppose I must go over the same ground again and give them the same sermon and so, perhaps, I shall not have so attentive an audience.” I cannot help it if it is so, for I must preach from this text. As it was blessed to me, I hope it will be blessed to somebody else. I wanted to preach from it last Thursday night, on the exact anniversary of my spiritual birthday, but I was led to take another text and I am glad I was, for, when I entered my vestry tonight, I found on the table this note—“Mr. Spurgeon, I want to tell you that your ‘good news’ [Sermon No. 2866, Volume 50— “Good News”] last Thursday, was the means of reclaiming a wanderer. How good of Jesus to take such an one as I am back and give me the joy I had when first I knew Him!” The writer enclosed a thanksgiving offering and blessed the name of the Lord. So, this text has been reserved for tonight and who knows but that there has come here somebody who was not here on Thursday night, and whom the Lord intends to bless? I only hope it may be so! Indeed, I knowit will be so!
Let us read the text again. “Look unto Me, and be you saved, all the ends of the earth: for I am God, and there is no other.” This message is addressed, as you perceive, not to the Israelites, but to the Gentiles—to the nations at the very ends of the earth. Alas, many of these nations have long been looking to their idols. They do not feel at rest. They know
that they lack something and very earnestly are devout heathens looking to their false gods for what they need. They make great sacrifices and spend vast sums of money upon their idol temples—but salvation does not come and cannot come through these false gods. Jehovah bids them look to Him, that they may be saved. Some among the nations are throwing off the yoke of superstition, but, sad to say, they seem to be falling into skepticism instead. The Hindu, when educated, turns from his idols only to make an idol of his own judgment. Many men worship their own wisdom. They hope, by searching, to find out the Almighty unto perfection—and this theory and that they promulgate and say— “This form of thought and the other will emancipate the human mind.” Ah, it is not so! “The world by wisdom,” in the old Socratic and philosophic days worked out that problem, and the result was that they “knew not God,” but, “professing themselves to be wise, they became fools.” And that is where man, with his great thought and wisdom, always drifts to some absurdity or another. Only Jehovah can save mankind! Philosophy is powerless in this matter.
The nations have been looking long, first to this thing and then to that, to save them. Sometimes they have looked for some great conqueror who will break the yoke of oppression and set the people free. But how often have they been deceived and the idols of the democracy have turned out to be the grossest tyrants that ever lived. Then there are various international and other societies formed by which men are to lift themselves up by confederation. They will look there, too, in vain—though all men should join hand in hand, they cannot do it. If they looked to God, there would be accomplished what all mankind would not be able to perform! One man advises this policy. Another pleads for that form of government. One has this idea and the other has another. And, every now and then, there seems to be a craze for something or other. Just now we are told that civilization will do away with war and I know not what besides. All evil is to be extinguished by the growth of commerce. But the Lord of Hosts has willed it that nothing shall save the nations but Himself and this poor, bleeding earth needs to be told, again and again, that, for her wounds—and she has many of them—there is no healing liniment but that which flows from the hands, feet and side of Jesus Christ, the Son of God! From the crown of her head to the sole of her foot, she is full of “wounds, and bruises, and putrefying sores,” and for all these there is no cure but the blessed balm that flowed from Jesus’ heart on Calvary—no remedy but the one Sacrifice of Jesus Christ. “Look unto Me,” He says, “and be you saved, all the ends of the earth: for I am God, and there is no other.” O Lord, turn the eyes of the nations to Yourself and to Your Son! When this happens, then shall the day of the world’s salvation have fully come!