Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit · Sermon No. 3302
“Jesus sai unto them, Believe you that I am able to do this?” Matthew 9:28.
[Other Sermons by Mr. Spurgeon upon verses 27 to 30, are #1355, Volumen 23—OUR LORD’S QUESTION TO THE BLIND MEN and #1560, Volume 26— THE PLAIN MAN’S PATHWAY TO PEACE.]
I WANT to lay special emphasis on the word, “this,” in the text—“Believe you that I am able to do this?” The question of Jesus referred to one particular thing—it was not intended to apply to the general power of Christ to heal the sick or to raise the dead—it concerned the specific malady from which these two men were suffering. The question meant did they believe that Christ was able to cure their blindness? Among professing Christians, there is much so-called faith that is not really faith. Many of us profess much more in our creeds than we believe in our hearts and we hold a great deal more in theory than we do in reality. For instance, I suppose there is no professor of religion here who would dispute the power of the Lord Jesus Christ to do anything and everything—we believe that He has all power in Heaven and in earth. And yet, if it came to be a matter of personal detail and He said to us, “Believe you that I am able to do this?” we might not all be able to answer as promptly and as confidently as the blind men did, “Yes, Lord.”
I. I am going to speak about this matter, and I start with the very simple statement that FAITH, IN SO FAR AS IT IS TRUE, DEALS IMMEDIATELY WITH THE CASE IN HAND.
True faith believes that Jesus Christ is “able to do this.” It believes, of course, that He is able to do twenty thousand other things, but it believes especially that He is “able to do this”—to forgive this sin of which I am so deeply conscious, to remove this trial with which I am now so sorely afflicted, to sustain me under this temptation which so fiercely assails me, to strengthen me to accomplish this duty which so clearly is before me. As each special case arises, faith will exercise itself upon that particular thing and believe that Christ is “able to do this.”
There are solemn thoughts connected with unbelief concerning “this” which Christ is able to do. Over there is a Brother who is in such a plight that he thinks there is no way of deliverance for him out of it. He has a task before him which he hardly dares ask his Lord to enable him to perform because he lacks the necessary faith in his Lord’s power and willingness to help him! Now, my dear Friend, as you are in doubt in this case, I want to ask you what is to prevent you from doubting in the next difficulty that occurs to you—and then in the next after that, and so on? You say that it is only upon this one point that you are in doubt and that you think you have very good reasons for not believing in this particular case? But the next circumstances that occurs to you will very probably furnish you with just as weighty reasons for doubting—and so will it be with each succeeding case as it arises. It seems to me that you are shut up to this alternative, either to trust God in this case or else to confess that you do not intend to believe Him in any case. I know you will urge that the present case is a very peculiar one, but I shall remind you that the next one will also be a very peculiar one. I have not lived as long as some of you have but, during the years that I have been able to observe what has been passing around me, I have noticed that every year of my life has been a crisis in the affairs of the nation—at least so the papers have always told us and so have some good people always told us! I think it is very likely that the present time is a most solemn crisis and I also think with equally good reason, that this is a most solemn crisis in your history and that if you do not believe now, you are not likely to believe in the next crisis that comes to you. The fact is, you must either believe God always or you must never believe Him! If you think Christ is not “able to do this”—forgive this sin, remove this trial,
overcome this temptation, or strengthen you for this duty—you will probably think the same when the next testing times comes.
Moreover, it seems to me that if you doubt God concerning any one trial, you give up the whole case. You would have me believe that your present trial is very peculiar and strange. Well, suppose I admit that it is? Still, if you do not believe concerning this, you have given up the whole case, for what Christ claims is Omnipotence—and if there is any one thing that He cannot do, then He is not Omnipotent! If there is any one heart too hard for Him to break, if there is any one sin too strong for Him to enable me to abandon, then He is not Omnipotent. If you look this thought fairly in the face, I think you will scarcely dare to rob your Lord of one of the most glorious of His attributes! You would surely hesitate to put forth that right hand of yours to snatch from His crown one of its most precious gems! No, you would sooner lose your life than commit so traitorous a crime as that—yet you do practically commit it if you do not believe that He is “able to do this,” whatever, “this,” may be and, therefore, you do virtually say that He is not Almighty!