The Spurgeon Series 1857 & 1858. Charles H. Spurgeon

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ this maiden, whom we have introduced to you, the daughter of Jairus, she is yet caressed; she has only been dead a moment or two, and the mother still presses her cheek with kisses. Oh! can she be dead? Do not the tears rain on her, as if they would sow the seeds of life in that dead earth again? — earth that looks fertile enough to bring forth life with only one living tear? Indeed, but those salt tears are tears of barrenness. She does not live; but she is still caressed. Not so the young man; he is put on the bier; no man will touch him any more, or else he will be utterly defiled. And as for Lazarus, he is shut up with a stone. But this young maiden is still caressed; so it is with many of you; you are loved even by the living in Sion; God’s own people love you; the minister has often prayed for you; you are admitted into the assemblies of the saints, you sit with them as God’s people, you hear as they hear, and you sing as they sing. Alas! for you; alas! for you, that you should still be dead! Oh! it grieves me to the heart, to think that some of you are all that heart could wish, except that one thing; yet lacking what is the only thing that can deliver you. You are caressed by us, received by the living in Sion into their company and acquaintance, approved of and accepted; alas! that you should yet be without life! Oh! in your case, if you are saved, you will have to join with even the worst in saying, “I have been quickened by divine grace, or else I have never lived.”

      10. And now will you look at this maiden again? Note, she has no grave clothes on her yet; she is dressed in her own clothes, just as she retired to her bed a little sick, so she lies there; not yet have the napkin and the shroud been wrapped about her; she still wears the sleeping attire, she is not yet given up to death. Not so the young man over there — he is in his grave clothes; not so Lazarus — he is bound hand and foot. But this young maiden has no grave clothes upon her. So with the young person we wish to speak of this morning; she has as yet no evil habits, she has not yet reached that point, the young man over there has begun to have evil habits; and that grey headed sinner is bound hand and foot by them; but as yet she appears just like the living, she acts just like the Christian; her habits are fair, goodly, and comely; there seems to be little wrong with her. Alas! alas! that you should be dead, even in your fairest clothes. Alas! you who have set the garland of benevolence on your brow, you who do gird yourself with the white robes of outward purity, if you are not born again, you are still dead. Your beauty shall fade away like a moth; and in the day of judgment you will be severed from the righteous, unless God shall make you live. Oh! I could weep over those young ones who seem at present to have been delivered from forming any habits which could lead them astray, but who are yet unquickened and unsaved. Oh! would to God, young man and young woman, you might in early years be quickened by the Spirit.

      11. And will you notice, yet once more, that this young maiden’s death was a death confined to her bedroom. Not so with the young man; he was carried to the gate of the city, and many people saw him. Not so Lazarus; the Jews came to weep at his tomb. But this young woman’s death is in her bedroom. Indeed, so it is with the young woman or the young man I mean to describe now. His sin is as yet a secret thing, kept to himself: as yet there has been no breaking forth of iniquity, but only the conception of it in the heart, just the embryo of lust, not as yet broken out into act. The young man has not yet drained the intoxicating cup, although he has had some whisperings of the sweetness of it; he has not yet run into the ways of wickedness, though he has had temptations thrust upon him; as yet he has kept his sin in his bedroom, and most of it has been unseen. Alas, my brother, alas! my sister, that you who in your outward conduct are so good, should yet have sins in the chamber of your heart, and death in the secrecy of your being, which is as true a death as that of the grossest sinner, though not so thoroughly revealed. Would to God that you could say, “And he has quickened me, for with all my loveliness, and all my excellence, I was by nature dead in trespasses and sins.” Come, let me just press this matter home. I have some in my congregation that I look upon with fear. Oh! my dear friends, my much loved friends, how many are there among you, I repeat, that are all that the heart could wish for, except that one thing — that you do not love my Master. Oh! you young men who come up to the house of God, and who are outwardly so good; alas! for you, that you should lack the root of the matter. Oh! you daughters of Sion, who are always present at the house of prayer, oh! that you should yet be without grace in your heart! Take heed, I beseech you, you fairest, youngest, most upright, and most honest; when the dead are separated from the living, unless you are regenerated, you must go with the dead; though you are never so fair and goodly, you must be cast away, unless you live.

      12. 2. Thus, I am finished with the first case; now we will go to the young man, who stands second. He is not more dead than the other, but he is further gone. Come, now, and stop the bier; you cannot look upon him! Why, the cheek is sunken — there is a hollowness there; not as in the case of the maiden, whose cheek was still round and ruddy. And the eye — oh! what a blackness is there! Look on him; you can see that the gnawings of the worm will soon burst forth; corruption has begun its work. So it is with some young men I have here. They are not what they were in their childhood, when their habits were proper and correct; but maybe they have just been enticed into the house of the strange woman; they have just been tempted to go astray from the path of rectitude; their corruption is just breaking forth; they disdain now to sit at their mother’s apron strings; they think it is foul scorn to keep to the rules that bind the moral! They! they are free, they say, and they will be free; they will live a jolly and a happy life; and so they run on in boisterous yet wicked merriment, and betray the marks of death about them. They have gone further than the maiden; she was still fair and comely; but here there is something that is the later results of death. The maiden was caressed, but the young man is untouched; he lies on the bier, and though men bear him on their shoulders, yet there is a shrinking from him; he is dead, and it is known that he is dead. Young man, you have gone as far as that; you know that good men shrink from you. It was only yesterday that your mother’s tears fell fast and thick as she warned your younger brother to avoid your sin; your very sister, when she kissed you only this morning, prayed to God that you might find good in this house of prayer; but you know that of late she has been ashamed of you; your conversation has become so profane and wicked, that even she could scarcely endure it. There are houses in which you were once welcome; where you once bowed your knee with them at the family prayer, and your name was mentioned too; but now you do not choose to go there, for when you go, you are treated with reserve. The good man of the house feels that he could not let his son go with you, for you would contaminate him; he does not sit down now side by side with you, as he used to do, and talk about the best things; he lets you sit in the room as a matter of mere courtesy; he stands far away from you, as it were; he feels that you have not a spirit congenial with his own. You are a little shunned; you are not quite avoided; you are still received among the people of God, yet there is a coldness that reveals that they understand that you are not a living one.

      13. And note, too, that this young man, though carried out to his grave, was not like the maiden; she was in the garments of life, but he was wrapped in the grave clothes of death. So many of you have begun to form habits that are evil; you know that already the screw of the devil is tightening on your finger. Once it was a screw you could slip off or on; you said you were master of your pleasures — now your pleasures are master of you. Your habits are not now commendable, you know they are not; you stand convicted while I speak to you this morning; you know your ways are evil. Ah! young man, though you have not yet gone as far as the open profligate and desperately profane, take heed, you are dead! you are dead! and unless the Spirit quickens you, you shall be cast into the valley of Gehenna, to be the food of that worm which never dies, but eats souls throughout eternity. And ah! young man, I weep, I weep over you; you are not yet so far gone, that they have rolled the stone against you; you are not yet become obnoxious; you are not yet the staggering drunkard, nor yet the blasphemous infidel; you have much that is wrong with you, but you have not gone to all the lengths yet. Take heed; you will go further still; there is no stopping in sin. When the worm is there, you cannot put your finger on it, and say, “Stop; eat no more.” No, it will go on, to your utter ruin. May God save you now, before you shall come to that consummation for which hell so sighs, and which heaven can alone avert.

      14. One more remark concerning this СКАЧАТЬ