Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit · Sermon No. 2894
“Now therefore come, let us surrender to the army of the Syrians: if they keep us alive, we shall live; and if they kill us, we shall but die.” 2 Kings 7:4.
OUTSIDE the gates of Samaria, at the time mentioned in our text, you might have seen four miserable beings, gaunt and thin, with that sharpness of eye and visage which is always the effect of protracted hunger. They were lepers, suffering from a loathsome disease and emaciated by starvation. They held, as it were, a miniature council of war, and the result of their deliberations was that they said to one another, “Why do we stay here to die? If we go into the city, even should we be permitted to remain there, famine is so rife that we would soon die. And if we continue to sit here, it is quite certain that we must pine away and perish. Let us go to the camp of the Syrians—here is a little hope in that direction, though it may be a very slender one. The Syrians may put us to death and so end our miseries. Perhaps death by the sword is preferable to death by famine—at any rate, we can but die in any case. Let us choose the desperate alternative— let us take that course which, although it requires the greatest boldness, holds out some slight hope of success.”
You know the result of their decision. They went to the Syrian camp, found that the host had fled, feasted themselves to the fullest and, possibly, began to appropriate some of the plunder that abounded all around them. Then, suddenly, the thought struck them, “Here we have bread and corn in abundance, yet the people in Samaria are starving. This is a time of common distress so, though they did throw us out of the city, it would be a deed unworthy even of lepers if we left our fellow creatures without news of our discovery. Let us go back and tell the good news to the people in the city, that their suffering may be relieved as our own has been.” They did so and soon the famished crowds poured out of Samaria and fed to the fullest!
You are familiar with the narrative, so I will base upon it an argument which may prove useful to any enquiring ones who may be here. There are probably with us some who have before them an alternative somewhat similar to the one mentioned in our text. If so, I hope they will imitate these poor lepers in their actions and, afterwards, count it their joyful privilege to deliver to others a message as cheering as the one which these lepers carried to the famine-stricken people of Samaria!
I. First, then, THERE ARE SOME OF YOU WHO HAVE AN ALTERNATIVE PRESENTED TO YOUR CONSCIENCES.
There was a time when you were careless about eternal things, but that time has passed. You can look back, possibly only a few weeks, to the time when the Sabbath was to you a day of revelry, when the House of God was entirely neglected by you, when the Bible was a Book which you would not have read unless you had been flogged to read it and when prayer was a duty and privilege that you utterly despised. But now your conscience has been somewhat awakened and though not thoroughly as yet, still partially you have begun to perceive that what is written in Scripture is true, that we have gone astray like lost sheep, that our iniquities have prevailed against us and that our very righteousnesses are as filthy rags. You have heard the Gospel preached. It matters not where—whether in the cathedral, or in the theater, or anywhere else. But now that you have listened to the Word, Satan has interposed and has said to you, “Christ will not receive such sinners as youare! The Grace of God was never intended for men who have degraded themselves as you have.
There may be hope for other men, but there is none for you—the gate of Mercy is fast closed against you and it has been said of you, “‘He that is filthy, let him be filthy still; he has disobeyed his God, let him receive the penalty for that disobedience.’”
Now you perceive that there are just two courses open to you. You can sit still, but then you know that you must perish. Or you can go to Christ, but your fear is that you will still perish. Yet you can but die if you go to Him and He rejects you—but if you do not go to Him, you will surely perish. Even should you believe in Him, you fear that you may be lost—but if you do not believe in Him, there is no hope at all for you. Should you go to Him in prayer? Your fears tell you that He may repel you and say to you, “Get out! What right have you, who once cursed Me, to expect any favor from Me? You, who have scorned My Grace a hundred times and defied My Law, what do you mean by falling upon your knees and entreating My mercy? Go away, ungrateful wretch, and perish in your sins!” Yet still this Truth of God is present to your mind—that if you do perish there, you do but perish, and it is quite certain that you will perish if you remain where you are! Let me try and work out this question for you, sitting down by your side, as one of the leprous men may have sat down by his fellow. You know, my Friend and Brother, that should you die as you now are, it is absolutely certain that you will perish. Do not listen to Satan’s lie—“You shall not surely perish.” You all know that the Bible is the Book of God. I can hardly believe any man who tells me that he doubts whether the Bible is the Word of God. The Truth of Scripture is being so perpetually confirmed by all the discoveries of those who travel in the land where it was written that I can scarcely credit the doubts concerning its authenticity as being honest.