The authority of the Scripture is not of man, but of the Holy Ghost.
2. The Scriptures are no dumb letter, but the voice of the Holy Ghost, who by them speaketh.
3. The Holy Ghost is God, the Inspirer of the prophets that wrote the Scripture.
4. The Holy Ghost is a distinct person of the Godhead from the Father and the Son, exercising the proper actions of a person inspiring the prophets, inditing the Scriptures, and speaking to the Church. (D. Dickson, M. A.)
To day, if ye will hear His voice. -
The voice of Jesus
are the voices audible to man throughout this terrestrial sphere. As he journeys on the pathway of life, they salute his ears at every step. In the busy city, the secluded hamlet, the open field; in the arid desert, and on glassy ocean, their words are heard. These voices are vastly dissimilar in their utterances and in their tones, and are fraught with momentous consequences to man. There is creation’s voice, and they who lend an attentive ear will find “ tongues in trees, books in the running brooks, sermons in tones, and good in every thing.” Then there is the voice of conscience, which proclaims sin and guilt, warns of misdoing, and harasses with fears. Then there are a multitude of human voices which make glad the heart. The voice of a mother, resonant with ineffable tenderness. The voice of friendship, how it brightens the eye, awakens sympathy, cheers in the hour of adversity. How welcome the voice of mercy, as it announces pardon to the transgressor, or utters a gracious reprieve to the condemned. Then there are other voices, the object of whose utterance is to lure man from the path of virtue, degrade, and destroy. But amid these multifarious voices, the one referred to in our text ever sounds distinct. Like sweetest music it falls upon the ear of the soul, and, when listened to, makes melody in the heart. It is the voice of Divine love, compared with which human affection sinks into insignificance. It sounds in the ear of the sinner and tells of liberty, comfort, strength. Sometimes this voice is preceded by manifestations of Almighty power such as occurred to Elijah on Horeb’s mount. The destructive wind of adversity may break in pieces the mountain of earthly prospects; the fire of personal afflictions may threaten to consume our bodies; and then follows the still, small voice, proclaiming the illusive character of the fleeting things of time. This voice is constantly asking admission to the human heart Rev_3:20). The saints of old heard it, and were filled with joy; the disciples, journeying, heard it, and their hearts burned within them. Saul of Tarsus heard it, and it crushed out all his pride, laid him low in the dust, subdued his rebellious spirit, and evoked the prayer--“Lord, what wilt Thou have me do? “ But how many close their ears to that voice, and turn away from the loving Saviour t The hue of health flushes the cheek, vigorous physical life is theirs, easy circumstances surround them, and all will be well. The period when we are to hear that voice is to-day; now is the accepted time, this is the day of salvation. By to-morrow the pulse may cease its beating. “To-day, if ye will hear His voice, harden not your hearts.” He asks your attention, your heart, your soul, your all; but He uses no compulsion. If ye will hear! (R. Kingshott.)
An admonitory address
I. THE GREATNESS OF THE SPEAKER.
1. He who addresses you is Christ the Redeemer. This calls for serious consideration.
2. It is He who has witnessed all your past life and behaviour.
3. It is He who will judge you at last, as having a perfect knowledge of your whole life.
4. His judgment is “upright.” Then there will be no mercy, but all will be judgment.
II. THE THINGS WHICH CHRIST SAYS.
1. He says that your time is gone! This is a serious address.
2. He says that eternity is at hand!--a long, a never-ending eternity!
3. Christ farther says, What have you done with your privileges, and how have you improved the means of grace in past time?
4. Christ still farther says, When will you be ready, and what would make you ready to enter into glory?
III. THE TIME SET FOR YOUR HEARING THESE THINGS is mentioned in our text as being” today”--not to-morrow.
IV. THE CONSEQUENCES OF ATTENDING TO OR NEGLECTING THESE THINGS. If repentance be obtained, heaven will be your everlasting happy home. If sin continues, hell will be your doom. (James Kidd, D. D.)
A dissuasive from procrastination
I. There is a voice which may, with emphatic propriety, be termed THE VOICE OF GOD.
1. the providences of God, particularly those of an afflictive nature.
2. The sacred Word--both law and gospel.
II. THE VOICE OF GOD DEMANDS OUR SERIOUS ATTENTION,
1. Should a servant decline the reasonable commands of his master--a son, the gentle authority of his father--or a subject turn his back upon his prince, who might condescend to address him?
2. The nature of the subject upon which He deigns to address us is another reason for our attention to His voice. He calls us to no hard service. He invites us to approach that we may receive those blessings which constitute the happiness of man.
III. YOUR ATTENTION TO THE VOICE OF GOD SHOULD BE WITHOUT DELAY.
IV. IF WE WOULD LISTEN TO THE VOICE OF GOD WE SHOULD BE CAUTIOUS NOT TO ADOPT A CONDUCT WHICH WILL PREVENT OUR ATTENTION TO ITS ADMONITIONS.
1. Yon must avoid that state of insensibility into which so many nominal Christians have fallen.
2. It will be of equal importance that you also studiously avoid the inordinate cares of life, which first this obstruct and then close up the avenues to the soul, and so produce a fatal insensibility.
3. Moreover, it will be of vast consequence that you avoid temptation; for the mind is rendered insensible in proportion as it becomes familiar with sin.
4. Finally, beware of the whirlpool of scepticism--the dangerous shoals and fatal rocks of infidelity. (S. Lowell.)
Peril of delaying repentance
Not to listen to God’s voice (evil and perilous though it be) is a far lesser evil than to will not to listen to it. Men fail to listen through the impulse of passion; they will not to listen through deliberate choice. A single sin, grave though it be, is of human infirmity; to defer repentance, when called, is deliberately to reject God.
1. He does not promise you time. One time is our’s, now. The past is gone; the future is not yet. One time we ever have, a time fleeting by, an ever-passing present. God renews to us this present again and again, in every moment of our being. You can attend, or pray, or resolve at this moment. When the next is come, you may, if God’s grace continues, do the same. But you cannot efface what you have done; you cannot replace what you have left undone. But there will be a morrow which will have no to-morrow except eternity. God has promised pardon to the penitent, but where has He promised a morrow to the procrastinator?
2. He has not promised thee grace. He gives His grace at all times freely. We have no claim upon it; else it were not grace, but debt. He gives it overflowing, without, beyond, against our deserts. But He gives it with wisdom also. He gives it although it is abused; but He does not give it in order that it should be abused, or to encourage man’s abuse of it. But it would be to encourage man’s abuse of it, to store it up for those who not only again and again refuse it, but who refuse it now because they may have it hereafter (Rom_2:4-5). What is it but to make the mercy of God the occasion of sin, to sin on now, because God is so good, that thou thinkest that He will give thee grace to repent hereafter? And when wishest thou that He should give thee grace to amend? Next year? or the next? or the next? No! In none of these, if thou art even thus far honest with thyself, dost thou wish to amend. No, not yet. How is this? Because thou knowest full well, that even in these six years, thy passions will not be exhausted, thy desires will not be weakened; the wants which thou suppliest unlawfully will still be craving; the evil habits which thou nurturest will be even strengthened; the embers of thy earthly fires will not have died out. “When, then,” God may ask, “wilt thou choose Me?” Alas, if thou speakest truly, thou wilt say, “When I have nothing else to prefer to Thee.” God is nothing to thee. Thou wantest, willest, wishest nothing of God, but to escape Him. It is not God thou choosest, but thyself still. One thing alone thou really choosest, impunity in sin. Those who picture to themselves future repentance, picture to themselves at best only the exchange of pleasure for pleasure, unlawful pleasure, it may be, for lawful; but mostly they picture to themselves a time when they shall be worn out to the world and the world to them, in sickness or death. Then they would give up what they cannot keep; they would part with what has parted with them; and they would receive in exchange--not God whom they know not, but--in some way, they know not how, escape from hell.
3. But wilt thou then have the will to repent? Judge of the future from the past. Think of the time when thou wert just hesitating on the borders of sin, when it first looked pleasant to thee, when first thou was tempted to some slight forbidden gain to take some little thing that was not thine, to give way to some childish or youthful vanity, to taste some slight forbidden pleasure. If thou hast not repented yet, hast thou more or less mastery over thyself now than then? Is it easier to thee to abstain from greater sin now than from lesser sin then? Too surely, thy bands have been bound faster around thee; thy desires have become stronger; thy will weaker. People sin, out of the very habit of sinning. Sin wears out the heart, the mind, the soul, the strength; not itself. It lives on upon the life of soul and body. It lives upon their destruction; but itself thrives and is vigorous in their decay. You have seen the fungous, unsubstantial, putrid, stinking, disgusting, poisonous, fed from the yet living tree. You know it to be the token of decaying life on which it feeds. Such is sin. Its seat is in the will. It corrupts the will. The corrupted will anticipates the sin in act; it survives the power to enact. Avarice, falsehood, hatred, censoriousness, vanity, hypocrisy, love of ill-gotten goods, impurity, will live on in the aged sinner’s soul; they will accompany him to the last; they will pass out of this world with him and in him; but whither will they accompany him? Will they escort him, as an angel-train, guarding him from the evil spirits, who wait for the departure of the disembodied soul, to seize on their lawful prey? Will they carry him to Abraham’s bosom, into the realms of peace and truth and love, where nothing defile, I shall enter? Will they present him before the judgment-seat of Christ, who bids us to love one another as He has loved us, to purify ourselves as He is pure, to deny ourselves as He denied Himself and emptied Himself of His glory that He might take our shame, and thereby bring us to partake of His glory and His love? (E. B.Pusey, D. D.)
Taking the first opportunity of grace
1. It is God which worketh in us both to will and to do (Philippians if. 13). And no man can come to Christ except the Father draw him (Joh_6:44). Is it not then a point of wisdom to yield when God draws?
2. Thou knowest not what a day may bring forth; therefore put not off the grace that is offered thee to-day. Boast not thyself of to-morrow Pro_27:1).
3. By putting off an opportunity men make themselves more unfit for another opportunity; for sin, the longer it groweth the stronger it groweth, and the heart useth to be more hardened by putting off means of softening. As they who had received grace were exhorted to persevere therein, put not off to-day, much less let childhood put off to youth, or youth to man-age, or man-age to old-age, or old-age to death-bed. (W. George.)
The offer of salvation
1. That while men have the offer of salvation and the word preached unto them, it is their day.
2. That by the outward hearing, God requireth the heart to be brought down and mollified.
3. That He requireth present yielding, to-day, while he calleth, without delay, because we cannot be sure how long God will spare or continue his offer beyond this present.
4. He that studieth not to yield his heart to believe and obey God’s word, sounding in his cars, hardeneth his heart. For what is it else not to harden their heart, but heartily to believe and give obedience? (D. Dickson, M. A.)
Religion “to-day”
I. THE VOICE THAT SPEAKS. “To-day if ye will hear His voice”: whose voice? The voice of God. It is the Holy Ghost that speaks, the source of all inspiration; so that all Scripture may be regarded as “His voice.” And if it he the voice of God, does it not demand your deep attention, your prompt obedience? Shall God speak, and man refuse to hear? Nor does He speak to you in vengeance, but in love. He does not make His appeal to-day to the sword of justice, but He makes His appeal to the blood of His Cross. And oh 1 can there be any subject more momentous--involving, as it does, your highest interests for time and for eternity? “To-day if ye will hear His voice.” But how does He speak? Most impressively, most earnestly: by His Word, by His Gospel, by His providence, by your teas, in, by your conscience. But what does He say? There are two subjects, on which He addresses you: your own condition as a sinner in His sight--your guilt, pollution, and depravity; and the rich provision of His mercy in the mediatorial character and work of His beloved Son.
II. THE PROMPT AND IMMEDIATE ATTENTION IT DEMANDS. “To-day if ye will hear His voice.” Why “to-day”? Because to-day all is ready. The great salvation is ready; the way of access to the throne is ready; the great Intercessor there is ready; the angels that hover over this assembly are ready; and the Church on earth is ready, to bid you welcome to its communion, Why “to-day”? why “to-day”? Because you will never have a more suitable season than to-day. Be assured, that the longer you delay, the more deep and firm will be the hold which the world will get of your heart; “ the cares of the world and the deceitfulness of riches,” like the thorns in the parable, will have grown up to choke every good resolution. Why “to-day”? why “to-day”? Because you have delayed long enough. Ah! too long--too long. You should have heard His voice long ago; you should have heard His voice in the days of your youth; you should have heard His voice in early childhood. You should have heard His voice the first time He spoke to you. You should have heard His voice in the advantages which you enjoyed; in parental instruction--in the Sabbath School-under a faithful ministry. Why “to-day”? why “to.day”? Because you may not see to-morrow. Amid the stillness of “this night,” death may enter in at your window. Or to-morrow may come, and this voice not speak to you to-morrow. Or if the voice speak to you to-morrow, you may not be in circumstances to profit by it. Now, it convinces of sin; to-morrow it may not convince. Now, conscience speaks; but to-morrow conscience may be seared.
III. THE SOLEMN WARNING, the admonition, the remonstrance, by which a prompt and immediate attention to the voice that speaks to you is enforced. “To-day if ye will hear His voice, harden not your hearts.”
1. “Harden not your heart” with infidel objections. Do not say--“The Scripture is not true.” Have you proved it? Can you stake eternity upon it? You know you cannot!
2. Do not “harden your heart” by saying you cannot believe. You will not. It is not for want of evidence, but for want of inclination.
3. Do not say, “I am not responsible for my belief.” Iris false. You are responsible for your belief; the great God holds you responsible for your belief; and so far from your not being responsible for your belief, your destiny will turn upon it. It is upon that very thing it will hinge. “He that believeth, shall be saved; and he that believeth not, shall be damned.”
4. “Harden not your heart.” Oh! think of the consequences if you do. The result is inevitable; the consequence is infallible. He will turn upon you in indignation, who now bends to you in condescension and love. The cup of salvation is handed round amongst you; dash it not untasted from your lips. The sceptre of His grace is stretched out to you; touch it and live. (T. Raffles, D. D.)
Instant consideration of religion recommended
I. THE EXCELLENCE OF RELIGION, AND YOUR INTEREST IN THE PRACTICE OF IT. Both these are indisputable. What do you set your thoughts on, when you take the affairs of religion under your consideration? Is it not the glory of God, and your own salvation from sin and wrath? Now what is so excellent in itself, so honourable, so suitable to the capacities of thinking beings, as these pursuits which form the nature of practical religion?
II. THE UNCERTAINTY OF LIFE, AND TILE DANGER OF DYING UNPREPARED FOR ETERNITY. What is human life? A vapour, appearing a little while, and then vanishing.
III. THE IMMUTABILITY OF GOD’S PRESENT DEMANDS. Whatever He requires of you now, He will require twenty or thirty years hence, should you live so long. The method of pardon is already fixed. The Unchangeable will never alter it. And if He will not, men cannot. If you dislike at present humiliation; if you feel now an aversion at a dependence on the Lord Jesus Christ for justification; if the duties of holiness seem hard and disagreeable at this instant, they will for ever be so, in relation to depraved dispositions.
IV. THE LONGER IT IS DELAYED, YOUR AVERSION AND INABILITY TO IT WILL INCREASE. Was your life threatened with some distemper, how would you reason, and how would you act? Would you say, I will stay till I be a little worse, and then I will apply to a physician? Would it not be reckoned madness to sport in this manner with life and health?
V. THE NECESSITY OF AN OPERATION OF DIVINE GRACE ON YOUR SOULS. God is now striving with you. But what if these are the last touches He will ever give a heart so long hardened against Him? (Alex. Shanks.)
The solemn caution
I. THE VOICE REFERRED TO.
1. It is the voice of mercy.
2. It is the voice of Divine authority.
3. It is the only voice directly connected with the sinner’s salvation.
4. This voice addresses us through various mediums of communication.
II. THE ATTENTION DEMANDED.
1. That we hear so as to understand it.
2. That we hear so as to believe it.
3. That we hear so as to obey it.
III. THE SPECIFIED PERIOD FOR HEARING CHRIST’S VOICE,
1. Short.
2. Uncertain.
3. Succeeded by the darkness of the grave.
IV. THE IMPORTANT CAUTION ANNEXED. “Harden not your hearts”
1. By inattention to the concerns of the soul.
2. By pursuing the works of darkness.
3. By yielding to the influences of unbelief.
4. By a sordid attachment to the present world. Application.
(1) You are all responsible, for the voice of Christ has repeatedly sounded in your ears.
(2) You have all your day--a period given for the improvement of your privileges and mercies.
(3) How necessary, then, to hear His voice! How important that you harden not your hearts!
(4) Let our influence be laid out in bringing the ignorant and perishing of our race to hear the joyful sound, that they may not perish for lack of knowledge!
(5) Let us be watching and preparing for the second advent of the Saviour, when they that are in their graves shall hear His voice and live. (J. Burns, D. D.)
Sinners entreated to hear God’s voice
1. The first motive which I shall set before you with this view, is the shortness and uncertainty of life. I urge you to become religious to-day, because you are not sure of to-morrow. Need I tell you, that you are frail as well as mortal; that you must not only die, but may die soon and suddenly? Who, let me ask, are the persons that die suddenly and unexpectedly? Are they the feeble, the infirm? No, observation will tell you, that they are the youthful, the vigorous, the strong. She will tell you that while the former, like a reed, bend before the blast and escape, the latter, like the stubborn oak, brave its fury, and are prostrated.
2. This remark suggests a second reason, why you should not postpone religion to another day. You cannot properly, or even lawfully, promise to give what is not your own. Now to-morrow is not yours; and it is yet uncertain whether it ever will be. To-day, then, is the only time which you can properly or lawfully give to God.
3. A third reason why you should commence a religious life to-day, is, that if you defer it, though but till to-morrow, you must harden your hearts against the voice of God. God commands you to commence immediately a religious life. Now if you do not comply, you must refuse, for there is no medium. Here then is a direct, wilful act of disobedience to God’s commands; and this act tends most powerfully to harden the heart; for after we have once disobeyed, it becomes more easy to repeat the disobedience. But this is not all. If you disobey, you must assign some excuse to justify your disobedience, or your consciences will reproach and render you uneasy; if no plausible excuse occurs, you will seek one. If none can readily be found, you will invent one. This also tends most powerfully to harden the heart. A man who is frequently employed in seeking arguments and excuses to justify his neglect of religion, soon becomes expert in the work of self-justification. He is, if I may so express it, armed at all points against the truth; so that in a little time nothing affects him, no arrow from the quiver of revelation can reach his conscience. But if, as is sometimes the case, his excuses prove insufficient, and his understanding and conscience become convinced, he can avoid compliance only by taking refuge in an obstinate refusal, or by resolutely diverting his attention to some other object, till God’s commands are forgotten, or by a vague kind of promise that he will become religious at some future period. Whichsoever of these methods he adopts, the present impression is effaced, and his heart is hardened. He has resisted the force of truth, and thus rendered it more easy for him to resist it again. In a word, he has less religious sensibility; he has become more inaccessible to conviction, and less disposed to yield to it, than before. Now this is precisely what the Scriptures mean by hardening the heart to-day. (E. Payson, D. D.)
The Holy Ghost saith “to-day”
It is the mistake and ruin of many, both young and old, that they believe and obey Satan rather than God. The one motto is “ to-day!” the other is “to-morrow!”
I. A CREST SPEAKER. Much depends, for the way in which we regard and treat what is said, on the person who says it. In connection with the Holy Ghost being the speaker here I have three remarks to make. In regard to what is said, you may be sure that.
1. It is important--for “the Holy Ghost saith” it. Much importance is attached to what great men say. A man’s position gives importance to what he says--a king, for instance, or a statesman, or a master, or a judge. How much more important is the word of the Holy Ghost, whether it be in the way of warning, or encouragement, or command, or reproof! When He comes to you, you may be sure it is some momentous errand that has brought Him; and while all Scripture is His Word, such a saying as that in our text is His, in a special sense, and is of peculiar significance. And as, when a king speaks, every voice is hushed, so when the Holy Spirit speaks, there may well be the deepest interest, attention, and reverence. “He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith.”
2. It is true--for “the Holy Ghost saith” it. Sometimes the word of the wisest and greatest is not to be trusted, and even the truest and best may mistake. Here is One who never deceived, never mistook, never was untrue, whose word never was broken--the Holy Ghost. He is the “ Spirit of truth.” His is the “ Scripture which cannot be broken.”
3. It is kind--for “the Holy Ghost saith” it. He is the Spirit of Love as well as of Truth. With what a gentle voice He speaks. I dare say you have seen people in anxiety about their souls. Their happiness was gone. And in regard to all this, you have heard it said that it was the Holy Spirit’s doing; and you have thought hardly of Him in consequence. And yet never was He more kind than when He did this very thing. When He awakens and alarms, it is to warn of coming danger, and lead to flight and safety. Will you not listen to Him as a loving Friend?
II. A MOMENTOUS WORD.
“To-day!” This is what the Holy Ghost says. It is a little word, but it has a world of meaning in it. It may be said to be at once a warning and an invitation.
1. It sets before us the time for repenting. Sin is rebellion against God, and each new sin is another act of rebellion still further endangering the rebel’s head. What is to be done? The sin must have an immediate arrest laid upon it--must be forsaken. Here is a boy who has begun to be in earnest about his soul. He knows he is lost. He would like to be saved. But he would like to keep his sins too, at least for a while. He is just like that lad, who, while working among the waggons on a railway, has had his leg so bruised and crushed that there is nothing for it but to have the limb taken off. But he cannot make up his mind to part with it. Day after day he asks to have the operation deferred, each day thinking it will not be so difficult the next; though his whole experience has proved that it would have been easier at first, and that the longer the delay, the more difficult it will always become. At length the surgeon, if he is wise and kind, will break in on this state of things, and say, “We cannot tamper with a matter of this kind any longer. It is as much as your life is worth, to put off another day. The choice lies between your limb and your life; which are you prepared to lose? Whatever is to be done, must be done at once. It must be now or never.” And even so it must be with sin, with the evil habit, the forbidden indulgence--it must go at once. I know how difficult it is. It is compared to cutting off a right hand, or plucking out a right eye. “I’ll repent one of these days. I’ll repent to-morrow.” And thus it goes on from day to day, till at length the Holy Ghost breaks in with His great word, and says, “To-day!” There must be no more putting off. You have lost too much time already. It is as much as your soul is worth to wait longer. Or is there a girl who has got a sense of her sin, but fears she is too far gone to be saved. She has put off so long, that she believes she is now past hope. “Except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish.” She is like to give way to utter despair. Nay, but the Holy Ghost saith, “To-day!” It is not too late yet. It may be too late to-morrow.
2. It sets before us the time for believing. But here, too, what delay! Here is one trying to make himself better first. He says he is not fit to come to Jesus as he is. His heart is too hard: his sin is too great. He is like that diseased boy who can hardly walk, and yet refuses to see the doctor, or to knock at the infirmary door, because he is too ill, or does not yet sufficiently feel his need of help. He hopes to go by and by. He might not be received as he is. His case is too desperate. He must try to improve himself a little first. He does not see that the worse he is, the greater is the necessity for getting help at once. And when the Holy Ghost saith “ To-day,” it is as if He said, “Now is the time to flee to Jesus, whatever you may be. Now is the time to come to Him, all as you are.” What a happy day it would be if we heard some of you saying, “Lord we take Thee at Thy word to-day I we come to Thee to-day!”
3. It sets before us the time for working. It is good for ourselves to work. Idleness of every kind is evil,--unhealthy for the body, for the spirits, for the soul. And so, Christian workers get personal benefit from their work. We need to be doing some work for Christ and for others, to keep our own souls healthy and lively and right. It is good for others. There are few for whom the youngest of us could not do something. It is pleasing and honouring to God. God likes to see His people working. It is one proof of their love to Himself. But where is all this to be done? Here on earth. And by whom? Not only by the old, but by the young also. And when? Now. Perhaps some of you are purposing to be workers when you are grown up. You think of doing nothing meanwhile. But “the Holy Ghost saith, To-day”;--not when you are older, but now while you are yet young. The kind of work which the Lord now asks of you can only be done here--not in heaven. Can you think of so many perishing all around you, without your doing anything for them? Can you do or give nothing for the heathen now? And so it is as regards giving for Christ. I fear we are far behind in this respect. What a sad thought it will be, “I might have done something for Christ, if I had only began in time!”
4. It sets before us the best time for repenting, for believing, for working--“to-day.” Not when you are older, not when you are better qualified,but just now, immediately--to-day. You must have noticed the tide gradually coming in till the shore was covered; and when it was at its full, how eager the fishermen were to get their boats afloat; and how easy it was then as compared with what it was when the tide was back. The tide may be said to he in with you now: it is full tide; it is the time for getting your own boat afloat, and helping others with theirs: and for your encouragement, and for your warning, ere it go back, “the Holy Ghost saith, To-day!”
5. It sets forth the time for repenting, for believing, for working, as very short: a day--this day--to-day. You say you must enjoy yourselves, and see what the world can do for you. Or you must learn your business first. Nay; but here again, “the Holy Ghost saith, Today!” It is slipping past, and will soon be over.
6. It sets forth what may be the only time for repenting, for believing, for working. “Oh that thou hadst heard, even thou, in this thy day!” As if every one had his “day”--and when that is lost, it is lost for ever. “Thou knewest not the time of thy visitation.” This may be the only “to-day” we shall ever see.
III. THE LESSON.
1. Value to-day. Regard it and treat it as you do other precious things. We may well say what a daughter told me she heard her dying mother, a Christian woman, saying a few days ago. It was Sabbath morning, and when the early sunshine lighted up her room, after a long night of restlessness and suffering, she was overheard saying, “Dear day!” Oh yes, it should be a “dear day “ to us all, for it is the “day of grace,” the “day of salvation.”
2. Improve to-day. “Make hay when the sun shines.” If the day is so precious and so short, then surely we should make the very most of it. Do not waste it. Lay it out as a steward of God.
3. Remember that the night cometh.--Every day has its night, and so has this one. Whether you are improving it or not, it is going away, and the night will soon be on. (J. H. Wilson, D. D.)
The entreaty of the Holy Ghost
I. THE SPECIAL VOICE OF THE HOLY GHOST.
1. How does the Holy Ghost thus speak?
(1) He saith this first, in the Scriptures. Every command of Scripture calls for immediate obedience.
(2) Further, while the Holy Ghost speaks in Scripture on this wise, He speaks in the same manner in the hearts of His people, for he is a living and active agent.
(3) The like is also true when the Holy Ghost speaks in the awakened.
(4) Once more, the Holy Ghost speaks thus by His deeds as well as by His words. We have a common proverb that actions speak more loudly than words. Now the acts of the Holy Spirit in the leading of many to the Saviour are so many practical invitations, encouragements, and commands to others.
2. But why so urgent, blessed Spirit, why so urgent? It is because the Holy Ghost is in sympathy with God; in sympathy with the Father who longs to press the prodigal to his bosom; in sympathy with the Son who is watching to see of the travail of His soul.
II. A SPECIAL DUTY. “Hear His voice”--that is, hear it obediently, eager to do what he bids you, as he enables you. Do not hear and forget. Retain the truth in your memories, and, better still, practise it in your lives.
1. Hear ye the Lord when He instructs you. How often are men’s ears stopped up with the wax of prejudice, so that they are dull of hearing. They have made up their minds as to what the gospel ought to be, and will not hear what it is.
2. But the Lord does more than instruct you, He commands; for let men say what they will, the Gospel to be preached to the ungodly is not merely warnings and teachings, it has its solemn, positive commands.
3. But the Lord does more than command, He graciously invites; with tenderness He bids sinners to His banquet of mercy. Shall His love be slighted, and His bounty treated with scorn?
4. But the Lord does more than invite, He adds His promises. Oh do not count yourselves unworthy of them.
5. The Lord also threatens, as well as entreats. He declares that the despisers shall wonder and perish. If Christ be rejected, eternal wrath is certain.
III. A SPECIAL TIME EMPHASISED.
1. To-day, that is while God speaks. Oh, if we were as we should be, the moment God said “Seek ye My face,” we should reply, “Thy face, Lord, will I seek”: as soon as the invitations of mercy were heard there would be an echo in our souls to them. Hear God to-day, for to-day He speaks.
2. The apostle says in the next chapter, “To-day--after so long a time.” I see that some of you have bald heads, or grey hairs lie thick upon them. Is it not long enough to have provoked your God these sixty years? “To-day,” that is, especially while the Holy Ghost is leading others to hear and to find mercy; to-day, while the showers are falling, receive ye the drops of grace; to-day, while there are prayers offered up for you; to-day, lest the preaching of the Word of God should come to be a matter of routine, and the preacher himself, discouraged, should lose all zeal for your soul; to-day, while everything is peculiarly propitious, hear ye the voice of God. While the wind blows, hoist the sail; while God is abroad on errands of love, go forth to meet Him. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
To-day
From first to last, salvation is the product of the mighty energies of the Holy Ghost, and is brought about by His voice speaking to our hearts. We shall never be disposed to seek for salvation until the Holy Spirit of God in one way or another begins to stir our desires. Further, we may say that, although we are distinctly commanded to repent and believe the gospel, we never shall repent without His first having convicted us of sin; so that from first to last, on our side as well as His, salvation is of the Lord. All this is true; but it is only one side of the truth, though it is a side we must not ignore. I can imagine a man saying or feeling, “If that be so, I am not responsible for my conduct. If the Holy Spirit of God is not pleased to strive with me it is impossible for me to come to Christ; therefore, unless He make me willing I can do nothing. I do not distinctly feel that He is drawing me now, and therefore there is nothing for it but to go on living in sin until my call comes, if it ever do come at all.”
1. First, are you quite sure that God has not spoken to you, and that you may not have failed to hear His voice, either because in your sin you did not wish to hear it, or because in your perversity and ignorance you had made up your mind that His voice must speak in a certain particular way, while God has seen fit to speak after quite a different manner?
2. And, second, is your conscience quite clear that He never has spoken to you, and you have known it, and been convinced of it, and yet have hardened your heart against His call? It is quite true that you cannot come unless the Spirit draw, but is it equally true that He has never drawn? It is not too much to say, that whatever moves you in the right direction, whatever influences you to forsake sin and turn to God, is the work of the Holy Ghost. The fervent desire after better things, the inward restlessness, the sense of guilt, the feeling of shame, the fear of punishment, the longing for purity and moral freedom--all these are the effects of the influence of God the Holy Ghost. You shall never be able to say, “I would, but God would not.” Oh that God might never have to bring the apposite charge against you. I have spoken of one great danger against which we have to guard, if we would benefit by the Divine voice, the danger of ignoring it, and failing to recognize it; but remember there is yet another danger, and to it our text more particularly alludes; it is the danger of bearing God’s voice so plainly that we can entertain no reasonable doubt but that it is God’s voice, and yet while He is speaking hardening our hearts against Him. “Harden not your heart.” These words bring before us the thought of a capacity that we all possess. We all possess the power to harden our hearts against the gracious influences of God. It is a dangerous thing to do under any circumstances, even when our relations with God are not concerned. I once heard a man say, “I used to think it manly to repress my feelings, and so I set myself to steel my heart against them, and now I cannot feel when I would. Happen what may, I might offer my fortune for a tear, and offer it in vain.” This may be a serious matter. We have no more right to murder our feelings than any other element in our manhood, but that is a small thing as compared with the folly and the sin of hardening our heart against the Holy Spirit of God. And remember this is a sin which we all remain capable of committing, however strong the influences of God the Holy Spirit may be. He never so influences us that it is impossible for us to resist Him. What shall we say of the folly of him who mutilates his own moral nature of all its higher sensibilities and capacities of spiritual apprehension, and of his own accord elects to be “past feeling”--“twice dead, plucked up by the roots, and withered”? But remember, there is only one way of avoiding this terrible issue and that is by yielding at once. But when the Holy Ghost speaks, and you hear His voice: there is always a “now” in it. He takes care to put before you something to be done then and there. “To-day harden not your heart.” You are responsible for this winged moment that is even now flying from you. The Holy Ghost saith, “To-day if ye shall hear His voice, harden not your hearts.” Oh, think of all the possibilities, the glorious possibilities of to-day! (W. Hay Aitken, M. A.)
To-day--a voice for the opening year
I. THE HOLY GHOST COMMANDS IT, AND THEREFORE IT IS BINDING. The obligation is founded on
1. Absolute proprietorship.
2. Mediatorial interposition.
II. THE HOLY GHOST COMMANDS IT, AND THEREFORE IT IS PRACTICABLE.
III. THE HOLY GHOST COMMANDS IT, AND THEREFORE IT IS URGENT.
1. The Holy Ghost thoroughly understands the transcendent importance of the work. The Holy Ghost knows exactly the portion of time allotted you for the work. (Homilist.)
The right time
You admit that it would be the right time to start on a certain journey when the following four conditions were all combined. First, a clear duty to undertake the journey; secondly, a safe route; thirdly, a suitable conveyance waiting for you; fourthly, the danger that you could not go on a later day. To these might be added that year life depended on your starting at once (as happened to myself years ago, when I found myself in a village where cholera was raging fearfully). Now all these five conditions meet, and press you to betake yourself to the Lord Jesus for immediate salvation. Add now to these undeniable arguments the other one--that every day you postpone makes it harder for you to come. Manyyears ago the merchant-ship Lowell went ashore on the New England coast in a terrific gale. Her bows projected so far up towards the shore that the crew leaped off the bow-prit and were rescued, one by one, by the keeper of a neighbouring lighthouse. All leaped off except the first mate, who had been in feeble health; he continued to walk the deck and give orders to the men. The keeper shouted to him, “Jump ashore this tide or you are lost!” The poor man continued to tramp the deck, which soon crashed to fragments, and he was swallowed up in the wreck. What was the matter? The terrors of the scene had so deranged his weak nerves, that he had become insane and laud, heal at the idea of danger. Yet that unhappy officer of the sinking ship did not act more insanely than you do in persisting in risking the life of your precious soul. When Jesus calls, your salvation depends on prompt obedience. It was short work with Peter when Christ said to him, “Follow Me.” Again was it short work with him when be was sinking in the waves arid cried out, “Lord, save me.” It was short work with the Philippian jailer when he heard Paul’s directions and threw himself into the Saviour’s arms on the spot. All the Bible narratives (except that of Nicodemus) describe a prompt action where salvation was secured. Prompt obedience saves! (T. Christlieb, D. D.)
Only to-day is yours
To-day only, to-day is yours; to-morrow belongs to God, and you have no right to take it for granted that He will certainly give it you. What if He does not? An incident occurred some years ago which illustrates this point in a manner so exceptionally startling that I should not venture to relate it to you if it had only come to me by hearsay. I am able to relate it as a fact on the authority of a gentleman who was acquainted with the person referred to. A young lady of good family, a woman of the world, and a devotee of fashion, came home from a religious service, which she had been induced to attend, evidently profoundly impressed. On returning to her chamber, and turning over in her mind all she had heard, I suppose she felt under the force of a mighty influence that was drawing her towards better things. Moved no doubt by a spiritual impulse, she sat down by her table, and took pen, ink, and paper, and wrote down these words: “If God spare my life for six months from this time, I will give my heart to Him.” She signed her name, and then I suppose a misgiving must have crossed her mind, for she drew her pen through what she had written, and she wrote again underneath, “If God spares me for three months from this time, I will give my heart to Him.” Once again the voice within, I apprehend, urged the danger of delay. “Are you sure that you will live three months longer?” And a second time she drew her pen through what she had written, and once more she wrote, “If God spare me for one month from the present date, this day month I will give my heart t, Him.” The day before that date there was to be a great fancy dress ball, and she had made up her mind she must go to that ball at all costs; something, I conclude, told her that it would not be consistent to go if she were a real Christian, so she fixed the date just one day beyond this last scene of dissipation. “If God spare me one month from this time, I will give my heart to Him”; and she signed her name, and she went to her bed. The next morning her lady’s maid came to call her as usual. She tapped at the door, but there was no answer. She threw it open, entered the room, looked at the bed. There upon the bed lay her young mistress, a cold corpse, and by her side was a sheet of paper, and on this sheet of paper were written the words, “If God spare me for one month, I will give my heart to Him.” God did not spare her for one night. She had heard God’s voice, but, alas I there would seem to be too much reason to fear that she had done what I entreat you not to do. “To-day if ye shall hear His voice, harden not your hearts.” One more illustration, and it shall be on the brighter side. Some years ago at the close of an evangelistic service, a rough sort of man--a collier he was--came up to the minister who had preached. “Sir,” he said, “do you mean what you told us in your address to-night?” “What did I tell you?” “Why, sir, you said that if we were determined to seek and find salvation, we might have it to-night.” “Yes,” said the preacher, “I did mean that.” “Very well, sir; then I want to find it. It must be settled to-night with me; it must be settled now.” “Thank God,” said the preacher, “I am glad to hear you say that. Now let me try and show you how you may get it.” Well, they had a long talk together. The preacher set before the poor ignorant man as plainly as ever he could the way of salvation; and then they got to their knees, and there they knelt praying and crying to God together, while the preacher sought to direct the seeking soul to Christ. Time was creeping on, and at last the clock struck eleven. The preacher was very weary, and naturally enough, having his own home duties to care for, he said to the collier, “My dear fellow, I think now that perhaps you had better go home and consider what I have been saying. I don’t see that we can get very much further to-night”; for the poor man was very ignorant and full of unbelief. “Sir, didn’t you tell me that it might be settled to-night?” “Yes,” said the preacher. “Very well,” then he said; “I have made up my mind if it can be settled to-night it shall be settled to-night; I don’t rise from my knees until it is settled.” “Very good, then,” said the preacher, “if that is so we will stay together.” The clock struck twelve, still they were kneeling together; one, and still they were kneeling together; two, and still they were there. The summer’s sun was just rising, daylight was just beginning to dawn, the poor man was thoroughly worn out. Like Jacob wrestling with the angel, he had no strength left. The moment of our weakness is the moment of God’s power. Fairly exhausted and wearied out, at last he was fain to trust himself in the arms of Christ. He might have done so at first as well as at last, but it was only after these hours of anguish that he was brought to the point of utter helplessness and self-despair, and so at length he just rested his weary soul on Jesus, and in a moment the burden was gone. He sprang to his feet with a joyful shout. “Glory be to God,” he cried, “it is settled at last; it is settled at last!” With a happy heart he went on his way rejoicing. In the middle of that day there was a hue and cry raised in the neighbourhood that there had been an accident down in the coal-pit, and, as is the custom in colliery districts, everybody rushed to the pit to know what had happened. The tidings soon spread that a portion of the earth in the pit had fallen in, and there was every reason to fear that a man was buried under the rubbish. Half a dozen stalwart colliers were soon at work, working with all that heroic determination which distinguishes those men under such circumstances. For many a long hour they continued their toil, until at last they got near to the place where the unfortunate man was imprisoned. Gently and carefully they prised up the superincumbent mass, and freed one shattered limb after another, and at last lifting the weight off the man’s breast, they dragged him out all crushed and shattered as he was. As he felt the load taken off him, he opened his eyes for the last time. A smile came over his begrimed countenance as he gasped out, “Thank God it was settled last night!” and he fell back and died. To-day, to-day, to-day! (W. HayAitken, M. A.)
The folly of procrastination
It is recorded of Archias, a chief magistrate, in one of the Grecian states, that he was unpopular in his government, and excited the hatred of many of the people, who conspired against his life. The day was arrived when a fatal plot was to be executed.
Archias was more than half dissolved in wine and pleasure, when a courier from Athens arrived in great haste with a packet, which contained, as it afterwards appeared, a circumstantial account of the whole conspiracy. The messenger being admitted into the presence of the prince, said, “My lord, the person who writes you these letters conjures you to read them immediately; they contain serious affairs.” Archias replied, laughing, “Serious affairs to-morrow”; and so continued his revel. On the same night, in the midst of that noisy “mirth, the end of which is heaviness,” the assailants rushed into the palace, and murdered Archias, with his associates; leaving to the world a striking example of the evil of procrastination. In ten thousand affecting instances, something like this has been the conduct and the fate of men respecting the concerns of eternity. They have been warned, but, like the unhappy prince whose case we have recited, they have said, “Serious things to-morrow,” and when in an unexpected hour their souls have been “required,” they have left the world exclaiming, “How have I hated instruction, and my heart despised reproof!” (S. Lowell.)
The importance of the present moment
The old sun-dial at Alfric, in Worcestershire, has lately been repaired, and its motto regilt. Now all eyes may read the weighty words inscribed on it by a vanished hand of long ago--“On this moment hangs eternity.” Is this statement true? Assuredly it is.As we live and act at the present moment we decide our future: living for God, we shall live for ever with God; living for this world, we pen.-h with it.
Come while the lamp burns
There is a story told in ancient history of a certain king who lighted a lamp, and had it hung in his palace: he then sent heralds forth to bring every criminal and rebel to his presence, that they might obtain pardon. Those who came while the lamp was burning were set free; but those who delayed till the lamp had gone out, or who altogether neglected the invitation, met with a terrible death.
The folly of increasing the burden of sin by delay
A hermit was conducted by an angel into a wood, where he saw an old man cutting down boughs to make up a burden. When it was large be tied it up, and attempted to lift it on his shoulder, and carry it away; but, finding it very heavy, he laid it down again, cut more wood, and heaped more on; and then tried again to carry it off. This he repeated several times; always adding something to the load, after trying in vain to raise it from the ground. In the meantime, the hermit, astonished at the old man’s folly, desired the angel to explain what this meant. “You behold,” said he, “in the foolish old man an exact representation of those who, being made sensible of the burden of their sins, resolve to repent, but soon grow weary, and, instead of lessening their burden, increase it every day. At each trial they find the task heavier than before, and so put it off a little longer, in the vain hope that they will by and by be more able to accomplish it. Thus they go on adding to their burden till it grows too heavy to be borne; and then, in despair of God’s mercy, and with their sins unrepented of, they lie down and die. Turn again, my son, and behold the end of the old man whom thou sawest heaping up a load of boughs.” The hermit looked, and saw him in vain attempting to remove the pile, which was now accumulated far beyond his strength to raise. His feeble limbs tottered over their burden; the poor remains of his strength were fast ebbing away; the darkness of death was gathering around him; and, after a convulsive and impotent attempt to lift the pile, he fell down and expired.
Harden not your hearts
Hardening the heart
I. TO HARDEN THE HEART IS TO CHERISH A VOLUNTARY INSENSIBILITY TO GOD AND DIVINE OBJECTS.
II. HOW THE HEART IS HARDENED.
1. By fixing its affections supremely on the world. A striking exemplification of this was furnished by that miser whose band, cold in death, still held its firm grasp upon his gold, when his spirit had gone to the bar of God.
2. By refusing to turn the attention to Divine things. No truth is plainer than this; that a man will not feel what he does not think of. God unthought of, must leave the heart as hard and unmoved as it would be were there no God, no Christ, and no heaven.
3. By excusing sin. The object of every excuse formed by the mind is to impair or destroy a sense of obligation and guilt.
4. By presumptuous hopes and expectations from futurity. The very language of such hopes is, the authority and glory of God shall not be felt now; the evil of sin and the awful realities of a future world shall not be felt now; all sensibility shall be deadened by hopes from futurity. These hopes of a future repentance, fellow-sinner, are a shield to your heart, which the arrows of the Almighty will never penetrate.
III. TO ENFORCE THE EXHORTATION NO LONGER TO HARDEN THE HEART, BY THE CONSIDERATIONS IMPLIED IN THE TEXT, “To-day if ye will hear His voice.” The declaration implies
1. That to harden the heart is a fatal obstacle to bearing and obeying the gospel.
2. To harden the heart is the only obstacle to an immediate compliance with the demands of the gospel.
3. To abstain from hardening the heart is as easily done at the present as any future time.
4. The last consideration is that those who now harden their heart may never hear and obey the gospel. This appears, if we consider, in all such cases, the increase of guilt. To harden the heart against the voice of God once is a high measure of provocation; and if it be the tendency of sin, of accumulated guilt, to exhaust the patience of God and to provoke His speedy vengeance, what must be the effect of hardening the heart with the formal design of continuing to rebel against Him? When in its own nature it involves every act of future sin; when its whole strength--strength, too, thus to offend God--is derived from the fact that God is good and long-suffering? What purpose embodies baser ingratitude, a more direct insult to God, greater hardihood in rebellion, and a greater amount of crime; and what purpose could the sinner form to provoke God’s instant vengeance if this does not? Again, there is a fearful principle of God’s administration which arrays all its alarms before such persons. “Ephraim is joined to idols, let him alone.” (N. W. Taylor, D. D.)
Soul insensibility
I. HOW THIS HARDNESS OF HEART IS EVIDENCED.
1. One of these signs is dulness of conscience. A sensitive conscience is only the possession of those whose hearts have not been hardened, or have been softened. But where there is religious insensibility the hearing of the conscience is confused, its sight perplexed, its voice low and weak. This is the state of the moral nature of which Paul speaks when he describes a
“conscience seared with a hot iron”--an allusion, evidently, to the custom, that was very prevalent among ancient Eastern doctors, of cauterising any affected flesh. Sin is indeed a terrible caustic to the conscience. At first it burns the living moral tissue very painfully, but at last it leaves it insensitive, almost destroyed.
2. Another sign of a hardened heart is poverty of love. No tale of human want or woe stirs their pity or prompts their help; no statement of God’s great bounty or wondrous love awakens their praise.
3. Another sign--comprising those we have mentioned, and suggesting several more--is inability to be moved by the gospel truth.
II. HOW THIS HARDNESS OF HEART IS ATTAINED.
1. By familiarity with the mere theory of religion. It is well enough to have true ideas, to accept a correct creed; but if those ideas linger only in the intellect, are merely themes for memory, imagination, logic, and do not send down into the affections an influence that will permeate the entire being; if that correct creed is a mere mental property, held and defended jealously by the mind, but not colouring and controlling the plans and loves and whole scope of the daily life, then those ideas, that creed, however true, produce hardness of heart. They lose their freshness, and thus much of their force. The soul becomes accustomed to them, as the forester to the rustling of the foliage, or the mariner to the murmur of the waves. And that familiarity intercepts every effort to arouse, and startle, and awaken.
2. By a neglect of religious claims. Some by procrastination, others by stolid indifference, refuse to come face to face with such questions as “What must I do to be saved?” The capacity for religion diminishes, and almost dies out through disuse. Is it not thus with every power we possess?
3. By conscious indulgence of any sin. The man who continues, perhaps, in a very studied secrecy, to carry on some business scheme that he knows to be fraudulent, to cherish some desire that he knows to be impure, to maintain a habit that he knows is stamped with meanness, or uncharitableness, is doing the very best he can to become insensible to sincerity, holiness, nobility, and love.
III. HOW THIS HARDNESS OF HEART IS TO BE PREVENTED.
1. Be earnest. Triflers petrify with terrible rapidity.
2. Be real. They who simultaneously live two lives--the outward, upright, pious, irreproachable; the inward, false, godless, corrupt are, by all the restraint and repression that their hypocrisy involves, hardening their hearts, becoming in heart “ as hard as a piece of nether millstone.”
3. Be watchful. Not only to avoid trifling and to keep wide of all hypocrisy, but because of the insidious influence of familiarity with holy things, there is need in every one for watchfulness. Often introspect yourself to see if you are getting less tender-hearted; and if you are, use every means that can soften and quicken you again.
IV. How THIS HARDNESS OF HEART IS TO BE REPROVED.
1. How can the hard heart be broken? God has provided the means.
(1) The dispensations of His providence, such as the loneliness of Jacob, the manifold sorrows of Job, the sickness of Hezekiah, are designed to quicken our spiritual nature.
(2) God’s Word is a hammer that has crushed the pride, shivered the self-righteousness, broken the “ stony heart” of many a sinner.
(3) The Cross of the Lord Jesus Christ, and all that cross signifies of a life of love, of sacrificial suffering, and of atoning death, is the great power for melting and subduing human hearts.
(4) The Spirit of God, sometimes using these means, sometimes acting directly upon the human spirit, is the power that takes away “the stony heart, and gives a heart of flesh.”
2. What are the signs that the heart is rightly broken?
(1) There is consciousness of sin. As in broken stones we find fossils of the reptile or the fern, telling of the time when it was a soft, clay like substance, easily impressible; so in the process of breaking the hard heart, there is revealed the reptile of actual sin, as well as the fern of fair promise. “God be merciful to me a sinner!” “Father, I have sinned.”
(2) There is the sense of God’s gracious presence. When the heart is rightly broken, He who was “ sent to heal the broken-hearted” is there. “The Lord is nigh unto them that are of a broken heart, and sayeth such as be of a contrite spirit.” (U. R. Thomas.)
The response of the heart
I. WHEN WE HEAR GOD’S VOICE THE HEART MUST RESPOND. The assent of the intellect, the admiration of the understanding, the fervour of the imagination, and even the conviction of the conscience, do not suffice. God speaks to the heart. Oh that Christ may dwell there! God’s voice is to soften the heart. Alas I by nature we are bard-hearted; and what we call good and soft-hearted is not so in reality and in God’s sight. God wishes us to be delivered from hardness of heart, that is, from dulness of perception of His love and beauty, from ingratitude and lukewarmness towards Him, from pride and impenitence, from self-seeking and unrest. When we receive God’s Word in the heart, when we acknowledge our sin, when we adore God’s mercy, when we desire God’s fellowship, when we see Jesus, who came to serve us, the heart becomes soft and tender. For repentance, faith, praye
