Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit · Sermon No. 3324
“Turn you, turn you from your evil ways; for why will you die, O house of Israel?” Ezekiel 33:11.
IT is a token of the great mercy of God that He is very earnest in His pleading with men to turn from their sins that He may not be compelled to punish them, as He must do if they go on in their iniquities. A cruel governor is glad of an opportunity to show his severity and, therefore, not especially anxious to prevent offenses. But a kind, tender-hearted monarch He must be who leaves His Throne and comes down among the rebels and, with tears in His eyes, cries to them, “Oh, do not this wicked thing that I hate! Offend not against Me! Do not compel Me to take the sword out of its scabbard! Do not force Me to say that I will have no mercy upon you, but turn you, turn you from those evil courses which will certainly bring you mischief!” Sinner, God speaks to you tonight out of His Infinite Mercy. He has no pleasure in your death! It will give Him no satisfaction to cast you into Hell! He has taken an oath concerning it. “As I live,” says the Lord God, “I have no pleasure in the death of him that dies,” and to prove the sincerity of the oath, He cries, “Turn you, turn you from your evil ways: for why will you die, O house of Israel?” If you are not spared, but perish, it will not be because God is not merciful to you but because you are not merciful to yourselves!
The text as it stands is a very earnest exhortation from God. It is directed, I doubt not, to all sorts of sinful men. And it is directed to such in all sincerity and honesty, for albeit we believe without reserve in the Doctrines of Sovereign Grace, we do not for a moment desire to lessen the force or explain away the reality of so earnest an appeal as this! We can preach from such a text with all sincerity and intensity—indeed, as much as if we did not believe in any Election of Grace!
We would seek to give to all and every Scripture, the genuine meaning which it contains. But, dear Friends, solemnly penetrating and heart-searching as His exhortation is, and given as it is by God, Himself, if a man rejects it, he thereby adds to his sin. God calls to the sinner to turn, but turn he never will unless there is something more than the call! By the public ministry, by sickness, by the Bible, by conscience—yes, and by the common and universal operations of the Holy Spirit, God calls to men—“Turn you, turn you, why will you die?” But they seem determined to die and, therefore, they go over hedge and ditch to destruction—and this against all the warnings and rebukes of the Most High!
So they will continue in their sins and aggravate them by the rejection of the very exhortation which was meant to deliver them from them—and so make themselves yet more guilty before God by turning against His Word which was meant to have a blessing in it for them. I do not intend, therefore, being the means of adding to your guilt tonight. When I took the text, I felt as if I dared not preach from it. It shook me, though it may not shake you. As I read it, and read it, and read it again, I thought, if I deliver it as I find it there, I shall very likely only have to come back and say, “Who has believed our report?” And the most of my Hearers who are unconverted will only go away and say, “What care we for those alarming words?” So I remembered that when the Holy Spirit comes effectually to work upon the souls of men He uses the very same means and instruments which in our hands seem powerless. If I say to you, “Turn you, turn you, for why will you die?” you will take no notice of it. But if the Holy Spirit shall come and say this to you, then you shall certainly be obedient to it, for He has the key of the heart and He knows how, without violating the free agency of man, to make man willing in the day of His power! So that when He says, “Turn you, turn you,” they do turn, and when He says, “Why will you die?” they begin to reason with themselves and they see it is an ill thing that they should perish and, therefore, they turn to God!
Now, I will earnestly hope and pray that God the Holy Spirit will use these words upon some heart. And I intend to preach upon them, not as they stand in the Book, but as they will then stand in your hearts! Let me try, if I can, to picture what will take place in the man’s heart in whom God the Holy Spirit shall say by His effectual Grace, “Turn you, turn you, for why will you die, O house of Israel?” I shall try, therefore, to give an outline sketch of the spiritual experience which will be known in the human breast in which the Holy Spirit is now pressing home this solemn question.
There will be three things there—first the fears will be awakened. That word, “die,” will come like the point of a dagger to slay the soul’s false peace. In the second place, the heart will be affected. ’ ‘Turn you, turn you,” will cause the heart to turn away from its former lusts and turn towards God. And then, in the third place, the understanding will be set vigorously working, for the question, “For why will you die?” if pressed home by Divine Power, will turn reason into right reasoning—the man will begin to consider his ways and to ask himself seriously, why he should throw away his soul—why he should lose his most precious possession for which nothing can ever be given in exchange, or at its purchase price.