Teaching Resources International

“Peter was grieved because he said unto him the third time, Lovest thou me?” – John 21:17

This is a pointed question, which demands a personal answer and should, therefore, stir up full and frequent self-examination.  “Lovest thou me?”  It is a probing question that is likely to excite much grief when pressed home to the sensitive, tender-hearted disciple, even as Peter was grieved because the Lord said unto him the third time, “Lovest thou me?”  Yet it is a pleasing and profitable question to so many of us as can give a like solemn and satisfactory response to that of Simon Peter, “Lord, thou knowest all things; thou knowest that I love thee.”

I. It is very necessary that all disciples, even the most privileged, the most talented, and the most famous, should often be asked the question, hear it in their souls, and feel its thrilling intensity, “Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou me?”

It must have been momentous indeed, or the Savior would not have repeated it to Peter three times at one interview.  He tarried on earth but forty days after his resurrection.  These opportunities for conference, therefore, with his disciples would be few.  On what subjects, then, should he speak to them but those which appeared to him of the weightiest import?  Of the times or the seasons that must presently transpire, he refrains to divulge a secret.  With the fulfillment of ancient predictions that prompted the curiosity of the Jew, or the solution of metaphysical problems that harassed the minds of Gentile philosophers, he did not meddle.  I neither find him interpreting obscure prophecy, nor expounding mystic doctrine; but instead thereof I do find him inculcating personal piety.  The question he propounds is of such vital importance that all other questions may be set aside till this one question is positively settled, “Lovest thou me?”

Hence, beloved, I infer that it is of infinitely more consequence for me to know that I love Christ than it is to know the meaning of the little horn, or the ten toes, or the four great beasts.  All Scripture is profitable to those who have grace to profit by it; but wouldest thou both save thyself and them that hear thee, thou must know him and love him to whom patriarchs, prophets, and apostles all bear witness that there is salvation in none other, and no other name given under heaven whereby we must be saved.  You may whet your appetite for logic, but you cannot with your heart believe unto righteousness while you occupy your thoughts, your tongues, or your pens wrangling about Calvinism and Arminianism, sublapsarianism and supra-lapsarianism, or any of the endless controversies of the schoolmen and sectarians!  “Lovest thou me?” that is the moot point.  Canst thou give an affirmative answer?  Will thy conscience, thy life, thy God, attest the verity of thy love to him?  Then, though thou be no doctor of divinity, though thou canst not decipher the niceties of systematic theology, though thou art unable to rebut one in a thousand of the subtleties of the adversary, yet thou hast an unction from the Holy One; thy love approves thee; thy faith has saved thee; and he whom thy soul loveth will keep thee; for time and for eternity thou art blessed.

To my mind, I say, the gravity of the question is palpable from the time at which it was put.  During the few days of our risen Lord’s sojourn, he would not have given it such distinct prominence had it not been in Peter’s case the evidence of his repentance, his restoration, and the full recognition he received.  But, brethren, what question can more closely appeal to ourselves, to each one of us?  Love is one of the most vital of the Christian graces.  If faith be the eye of the soul, without which we cannot see our Lord savingly, surely love is the very heart of the soul, and there is no spiritual life if love be absent.  I will not say that love is the first grace, for faith first discovers that Christ loves us and shall we love him because he first loved us.  Love may be second in order, but it is not second in importance.  I may say of faith and love, that these are like two roes that are twins; or rather of faith, and hope, and love, that these are three divine sisters, who mutually support one another; the health of one betokening the vigor of all, or the decline in one the weakness of all.

“Lovest thou me?”  Why, the question means, Are you a Christian?  Are you a disciple?  Are you saved?  For if any man love wife, or child, or house more than Christ, he is not worthy of him.  Christ must have from every one of his disciples the heart’s warmest affection and where that is not freely accorded, depend upon it, there is no true faith, and consequently no salvation, no spiritual life.  On thine answer to that question hangs thy present state.  Dost thou love Jesus?  If the verdict be “No,” then thou art still in the gall of bitterness and the bonds of iniquity.

But if the truthful answer of thy soul be, “Thou knowest all things; thou knowest that I love thee,” then, weak as thou art, thou art a saved soul and with all thy mourning and trembling, thy doubts and misgivings, the Spirit of God bears witness with thy spirit that thou art born from above.  The sincerity of your love to Christ shows more plainly than aught beside the verity of your relation to him.

Oh! what searching of heart this question demands!  Do not flatter yourselves with any false confidence.  Many persons have been deceived upon this matter.  Alas! they are partial judges, who sit in judgment of themselves; for every defect they have an excuse; they find mitigating circumstances to palliate their basest crimes.  No marvel to me, but infinite pity for them that they choose their own delusions and become the dupes of their own infatuation.  Their feelings, enhanced by the music of a hymn or impassioned by the fervor of a sermon, they mistake for an inspiration of faith and love; and when the emotions pass off, as they quickly do, they grow loud in their professions.  At first their own hearts were deceived; at length they practice deception on others.  O ye church members!  I beseech you, do not conclude that you are members of the invisible Church because you are members of the visible Church.  Though your names may be inscribed on the roll of the faithful here, do not be too sure that they are written in the Lamb’s Book of Life.  Never take your position before God for granted.  Do not shrink from a rigid scrutiny as those who never dare ask the question; do not disparage self-examination like those who affect to think it is the devil sets them to the task when he would beset them with legal terrors.  Believe me, Satan is too fond of lulling you into presumption to aid or abet in awakening you to make sure of your condition.  There is a gross infatuation which is the counterfeit of faith in God.  Its credulous victims believe a lie, and fondly they cling to it like limpets to a rock.  But sound believers are not afraid of vigilant self-examination; they are prepared to endure a severer test; they say, “Search me, God, and try me.”

It is your hollow dissemblers who resent all questionings, and take umbrage at any suspicions.  The man who knows that he has pure gold to sell is not afraid of the aquafortis with which the goldsmith tests it, nor even of the crucible into which he may cast.  Not so the impostor who hawks a baser metal; he entreats you to be satisfied with his warranty, though it is as worthless as his wares.  Search yourselves; examine yourselves, whether ye be in the faith; prove your own selves; know ye not that Jesus Christ is in you, except ye be reprobates?”  By yonder wreck, cast away upon the rocks of presumption; by the cries of souls who, concerning faith, have made shipwreck, while they dreamed they were sailing gloriously into harbor — I beseech you make sure work for eternity and take care that your answer to the question, “Lovest thou me,” is well weighed, truthful, and sincere, lest you should split on the mane reefs and be lost, forever lost!

And, dear friends, I am sure the more closely we examine ourselves, the more need for self-examination we shall discover.  Can you not recollect much in the tone of your thoughts and the temper of your actions that might well lead you to suspect that you do not love Christ?  If this be not so with all of you, I know it is so with me.  Mournfully must I confess that when I look book upon my past service for my Master, I could wish to blot it out with tears of penitent compunction, so far as my share in it has been concerned.  Wherein he hath used me let him have all the glory, for to him it belongs.  His be the praise.  For me there remaineth shame and confusion of face, because of the coldness of my heart, the feebleness of my faith, the presumption with which I have trusted to my own understanding, and the resistance I have offered to the motions of the Holy Spirit.  Alas for the carnality of our minds, the worldliness of our projects, and our forgetfulness of God in times of ease.  It is strange to me if we have not all cause to mourn over delinquencies like these.

And if it be so with those of us who still can honestly say that we know we love our Lord, what scruples, what perilous scruples might some of you entertain whose conduct, character, and the tenor of your lives may well raise a graver question!  You imagine that you love Christ.  Have you fed his lambs?  Have you fed his sheep? Have you given that proof which our Savior imperatively requires of you?  What are you doing for him now?  It is poor love that spends itself in professions and never comes to any practical result.  Let this enquiry, then, pass round: —

“What have I done for him who died

To save my precious soul?”

Alas! then, if instead of having, like the believed Persis, labored much in the Lord (Romans 16:12), might we not, some of us, suspect ourselves of having so acted as rather to dishonor his name?  Are you not tenderly conscious that Christian people full often lend their sanction, by a loose conversation and lax habits, to the sins which the world has allowed and applauded?  Jerusalem becomes a Comforter to Sodom when those who call themselves people of God conform to the usages of society and of such society as is corrupt at the core.  They say, “Ah! you see, there is no harms in it; for the saints themselves indulge in it.  They are of the same mind as we are; they make a great presence, but to no great purpose, for they do as we do.”  God forgive us if we have opened the mouths of the lord’s enemies after this fashion.  Surely such failures and such offenses make it necessary for us to ask whether we love the Lord or not.  And though we may hesitate to answer the question, it is well to raise it, lest, closing our eyes in carnal security, we should go on to destruction.  Let us put the question to ourselves again, and again, and again, for the question will not mar our faith, nor even mar our comfort, so; long as we are able to fall book upon Peter’s reply, “Lord, thou knowest all things; thou knowest that I love thee.”  And now, presuming that we are, all of us, convinced that the question is expedient and becoming, let me remark that: —

Ii. It is a question which, when raised, often causes grief.

Peter was “grieved,” but the Lord Jesus Christ never grieved one of his disciples heedlessly.  This goes again to prove the need of the question.  He was rather for comforting, cheering, and blessing them.  He inflicted no needless pain.  He shielded them from needless anxiety.  Yet Peter was grieved.  Now why should you and I be grieved when the enquiry turns upon our sincerity?  You know that if we do not canvass the matter ourselves, our foes will be prompt enough to suspect us, especially if we are in a public position.  The clearer your character the keener the assault.  Satan — and he is the accuser of the brethren — said, “Doth Job serve God for nought?  Hast thou not set a hedge about him?”  The devil’s taunting question has become a proverb with the profane.  What worse can they say of the Christian minister than this, “Is he zealous for nought?  Has he not a motive?  Is there not selfishness in the background?”  Base insinuations will, I suppose, be freely uttered about you whatever may be your position in the world.  Of the tradesman who fears the Lord, they will say, “Of course, he makes it pay.”  As for the merchant who consecrates his wealth for the love of Christ, they ask, “Do not you see that he is seeking notoriety?  Is it not a cheap way of getting up a name?”  We are sure to have the question raised.  Sometimes it sorely grieves us, because of our pride.

We do not like to have our feelings chafed in such a manner.  I cannot help thinking there was some sin in Peter’s grief.  He was grieved as one who felt himself aggrieved — “Is it not too bad to ask me three times!  Why should the Lord thus distress me?  Surely the blessed Master might have put more confidence in me than to press a question which stings like a reproach.”  Yet what a poor simpleton he was to think so.  How much harm comes from answering in a hurry?  When our profession is canvassed, we ought not to be angry.  Did we know our own hearts, we should keenly feel the accusations it would be reasonable to lay against us, and the poor defense that conscience could make.  When my enemies are finding fault with me and forging lies to injure me, I sometimes think to myself that though I can exonerate myself from their charges, there are other faults of which they are not cognizant that humble me before God beyond their utmost surmise.  Their conspiracies cannot explore the secret of my confessions when I lay the imaginations of my heart before him against whom only I have sinned.  How dare we whisper into the ears of our fellowmen the wish, the whim the like, or the hate that haunts one’s breast, or aught of the multitude of vanities that float along the rapid current of one’s mind?  What would they think of us who do not know how rightly to think of themselves?  Surely pride is put out of countenance, for the worst opinions our enemies can form of us are probably as good as we dare to entertain of ourselves, taking the evil of our hearts into consideration.  The heart is a very sick of evil; if we have not perceived it, we have it yet to discover.  The voice Ezekiel heard speaks to us: “Son of man, I show thee greater abominations than these.”  Little charm ye can find, because little cheer ye can get out of these sermons, which wither your vain conceit.  But they are not the less profitable.  You prefer the small still voice of a kindly promise, or the rich tones of a glorious prophecy, and then you congratulate yourselves upon the happy Sabbath you have spent.  I am not quite so sure that your emotions are the truest test of your interests.  Is that always the most wholesome food your children get which has most sugar in it?  Do they never get surfeited with luxury till they need medicine?  Is comfort always the choicest blessing we can crave?  Alas, we form so high an estimate of our estate, that to question whether we love the Lord Jesus Christ or not, lowers our dignity, annoys, vexes, and sadly grieves us.  Not that price is the only incentive.  Shame crouches full often in the same obscure corner where pride nestles.  Both alike are disturbed by a gleam of daylight.

Peter must have felt when he heard the question for the third time, “Lovest thou me?” as if he could hear the cock grow again.  He recollected the scene and circumstance of the dark betrayal hour.  Doth not the Lord remember my fear and my cowardice, the falsehood I told, the cursing and swearing I gave way to, and the paltry excuse that edged me on when the taunt of a poor silly maid was too much for an apostle?  Ah, she annoyed me, she irritated me, I was conquered. I became a traitor, a blasphemer, almost an apostate.  The tears, the bitter tears he wept on the morning of the crucifixion when Jesus looked upon him, welled up again from his heart into his eyes as the risen Lord looked into his face and made him conscious how richly he deserved to be asked the question, “Lovest thou me?”  Yes, and like bitter memories may cover some of us with shame.

Bitter as gall must the recollections be to some of you who have so backslidden as to publicly dishonor Christ.  I do not want to say an unkind thing to you, but it is good sometimes to keep a wound open.  The Bible tells of some sins God has freely forgiven and yet fully recorded.  It is no marvel if we cannot forgive ourselves for having in any way brought dishonor and reproach upon the cross of Christ.  The grief is healthy.  We sing: —

“What anguish does that question stir,

if ye will also go?”

But what deeper anguish may that other question stir, “Lovest thou me?”  Our cheeks may well mantle with a crimson blush when we remember what grave cause for suspicion we have given to our Lord.

Not that wounded pride and conscious shame are the only sensations.  Peradventure fear distressed him.  Peter may have thought to himself, Why does my Lord ask me three times?  It may be I am deluded, and that I do not love him.  Before his fall, he would have said, “Lord, thou knowest that I love thee; how canst thou ask me?  Have I not proved it?  Did I not step down into the sea at thy beck and call?  I will go through fire and water for thee.” But Simon, son of Jonas, had learned to be more sober and less loud in his protestations He had been tried; he had attempted to stand alone, and he had proved his palpable weakness.  He looks dubious, he seems hesitant, he feels scrupulous.  He is alive to the fact that the Lord knows him better than he knows himself.  Hence the diffidence with which he, asserts his confidence — “Thou knowest all things; thou knowest that I do love thee.”

A burned child is afraid of fire, and a scalded child shudders at hot water.  So a precocious Peter feels the peril of presumption.  His timidity troubles him.  He hesitates to give his word of honor.  Distrust of self distresses him.  He dreams his former downfall o’er and o’er again.  The hypocrisy of his own heart horrifies him.  What can he say?  He answers the accuser, or rather he appeals to the appellant, “Thou knowest all things; thou knowest that I love thee.”  His previous guilt causes his present grief.  Should like horrors haunt you, friends, give no, place to grievous misgivings.  Do not encourage them.  Hide them away to the cross; behold the thorny crown.  Fly at once, poor guilty sinner, to the great atonement which was made by the Lord upon the tree, and let that fear be ended once for all.

Not that it was all pride, or all shame, or all fear; I think there was also love in it.  Peter did love his Master, and, therefore, he did not like to have, a doubt or a dark suspicion cast on his sincerity.  Love is a very jealous emotion, and keenly sensitive when questioned by those on whom it intensely coats.  “Why,” Peter seems to say, “my Lord and Master, what would I not do for thee?  Though I was so false and so faithless in that hour of trial, yet I know that I am true in the very bottom of my heart.  My fall has not been a total one nor a final one.  There is in my soul, my Lord, a true, deep, and honest love to thee; I know there is.”  He could not bear to have that love questioned.  What would the wife say if her husband should ask, “Lovest thou me?” and after she had given a fond assurance of affection, he should repeat the question solemnly, and with an earnest and a penetrating look, especially if she had done much to grieve him, and to make him suspect her?  Oh! I can understand how her love at last would make her heart feel as if it must burst.  With what earnestness she would exclaim, “Oh! my husband.  If you could see my heart, you would see your name written there.”  It is hard, even in the conjugal relationship, to have a suspicion cast upon your affection.  Because of the tenacity of his love, Peter was grieved.  Had he not loved Christ so ardently he would not have felt the grief so acutely.  Had he been a hypocrite he might have fired with anger, but he would not have grieved after this fashion.  I tell some of our dear young people who get into trouble, and say they are afraid that they are hypocrites, that I never yet knew a hypocrite who said he was afraid he was one, and those who say that they are afraid they do not love Jesus, and are timid and trembling — though I do not commend them for their trembling, yet I have a much better hope of some of them than I have of others who are loud in their protests and vehement in asserting, “Though all men forsake thee, yet will not I.”  One is comforted to hear the confidence with which some of our young brethren can speak.  Their warm expressions of love refresh us.  Yet we cannot help feeling that they have got to be tried.  Perhaps they will not be less confident in Christ when trial comes.  They will be less confident in themselves; and it is just possible that, though their voices may be quite as sweet, they will yet not be quite so loud.  Years of trial and temptation, and especially any experience of backsliding, will pluck some of the feathers out of us, and make us feel humble before the Lord.  This grief of Peter, what a complex passion it was!

Iii. But if it has grieved us to hear this question, it will be very sweet if we can truly give the answer, “thou knowest all things; thou knowest that I love thee.”

Surely the preacher need not say any more if the hearers would just say what is in their own hearts.  Let the question go round.  With all your imperfections and infirmities, your wanderings and backslidings, can you nevertheless declare that you do love the Lord?  Can you join in that verse:

“Thou know’st I love thee, dearest Lord;

But, oh! I long to soar

Far from the sphere of earthly joy,

and learn to love thee more?”

If you can say that you love Christ from your very heart, how happy you ought to be!  That love of yours is only a drop from the fountain of his own everlasting love.  It is a proof that he loved you are ever the earth was.  It is also a pledge that he always will love you when the heavens and the earth shall pass away.  “I am persuaded that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” Jesus’ hand is on thee, or ease thy heart would not be on him, and that hand will never relax its grip.  He himself has said it, “I give unto my sheep eternal life, and they shall never perish, neither shall any pluck them out of my hand.”  Now let your heart say, “What shall I dot What shall I render to him whom I love?”

And the Savior’s answer to you will be,” If ye love me, keep my commandments.”  You know his “commandments,” as to the holiness of your life, the nonconformity of your spirit to the world, your private communion with him.  You know his commandment concerning your profession of your faith by baptism.  You know his commandment, “This do ye in remembrance of me,” as often as ye break bread and take the cup of fellowship.  You know his commandment, “Feed my lambs; feed my sheep.”  Remember this, “If ye love me, keep my commandments.”

As for you who do not love my Lord and Master, what can I do but pray for you, that his great love may now overcome your ignorance and aversion — until, having first been loved of him, you love him in return.   Jesus Christ would have you trust him.  Faith is the first grace you need.  Oh! come and depend upon him who did hang upon the cross.  When you rest in him your soul is saved, and, being saved, it shall become your constant joy to love him who loved you, and gave himself for you. Amen.

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“Peter was grieved because he said unto him the third time, Lovest thou me?” – John 21:17

This is a pointed question, which demands a personal answer and should, therefore, stir up full and frequent self-examination.  “Lovest thou me?”  It is a probing question that is likely to excite much grief when pressed home to the sensitive, tender-hearted disciple, even as Peter was grieved because the Lord said unto him the third time, “Lovest thou me?”  Yet it is a pleasing and profitable question to so many of us as can give a like solemn and satisfactory response to that of Simon Peter, “Lord, thou knowest all things; thou knowest that I love thee.”

It is very necessary that all disciples, even the most privileged, the most talented, and the most famous, should often be asked the question, hear it in their souls, and feel its thrilling intensity, “Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou me?”

It must have been momentous indeed, or the Savior would not have repeated it to Peter three times at one interview.  He tarried on earth but forty days after his resurrection.  These opportunities for conference, therefore, with his disciples would be few.  On what subjects, then, should he speak to them but those which appeared to him of the weightiest import?  Of the times or the seasons that must presently transpire, he refrains to divulge a secret.  With the fulfillment of ancient predictions that prompted the curiosity of the Jew, or the solution of metaphysical problems that harassed the minds of Gentile philosophers, he did not meddle.  I neither find him interpreting obscure prophecy, nor expounding mystic doctrine; but instead thereof I do find him inculcating personal piety.  The question he propounds is of such vital importance that all other questions may be set aside till this one question is positively settled, “Lovest thou me?”

Hence, beloved, I infer that it is of infinitely more consequence for me to know that I love Christ than it is to know the meaning of the little horn, or the ten toes, or the four great beasts.  All Scripture is profitable to those who have grace to profit by it; but wouldest thou both save thyself and them that hear thee, thou must know him and love him to whom patriarchs, prophets, and apostles all bear witness that there is salvation in none other, and no other name given under heaven whereby we must be saved.  You may whet your appetite for logic, but you cannot with your heart believe unto righteousness while you occupy your thoughts, your tongues, or your pens wrangling about Calvinism and Arminianism, sublapsarianism and supra-lapsarianism, or any of the endless controversies of the schoolmen and sectarians!  “Lovest thou me?” that is the moot point.  Canst thou give an affirmative answer?  Will thy conscience, thy life, thy God, attest the verity of thy love to him?  Then, though thou be no doctor of divinity, though thou canst not decipher the niceties of systematic theology, though thou art unable to rebut one in a thousand of the subtleties of the adversary, yet thou hast an unction from the Holy One; thy love approves thee; thy faith has saved thee; and he whom thy soul loveth will keep thee; for time and for eternity thou art blessed.

To my mind, I say, the gravity of the question is palpable from the time at which it was put.  During the few days of our risen Lord’s sojourn, he would not have given it such distinct prominence had it not been in Peter’s case the evidence of his repentance, his restoration, and the full recognition he received.  But, brethren, what question can more closely appeal to ourselves, to each one of us?  Love is one of the most vital of the Christian graces.  If faith be the eye of the soul, without which we cannot see our Lord savingly, surely love is the very heart of the soul, and there is no spiritual life if love be absent.  I will not say that love is the first grace, for faith first discovers that Christ loves us and shall we love him because he first loved us.  Love may be second in order, but it is not second in importance.  I may say of faith and love, that these are like two roes that are twins; or rather of faith, and hope, and love, that these are three divine sisters, who mutually support one another; the health of one betokening the vigor of all, or the decline in one the weakness of all.

“Lovest thou me?”  Why, the question means, Are you a Christian?  Are you a disciple?  Are you saved?  For if any man love wife, or child, or house more than Christ, he is not worthy of him.  Christ must have from every one of his disciples the heart’s warmest affection and where that is not freely accorded, depend upon it, there is no true faith, and consequently no salvation, no spiritual life.  On thine answer to that question hangs thy present state.  Dost thou love Jesus?  If the verdict be “No,” then thou art still in the gall of bitterness and the bonds of iniquity.

But if the truthful answer of thy soul be, “Thou knowest all things; thou knowest that I love thee,” then, weak as thou art, thou art a saved soul and with all thy mourning and trembling, thy doubts and misgivings, the Spirit of God bears witness with thy spirit that thou art born from above.  The sincerity of your love to Christ shows more plainly than aught beside the verity of your relation to him.

From “Do I Love the Lord or No?”

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“Jesus saith to Simon Peter, Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou me more than these?  He saith unto him, Yea, Lord, thou knowest that I love thee.  He saith unto him, Feed my lambs.  He saith to him again the second time, Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou me?  He saith unto him, Yea, Lord thou knowest that I love thee.  He saith unto him, Feed my sheep.  He saith unto him the third time, Simon, son of Jonas, Lovest thou me?  Peter was grieved because he said unto him the third time, Lovest thou me?  And he said unto him, Lord, thou knowest all things; thou knowest that I love thee.  Jesus saith unto him, Feed my sheep.” — John 21:15-17

How very much like to Christ before his crucifixion was Christ after his resurrection!  Although he had lain in the grave, and descended into the regions of the dead, and had retraced his steps to the land of the living, yet how marvelously similar he was in his manners and how unchanged in his disposition.  His passion his death, and his resurrection, could not alter his character as a man any more than they could affect his attributes as God.  He is Jesus forever the same.  And when he appeared again to his disciples, he had cast aside none of his kind manners, he had not lost a particle of interest in their welfare; he addressed them just as tenderly as before, and called them his children and his friends.  Concerning their temporal condition he was mindful, for he said, “Children, have ye any meat?”  And he was certainly quite as watchful over their spiritual state for after he had supplied their bodies by a rich draught from the sea, with fish (which possibly he had created for the occasion), he enquires after their souls’ health and prosperity, beginning with the one who might be supposed to have been in the most sickly condition, the one who had denied his Master thrice, and wept bitterly — even Simon Peter. “Simon, son of Jonas,” said Jesus, “lovest thou me?”

Without preface, for we shall have but little time this morning — may God help us to make good use of it! — we shall mention three things: first a solemn question — “Lovest thou me?” secondly, a discreet answer, “Yes, Lord, thou knowest that I love thee,” and thirdly, a required demonstration of the fact, “He saith unto him, Feed my lambs;” or, again, “Feed my sheep.”

I. First, then, here was a SOLEMN QUESTION, which our Savior put to Peter, not for his own information, for, as Peter said, “Thou knowest that I love thee,” but for Peter’s examination.  It is well, especially after a foul sin, that the Christian should well probe the wound.  It is right that he should examine himself; for sin gives grave cause for suspicion, and it would be wrong for a Christian to live an hour with a suspicion concerning his spiritual estate, unless he occupy that hour in examination of himself.  Self-examination should more especially follow sin, though it ought to be the daily habit of every Christian and should be practiced by him perpetually.  Our Savior, I say, asked this question of Peter, that he might ask it of himself; so we may suppose it asked of us this morning that we may put it to our own hearts.  Let each one ask himself then in his Savior’s name, for his own profit, “Lovest thou the Lord? Lovest thou the Savior?  Lovest thou the ever-blessed Redeemer?”

Note what this question was.  It was a question concerning Peter’s love.  He did not say, “Simon, son of Jonas, fearest thou me.”  He did not say, “Dost thou admire me? Dost thou adore me?”  Nor was it even a question concerning his faith.  He did not say, “Simon, son of Jonas, believest thou in me?” but he asked him another question, “Lovest thou me?”  I take it, that is because love is the very best evidence of piety.  Love is the brightest of all the graces; and hence it becomes the best evidence.  I do not believe love to be superior to faith.  I believe faith to be the groundwork of our salvation.  I think faith to be the mother grace, and love springs from it.  Faith I believe to be the root grace, and love grows from it.  But then, faith is not an evidence for brightness equal to love.  Faith, if we have it, is a sure and certain sign that we are God’s children, and so is every other grace a sure and certain one, but many of them cannot be seen by others.  Love is a more sparkling one than any other.  If I have a true fear of God in my heart, then am I God’s child; but since fear is a grace that is more dim and hath not that halo of glory over it that love has, love becomes one of the very best evidences and one of the easiest signs of discerning whether we are alive to the Savior.

He that lacketh love must lack also every other grace in the proportion in which he lacketh love.  If love be little, I believe it is a sign that faith is little, for he that believeth much loveth much.  If love be little, fear will be little, and courage for God will be little, and whatsoever graces there be, though faith lieth at the root of them all, yet do they so sweetly hang on love, that if love be weak, all the rest of the graces most assuredly will be so.  Our Lord asked Peter, then, that question, Lovest thou me?”

And note, again, that he did not ask Peter anything about his doings.  He did not say, “Simon Peter, how much hast thou wept?  How often hast thou done penance on account of thy great sin?  How often hast thou on thy knees sought mercy at my hand for the slight thou hast done to me and for that terrible cursing and swearing wherewith thou didst disown thy Lord, whom thou hadst declared thou wouldst follow even to prison and to death?”  No, it was not in reference to his works, but in reference to the state of his heart that Jesus said, “Lovest thou me?”  To teach us this; that though works do follow after a sincere love, yet love excels the works, and works without love are not evidences worth having.  We may have some tears; but they are not the tears that God shall accept, if there be no love to him.  We may have some works; but they are not acceptable works, if they are not done out of love to his person.  We may perform very many of the outward, ritual observances of religion; but unless love lies at the bottom, all these things are vein and useless.  The question, then, “Lovest thou me?” is a very vital question; far more so than one that merely concerns the outward conduct.  It is a question that goes into the very heart and in such a way that it brings the whole heart to one question; for if love be wrong, everything else is wrong.  “Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou me?”

Ah! dear beloved, we have very much cause for asking ourselves this question.  If our Savior were no more than a man like ourselves, he might often doubt whether we love him at all.  Let me just remind you of sundry things which give us very great cause to ask this question: “Lovest thou me?”  I will deal only with the last week.  Come, my Christian brother, look at thine own conduct.  Do not thy sins make thee doubt whether thou dost love thy Master?  Come, look over the sins of this week: when thou wast speaking with an angry word and with a sullen look, might not thy Lord have touched thee, and said, “Lovest thou me?”  When thou wast doing such-and-such a thing, which thou right well knowest in thy conscience was not according to his precept, might he not have said, “Lovest thou me?”  Canst thou not remember the murmuring word because something had gone wrong with thee in business this week, and thou west speaking ill of the God of providence for it?  Oh, might not the loving Savior, with pity in his languid eye, have said to thee, “What, speak thus?  Lovest thou me?”

I need not stop to mention the various sins of which ye have been guilty.  Ye have sinned, I am sure, enough to give good ground for self-suspicion, if ye did not still hang on this: that his love to you, not your love to him, is the seal of your discipleship.  Oh, do you not think within yourselves, “If I had loved him more, would I have sinned so much?  And oh, can I love him when I have broken so many of his commandments.  Have I reflected his glorious image to the world as I should have done?  Have I not wasted many hours within this week that I might have spent in winning souls to him?  Have I not thrown away many precious moments in light and frivolous conversation which I might have spent in earnest prayer?  Oh! how many words have I uttered, which if they have not been filthy, (as I trust they have not) yet have not been such as have ministered grace to the hearers?  Oh, how many follies have I indulged in?  How many sins have I winked at?  How many crimes have I covered over?  How have I made my Savior’s heart to bleed?  How have I done dishonor to his cause? How have I in some degree disgraced my heart’s profession of love to him?”  Oh, ask these questions of thyself, beloved, and say, “Is this thy kindness to thy Friend?”  But I hope this week has been one wherein thou hast sinned little openly as to the world, or even in thine own estimation, as to open acts of crime.

But now let me put another question to thee, Does not thy worldliness make thee doubt?  How hast thou been occupied with the world, from Monday morning to the last hour of Saturday night?  Thou hast scarce had time to think of him.  What corners hast thou pushed thy Jesus into, to make room for thy bales of goods?  How hast thou stowed him away into one short five minutes to make room for thy ledger or thy day-book?  How little time hast thou given to him!  Thou hast been occupied with the shop, with the exchange, and the farmyard; and thou hast had little time to commune with him!  Come, just think!  Remember any one day this week; canst thou say that thy soul always flew upward with passionate desires to him?  Didst thou pant like a hart for thy Savior during the week?  Nay, perhaps there was a whole day went by, and thou scarcely though test of him till the winding up of it; and then thou couldst only upbraid thyself, “How have I forgotten Christ today?  I have not beheld his person; I have not walked with him.  I have not done as Enoch did!  I knew he would come into the shop with me; I knew he is such a blessed Christ that he would stand behind the counter with me; I knew he was such a joyous Lord Jesus that he would walk through the market with me!  But I left him at home and forgot him all the day long.”  Surely, surely, beloved, when thou rememberest thy worldliness, thou must say of thyself; “O Lord, thou mightest well ask, “Lovest thou me?’”

Consider again, I beseech thee, how cold thou hast been this week at the mercy-seat.  Thou hast been there, for thou canst not live without it; thou hast lifted up thy heart in prayer, for thou art a Christian, and prayer is as necessary to thee as thy breath. But oh! with what a poor asthmatic breath hast thou lived this week!  How little hast thou breathed?  Dost not remember how hurried was thy prayer on Monday morning, how driven thou wast on Tuesday night?  Canst thou not recollect how languid was thy heart, when on another occasion thou wast on thy knees?  Thou hast had little wrestling, mayhap, this week; little agonizing; them hast had little of the prayer which prevaileth; thou hast scarcely laid hold of the horns of the altar; thou hast stood in the distance and seen the smoke at the altar, but thou hast not laid hold of the horns of it.  Come, ask thyself, do not thy prayers make thee doubt?  I say, honestly before you all, my own prayers often make me doubt, and I know nothing that gives me more grave cause of disquietude.  When I labor to pray — oh! that rascally devil! — fifty thousand thoughts he tries to inject, to take me off from prayer; and when I will and must pray, oh, what an absence there is of that burning fervent desire; and when I would come right close to God, when I would weep my very eyes out in penitence, and would believe and take the blessing, oh, what little faith and what little penitence there is!  Verily, I have thought that prayer has made me more unbelieving than anything else.  I could believe over the tops of my sins, but sometimes I can scarcely believe over the tops of my prayers — for oh! how cold is prayer when it is cold!  Of all things that are bad when cold, I think prayer is the worst, for it becomes like a very mockery, and instead of warming the heart, it makes it colder than it was before and seems even to damp its life and spirit — and fills it full of doubts whether it is really a heir of heaven and accepted of Christ.  Oh! look at thy cold prayers, Christian, and say is not thy Savior right to ask this question very solemnly, “Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou me?”

But stop, again; just one more word for thee to reflect upon.  Perhaps thou hast had much prayer, and this has been a time of refreshing from the presence of the Lord.  But yet, mayhap, thou knowest, thou hast not gone so far this week as thou mightest have done, in another exercise of godliness that is even better than prayer, — I mean communion and fellowship.  Oh beloved, thou hast this week had but little sitting under the apple tree and finding its shadow great delight to thee.  Thou hast not gone much this week to the banqueting house and had its banner of love over thee.  Come, bethink thyself, how little hast thou seen thy Lord this week!  Perhaps he has been absent the greater part of the time; and hast thou not groaned?  Hast thou not wept?  Hast thou not sighed after him?  Sure, then, thou canst not have loved him as thou shouldst, else thou couldst not have borne his absence, thou couldst not have endured it calmly, if thou hadst the affection for him a sanctified spirit has for its Lord.  Thou didst have one sweet visit from him in the week, and why didst thou let him go?  Why didst thou not constrain him to abide with thee?  Why didst thou not lay hold of the skirts of his garment, and say, “Why shouldst thou be like a wayfaring man, and as one that turneth aside and tarrieth for a night?  Oh I my lord, thou shalt dwell with me.  I will keep thee.  I will detain thee in my company. I cannot let thee go.  I love thee and I will constrain thee to dwell with me this night and the next day.  Long as I can keep thee, will I keep thee.”  But no; thou wast foolish; thou didst let him go.  Oh! soul, why didst thou not lay hold of his arm, and say, “I will not let thee go.”  But thou didst lay hold on him so feebly, thou didst suffer him to depart so quickly, he might have turned round, and said to thee, as he said to Simon, “Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou me?”

Now, I have asked you all these questions, because I have been asking them of myself.  I feel that I must answer to nearly every one of them, “Lord, there is great cause for me to ask myself that question,” and I think that most of you, if you are honest to yourselves, will say the same.  I do not approve of the man that says, “I know I love Christ, and I never have a doubt about it;” because we often have reason to doubt ourselves, a believer’s strong faith is not a strong faith in his own love to Christ — it is a strong faith in Christ’s love to him.  There is no faith which always believes that it loves Christ.  Strong faith has its conflicts, and a true believer will often wrestle in the very teeth of his own feelings.  Lord, if I never did love thee, nevertheless, if I am not a saint, I am a sinner.  Lord, I still believe; help thou mine unbelief.  The disciple can believe, when he feels no love; for he can believe that Christ loveth the soul; and when he hath no evidence he can come to Christ without evidence and lay hold of him, just as he is, with naked faith and still hold fast by him.  Though he see not his signs, though he walk in darkness and there be no light, still may he trust in the Lord, and stay upon his God — but to be certain at all times that we love the Lord is quite another matter; about this we have need continually to question ourselves, and most scrupulously to examine both the nature and the extent of our evidences.

II. And now I come to the second thing, which is A DISCREET ANSWER.

“Simon son of Jonas, lovest thou me?”  Simon gave a very good answer.  Jesus asked him, in the first place, whether he loved him better than others.  Simon would not say that: he had once been a little proud — more than a little — and thought he was better than the other disciples.  But this time he evaded that question, he would not say that he loved better than others.  And I am sure there is no loving heart that will think it loves even better than the least of God’s children.  I believe the higher a man is in grace, the lower he will be in his own esteem, and he will be the last person to claim any supremacy over others in the divine grace of love to Jesus.

But mark how Simon Peter did answer: he did not answer as to the quantity but as to the quality of his love.  He would aver that he loved Christ, but not that he loved Christ better than others.  “Lord, I cannot say how much I love thee; but thou knowest all things; thou knowest that I do love thee.  So far I can aver: as to the quantity of my love, I cannot say much about it.”

But just notice, again, the discreet manner in which Peter answered.  Some of us, if we had been asked that question, would have answered foolishly.  We should have said, “Lord, I have preached for thee so many times this week; Lord, I have distributed of my substance to the poor this week.  Blessed be thy name, thou last given me grace to walk humbly, faithfully, and honestly, and therefore, Lord, I think I can say, ‘I love thee.’”  We should have brought forward our good works before our Master, as being the evidences of our love; we should have said, “Lord, thou hast seen me during this week.  As Nehemiah did of old, “Forget not my good works. O Lord, I thank thee. I know they are thy gifts, but I think they are proofs of my love.”  That would have been a very good answer if we had been questioned by our fellow man, and he had said, “You do not always love your Savior;” but it would be foolish for us to tell the Master that.  Peter’s answer was wise; “Lord, thou knowest that I love thee.”  You know the Master might have said to Peter had he appealed to his works, “Yes, thou mayest preach and yet not love me; thou mayest pray and yet not love me; thou mayest do all these works and yet have no love to me.  I did not ask thee what are the evidences of thy love.  I asked thee the heart of it.”

Very likely all my dear friends here would not have answered in the fashion I have supposed; but they would have said, “Love thee Lord?  Why, my heart is all on fire towards thee; I feel as if I could go to prison and to death for thee!  Sometimes, when I think of thee, my heart is ravished with bliss; and when thou art absent, O Lord, I moan and cry like a dove that has lost its mate.  Yes, I feel I love thee, O my Christ.”  But that would have been very foolish, because although we may often rejoice in our own feelings — they are joyful things — it would not do to plead them with our Lord, for he might answer, “Ah! thou feelest joyful at the mention of my name.  So, no doubt, has many a deluded one, because he had a fictitious faith, and a fancied hope in Christ; therefore the name of Christ seemed to gladden him.  Thou sayst, ‘I have felt dull when thou hast been absent.’  That might have been accounted for from natural circumstances; you had a headache, perhaps, or some other ailment.  ‘But,’ sayest thou, ‘I felt so happy when he was present that I thought I could die.’ Ah, in such manner Peter had spoken many a time before; but a sorry mess he made of it when he trusted his feelings, for he would have sunk into the sea but for Christ; and eternally damned his soul, if it had not been for his grace, when, with cursing and swearing he thrice denied his Lord.  But no, Peter was wise; he did not bring forward his frames and feelings, nor did he bring his evidences: though they are good in themselves, he did not bring them before Christ.  But, as though he shall say, “Lord, I appeal to thine omnipotence. I am not going to tell thee that the volume of my heart must contain such-and-such matter, because there is such-and-such a mark on its cover; for, Lord, thou canst read inside of it; and, therefore I need not tell thee what the title is, nor read over to thee the index of the content; Lord, thou knowest that I love thee.”

Now, could we, this morning, dear friends, give such an answer as that to the question?  If Christ should come here, if he were now to walk down these aisles, and along the pews, could we appeal to his own divine Omniscience, his infallible knowledge of our hearts, that we all love him?  There is a test-point between a hypocrite and a real Christian.  If thou art a hypocrite, thou mightest say, “Lord, my minister knows that I love thee.  Lord, the deacons know that I love thee; they think I do, for they have given me a ticket [to participate in the Lord’s Supper], the members think I love thee; for they see me sitting at thy table; my friends think I love thee, for they often hear me talk about thee.”  But thou couldst not say, “Lord, thou knowest that I love thee.”  Thine own heart is witness that thy secret works belie thy confession, for thou art without prayer in secret, and thou canst preach a twenty minutes prayer in public.  Thou art niggardly and parsimonious in giving to the cause of Christ; but thou canst sport thy name to be seen.  Thou art an angry, petulant creature; but when thou comest to the house of God, thou hast a pious whine and talkest like a canting hypocrite, as if thou were a very gentlemanly man and never seemed angry.  Thou canst take thy Maker’s name in vain, but if thou hear another do it thou wouldst be mighty severe upon him.  Thou affectest to be very pious, and yet if men knew of that widow’s house that is sticking in thy throat, and of that orphan’s patrimony which thou hast taken from him, thou wouldst leave off trumpeting thy good deeds.  Thine own heart tells thee thou art a liar before God.

But thou, O sincere Christian, thou canst welcome thy Lord’s question and answer it with holy fear and gracious confidence.  Yes, thou mayest welcome the question.  Such a question was never put to Judas.  The Lord loved Peter so much that he was jealous over him, or he never would have thus challenged his attachment.  And in this kind cloth, he often appeal to the affections of those whom he dearly loves.  The response likewise is recorded for thee, “Lord, thou knowest all things.”  Canst thou not look up, though scorned by men, though even rejected by thy minister, though kept back by the deacons, and looked upon with disesteem by some — canst thou not look up, and say, “Lord, thou knowest all things, thou knowest that I love thee”?  Do it not in brag and bravado; but if you can do it sincerely, be happy, bless God that he has given you a sincere love to the Savior and ask him to increase it from a spark to a flame, and from a grain to a mountain.  “Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou me?  Yea, Lord, thou knowest all things; thou knowest that I love thee.”

III. And now here is a DEMONSTRATION REQUIRED — “Feed my lambs: feed my sheep.”  That was Peter’s demonstration.  It is not necessary that it should be our way of showing our love.  There are different ways for different disciples.  There are some who are not qualified to feed lambs, for they are only little lambs themselves.  There are some that could not feed sheep, for they cannot at present see afar off; they are weak in the faith and not qualified to teach at all.  They have other means, however, of showing their love to the Savior.  Let us offer a few words upon this matter.

“Lovest thou me?”  Then one of the best evidences thou canst give is to feed my lambs.  Have I two or three little children that love and fear my name?  If thou wantest to do a deed, which shall show that thou art a true lover, and not a proud pretender; go and feed them.  Are there a few little ones whom I have purchased with my blood in an infant class?  Dost thou went to do something which shall evidence that thou art indeed mine?  Then sit not down with the elders, dispute not in the temple; I did that myself; but go thou, and sit down with the young orphans, and teach them the way to the kingdom.  “Feed my lambs.”

But there are many in our midst, good pious souls who love the Savior as much as the sheep do; but one of their complaints which I have often heard is, “Oh! sir, I joined your church.  I thought they would be all brothers and sisters to me, and that I could speak to them, and they would teach me and be kind to me.  Oh I sir, I came, and nobody spoke to me.”  I say, “Why did not you speak to them first?”  “Oh!” they reply, “I did not like.”  Well, they should have liked, I am well aware; but if we had some means of feeding the lambs, it would be a good way of proving to our Savior and to the world, that we really do endeavor to follow him.  I hope some of my friends will take that hint; and if, in concert with me, my brethren in office will endeavor to do something in that way, I think it will be no mean proof of their love to Christ.  “Feed my lambs” is a great duty; let us try to practice it as we are able.

But, beloved, we cannot all do that; the lambs cannot feed the lambs; the sheep cannot feed the sheep exactly.  There must be some appointed to these offices.  And therefore, in the Savior’s name, allow me to say to some of you, that there are different kinds of proof you must give.  “Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou me?”  He saith unto him, “Yea, Lord; thou knowest that I love thee.”  Then preserve that prayer-meeting; attend to it; see that it is kept going on, and that it does not fall to the ground.  “Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou me?”  See to thy servants; see that they go to the house of God, and instruct them in the faith.  There is a sister: Lovest thou Christ?  “Yea, Lord.”  Perhaps it is as much as you can do — perhaps it is as much as you ought to do — to train up your children in the fear of the Lord.  Do not, O Christian, say that thou lovest Christ and yet do nothing for him.  Doing is a good sign of living; and he can scarce be alive unto God that does nothing for God.  We must let our works evidence the sincerity of our love to our Master.

“Oh!” say you, “but we are doing a little.”  Can you do any more?  If you can, then do it.  If you cannot do more, then God requires no more of you; doing to the utmost of your ability is your best proof; but if you can do more, inasmuch as ye keep back any part of what ye can do, in that degree ye give cause to yourselves to distrust your love to Christ.  Do all you can to your very utmost; serve him abundantly; ay, and superabundantly: seek to magnify his name; and if ever you do too much for Christ, come and tell me of it; if you ever do too much for Christ, tell the angels of it — but you will never do that.  He gave himself for you; give yourselves to him.

You see, my friends, how I have been directing you to search your own hearts, and I am almost afraid that some of you will mistake my intention.  Have I a poor soul here who really deplores the languor of her affections?  Perhaps you have determined to ask yourself as many questions as you can with a view of reviving the languid sparks of love.  Let me tell you then that the pure flame of love must be always nourished where it was first kindled.  When I admonished you to look to yourself it was only to detect the evil; would you find the remedy, you must direct your eyes, not to your own heart, but to the blessed heart of Jesus — to the Beloved one — to my gracious Lord and Master.  And wouldst thou be ever conscious of the sweet swellings up of thy heart towards him; thou canst only prove this by a constant sense of his tender love to thee.

I rejoice to know that the Holy Ghost is the Spirit of love, and the ministry of the Spirit is endeared to me in nothing so much as this, that he takes of the things of Jesus, and shows them to me, spreading abroad the Savior’s love in my heart, until it constrains all my passions, awakens the tenderest of all tender emotions, reveals my union to him, and occasions my strong desire to serve him.  Let not love appear to thee as a stern duty, or an arduous effort; rather look to Jesus, yield thyself up to his gracious charms till thou art ravished with his beauty and preciousness.  But ah! if thou art slack in the proofs thou givest, I shall know thou art not walking with him in holy communion.

And allow me to suggest one profitable way of improving the ordinance of the Lord’s Supper.  That is: while you are partaking of it, my friends, renew your dedication to Christ.  Seek this morning to give yourselves over afresh to your Master.  Say with your hearts, what I shall now say with my lips: “Oh! my precious Lord Jesus, I do love thee; thou knowest I have in some degree given myself to thee up to this time, thanks to thy grace!  Blessed be thy name, that thou hast accepted the deeds of so unworthy a servant.  O Lord, I am conscious that I have not devoted myself to thee as I ought; I know that in many things I have come short.  I will make no resolution to live better to thine honor, but I will offer the prayer that thou wouldst help me so to do.  Oh! Lord, I give to thee my health, my life, my talents, my power, and all I have!  Thou hast bought me and bought me wholly: then, Lord, take me this morning, baptize me in the Spirit, let me now feel an entire affection to thy blessed person.  May I have that love which conquers sin and purifies the soul — that love which can dare danger and encounter difficulties for thy sake.  May I henceforth and forever be a consecrated vessel of mercy, having been chosen of thee from before the foundation of the world!  Help me to hold fast that solemn choice of thy service which I desire this morning, by thy grace to renew.”  And when you drink the blood of Christ, and eat his flesh spiritually — in the type and in the emblem, then I beseech you, let the solemn recollection of his agony and suffering for you inspire you with a greater love, that you may be more devoted to his service than ever.  If that be done, I shall have the best of churches; if that be done by us, the Holy Spirit helping us to carry it out, we shall all be good men and true, holding fast by him, and we shall not need to be ashamed in the awful day.

As for you that have never given yourselves to Christ, I dare not tell you to renew a vow which you have never made; nor dare I ask you to make a vow, which you would never keep.  I can only pray for you, that God the Savior would be pleased to reveal himself unto your heart, that “a sense of blood-bought pardon” may “dissolve your hearts of stone;” that you may be brought to give yourselves to him, knowing that if you have done that, you have the best proof that he has given himself for you.  May God Almighty bless you: those of you who depart, may he dismiss with his blessing: and those who remain, may you receive his favor, for Christ’s sake.  Amen.

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“And I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you forever: even the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it  seeth him not, neither knoweth him: but ye know him for he dwelleth with you, and shall he in you.” — John 14:16-17

You will be surprised to hear me announce that I do not intend this morning to say anything about the Holy Spirit as the Comforter.  I propose to reserve that for a special Sermon this evening.  In this discourse, I shall endeavor to explain and enforce certain other doctrines which I believe are plainly taught in this text and which I hope God the Holy Ghost may make profitable to our souls.  Old John Newton once said that there were some books which he could not read, they were good and sound enough; but, said he, “they are books of halfpence; — you have to take so much in quantity before you have any value; there are other books of silver, and others of gold, but I have one book that is a book of bank notes; and every leaf is a bank note of immense value.”  So I found with this text: that I had a bank note of so large a sum that I could not tell it out all this morning. I should have to keep you several hours, before I could unfold to you the whole value of this precious promise — one of the last which Christ gave to his people.

I invite your attention to this passage, because we shall find in it some instruction on four points, first, concerning the true and proper personality of the Holy Ghost; secondly, concerning the united agency of the glorious Three Persons in the work of our salvation; thirdly, we shall find something to establish the doctrine of the indwelling of the Holy Ghost in the souls of all believers; and fourthly, we shall find out the reason why the carnal mind rejects the Holy Ghost.

I. First of all, we shall have some little instruction concerning the proper PERSONALITY OF THE HOLY SPIRIT. We are so much accustomed to talk about the influence of the Holy Ghost and his sacred operations and graces that we are apt to forget that the Holy Spirit is truly and actually a person — that he is a subsistence — an existence; or as we Trinitarians usually say, one person in the essence of the Godhead.  I am afraid that, though we do not know it, we have acquired the habit of regarding the Holy Ghost as an emanation flowing from the Father and the Son, but not as being actually a person himself.

I know it is not easy to carry about in our mind the idea of the Holy Spirit as a person.  I can think of the Father as a person, because his acts are such as I can understand.  I see him hang the world in ether; I behold him swaddling a new-born sea in bands of darkness; I know it is he who formed the drops of hail, who leadeth forth the stars by their hosts, and calleth them by their name, I can conceive of Him as a person, because I behold his operations.  I can realize Jesus, the Son of Man, as a real person, because he is bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh.  It takes no great stretch of my imagination to picture the babe in Bethlehem, or to behold the “Men of sorrows and acquainted with grief;” of the King of martyrs, as he was persecuted in Pilate’s hall, or nailed to the accursed tree for our sins.  Nor do I find it difficult at times to realize the person of my Jesus sitting on his throne in heaven; or girt with clouds and wearing the diadem of all creation, calling the earth to judgment, and summoning us to hear our final sentence.  But when I come to deal with the Holy Ghost, his operations are so mysterious, his doings are so secret, his acts are so removed from everything that is of sense and of the body, that I cannot so easily get the idea of his being a person; but a person he is.  God the Holy Ghost is not an influence, an emanation, a stream of something flowing from the Father, but he is as much an actual person as either God the Son, or God the Father.  I shall attempt this morning a little to establish the doctrine and to show you the truth of it — that God the Holy Spirit is actually a person.

The first proof we shall gather from the pool of holy baptism.  Let me take you down, as I have taken others, into the pool, now concealed, but which I wish were always open to your view.  Let me take you to the baptismal font, where believers put on the name of the Lord Jesus, and you shall hear me pronounce the solemn words, “I baptize thee in the name,” — mark, “in the name,” not names, — “of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost.”  Every one who is baptized according to the true form laid down in Scripture, must be a Trinitarian: otherwise his baptism is a farce and a lie, and he himself is found a deceiver and a hypocrite before God.  As the Father is mentioned, and as the Son is mentioned, so is the Holy Ghost, and the whole is summed up as being a Trinity in unity, by its being said, not the names, but the “name,” the glorious name, the Jehovah name, “of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost.”  Let me remind you that the same thing occurs each time you are dismissed from this house of prayer.  In pronouncing the solemn closing benediction, we invoke on your behalf the love of Jesus Christ, the grace of the Father, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit, and thus, according to the apostolic manner, we make a manifest distinction between the persons showing that we believe the Father to be a person, the Son to be a person, and the Holy Ghost to be a person.  Were there no other proofs in Scripture, I think these would be sufficient for every sensible man.  He would see that if the Holy Spirit were a mere influence, he would not be mentioned in conjunction with two whom we all confess to be actual and proper persons.

A second argument arises from the fact, that the Holy Ghost has actually made different appearances on earth. The Great Spirit has manifested himself to man; he has put on a form, so that whilst he has not been beheld by mortal men, he has been so veiled in appearance that he was seen, so far as that appearance was concerned, by the eyes of all beholders.  See you Jesus Christ our Savior?  There is the river Jordan, with its shelving banks, and its willows weeping at its stale. Jesus Christ, the Son of God, descends into the stream, and the holy Baptist, John, plunges him into the waves.  The doors of heaven are opened; a miraculous appearance presents itself, a bright light shineth from the sky, brighter than the sun in all its grandeur, and down in a flood of glory descends something which you recognize to be a dove.  It rests on Jesus — it sits upon his sacred head, and as the old painters put a halo round the brow of Jesus, so did the Holy Ghost shed a resplendence around the face of him who came to fulfill all Righteousness and therefore commenced with the ordinances of baptism.  The Holy Ghost was seen as a dove, to mark his purity and his gentleness, and he came down like a dove from heaven to show that it is from heaven alone that he descendeth.  Nor is this the only time when the Holy Ghost has been manifest in a visible shape.  You notice that company of disciples gathered together in an upper room, they are waiting for some promised blessing, by-and-by it shall come.  Hark! there is a sound as of a rushing mighty wind, it fills all the house where they are sitting, and astonished, they look around them, wondering what will come next.  Soon a bright light appears, shining upon the beads of each: cloven tongues of fire sat upon them.  What were these marvelous appearances of wind and flame but a display of the Holy Ghost in his proper person?  I say the fact of an appearance manifests that he must be a person.  An influence could not appear — an attribute could not appear: we cannot see attributes — we cannot behold influences.  The Holy Ghost must then have been a person; since he was beheld by mortal eyes and came under the cognizance of mortal sense.

Another proof is from the fact that personal qualities are, in Scripture, ascribe to the Holy Ghost. First, let me read to you a text in which the Holy Ghost is spoken of as having understanding.  In the 1 Corinthians 2:9-11, you will read, “But as it is written, eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither hath it entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him.  But God hath revealed them unto us by his Spirit: for the Spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God.  For what man knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit of man which is in him?  Even so the things of God knoweth no man, but the Spirit of God.”  Here you see an understanding — a power of knowledge is ascribed to the Holy Ghost.  Now, if there be any persons here whose minds are of so preposterous a complexion that they would ascribe one attribute to another, and would speak of a mere influence having understanding, then I give up all the argument.  But I believe every rational man will admit, that when anything is spoken of as having an understanding it must be an existence — it must, in fact, be a person.  In 1 Corinthians 12:11, you will find a will ascribed to the Holy Spirit.  “But all these worketh that one and the self same Spirit, dividing to every man severally as he will.”  So it is plain the Spirit has a will.  He does not come from God simply at God’s will, but he has a will of his own, which is always in keeping with the will of the infinite Jehovah, but is, nevertheless, distinct and separate; therefore, I say he is a person.  In another text, power is ascribed to the Holy Ghost and power is a thing which can only be ascribed to an existence.  In Romans 15:13, it is written, “Now the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, that ye may abound in hope through the power of the Holy Ghost.”  I need not insist upon it, because it is self-evident, that wherever you find understanding, will, and power, you must also find an existence; it cannot be a mere attribute, it cannot be a metaphor, it cannot be a personified influence; but it must be a person.

But I have a proof which, perhaps, will be more telling upon you than any other.  Acts and deeds are ascribed to the Holy Ghost; therefore he must be a person.  You read in the first chapter of the Book of Genesis, that the Spirit brooded over the surface of the earth, when it was as yet all disorder and confusion.  This world was once a mass of chaotic matter; there was no order; it was like the valley of darkness and of the shadow of death.  God the Holy Ghost spread his wings over it; he sowed the seeds of life in it; the germs from which all beings sprang were implanted by him; he impregnated the earth so that it became capable of life.  Now it must have been a person who brought order out of confusion; it must have been an existence who hovered over this world and made it what it now is.  But do we not read in Scripture something more of the Holy Ghost?  Yes, we are told that “holy men of old spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost.”  When Moses penned the Pentateuch, the Holy Ghost moved his hand, when David wrote the Psalms, and discoursed sweet music on his harp, it was the Holy Spirit that gave his fingers their Seraphic motion when Solomon dropped from his lips the words of the Proverbs of wisdom, or when he hymned the Canticles of love it was the Holy Ghost who gave him words of knowledge and hymns of rapture.  Ah! and what fire was that which touched the lips of the eloquent Isaiah?  What hand was that which came upon Daniel?  What might was that which made Jeremiah so plaintive in his grief?  Or what was that which winged Ezekiel and made him like an eagle, soar into mysteries aloft, and see the mighty unknown beyond our reach?  Who was it that made Amos, the herdsman, a prophet?  Who taught the rough Haggai to pronounce his thundering sentences?  Who showed Habakkuk the horses of Jehovah marching through the waters?  Or who kindled the burning eloquence of Nahum?  Who cause Malachi to close up the book with the muttering of the word curse?  Who was in each of these, save the Holy Ghost?  And must it not have been a person who spake in and through these ancient witnesses?  We must believe it.  We cannot avoid believing it, when we recall that “holy men of old spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost.”

And when has the Holy Ghost ceased to have an influence upon men? We find that still he deals with his ministers and with all his saints.  Turn to the Acts and you will find that the Holy Ghost said, “Separate me Paul and Barnabas for the work.”  I never heard of an attribute saying such a thing.  The Holy Spirit said to Peter, “Go to the centurion, and what I have cleansed, that call not thou common.  The Holy Ghost caught away Philip after he had baptized the eunuch and carried him to another place; and the Holy Ghost said to Paul, “Thou shalt not go into that city, but shalt turn into another.”  And we know that the Holy Ghost was lied unto by Ananias and Sapphira, when it was said, “Thou hast not lied unto man, but unto God.”  Again, that power which we feel every day who are called to preach — that wondrous spell which makes our lips so potent — that power which gives us thoughts which are like birds from a far-off region, not the natives of our soul — that influence which I sometimes strangely feel, which, if it does not give me poetry and eloquence, gives me a might I never felt before, and lifts me above my fellow-man — that majesty with which he clothes his ministers, till in the midst of the battle they cry, aha! like the war-horse of Job, and move themselves like leviathans in the water — that power which gives us might over men, and causes them to sit and listen as if their ears were chained, as if they were entranced by the power of some magician’s wand — that power must come from a person, it must come from the Holy Ghost.

But is it not said in Scripture, and do we not feel it, dear brethren, that it is the Holy Ghost who regenerates the soul?  It is the Holy Ghost who quickens us.  “You hath he quickened who were dead in trespasses and sins.”  It is the Holy Spirit who imparts the first germ of life, convincing us of sin, of righteousness, and of judgment to come.  And is it not the Holy Spirit who after that flame is kindled, still fans it with the breath of his mouth and keeps it alive?  Its author is its preserver.  Oh! can it be said that it is the Holy Ghost who strives in men’s souls, that it is the Holy Ghost who brings them to the foot of Sinai and then guides them into the sweet place that is called Calvary — can it be said that he does all these things and yet is not a person?  It may be said, but it must be said by fools; for he never can be a wise man who can consider that these things can be done by any other than a glorious person — a divine existence.

Allow me to give you one more proof, and I shall have done.  Certain feelings are ascribed to the Holy Ghost, which can only be understood upon the supposition that he is actually a person.  In the 4th chapter of Ephesians, verse 30th, it is said that the Holy Ghost can be grieved: “Grieve not the Holy Spirit of God, whereby ye are sealed unto the day of redemption.”  In Isaiah 63:5-10, it is said that the Holy Ghost can be vexed: “But they rebelled, and vexed his Holy Spirit, therefore he was turned to be their enemy, and he fought against them.”  In Acts 7:51, you read that the Holy Ghost can be resisted: “Ye stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears, ye do always resist the Holy Ghost; as your fathers did, so do ye.”  And in the 5th chapter, 9th verse of the same book, you will find that the Holy Ghost may be tempted.  We are there informed that Peter said to Ananias and Sapphira, “How is it that ye have agreed together to tempt the Spirit of the Lord?”  Now, these things could not be emotions which might be ascribed to a quality or an emanation they must be understood to relate to a person; an influence could not be grieved; it must be a person who can be grieved, vexed, or resisted.

And now, dear brethren, I think I have fully established the point of the personality of the Holy Ghost; allow me now, most earnestly, to impress upon you the absolute necessity of being sound unto the doctrine of the Trinity.  I knew a man, a good minister of Jesus Christ he is now, and I believe he was before he turned aside unto heresy — he began to doubt the glorious divinity of our blessed Lord, and for years did he preach the heterodox doctrine, until one day he happened to hear a very eccentric old minister preaching from the text, “But there the glorious Lord shall be unto us a place of broad rivers and streams, wherein shall go no galley with oars, neither shall gallant ship pass thereby.  Thy tacklings are loosed: they could not well strengthen their mast, they could not spread the sail.”  “Now,” said the old minister, “you give up the Trinity, and your tacklings are loosed, you cannot strengthen your masts.  Once give up the doctrine of three persons, and your tacklings are all gone your mast, which ought to be a support to your vessel, is a ricketty one, and shakes.”  A gospel without a Trinity! — it is a pyramid built upon its apex.  A gospel without the Trinity! — it is a rope of sand that cannot hold together.  A gospel without the Trinity! — then, indeed, Satan can overturn it.  But, give me a gospel with the Trinity and the might of hell cannot prevail against it; no man can any more overthrow it than a bubble could split a rock or a feather break in halves a mountain.  Get the thought of the three persons and you have the marrow of all divinity.  Only know the Father and know the Son and know the Holy Ghost to be One and all things will appear clear.  This is the golden key to the secrets of nature; this is the silken clue of the labyrinths of mystery, and he who understands this, will soon understand as much as mortals ever can know.

II. Now for the second point — the UNITED AGENCY of the three persons in the work of our salvation. Look at the text, and you will find all the three persons mentioned. “I,” — that is the Son — “will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter.”  There are the three persons mentioned, all of them doing something for our salvation.  “I will pray,” says the Son.  “I will send,” says the Father.  “I will comfort,” says the Holy Ghost.  Now, let us for a few moments discourse upon this wondrous theme — the unity of the Three Persons with regard to the great purpose of the salvation of the elect.  When God first made man, he said, “Let us make man,” not let me, but “Let us make man in our own image.”  The covenant Elohim said to each other, “Let us unitedly become the Creator of man.”  So, when in ages far gone by in eternity, they said, “Let us save man.”  It was not the Father who said, “Let me save man,” but the three persons conjointly said with one consent, “Let us save man.”  It is to me a source of sweet comfort, to think that it is not one person of the Trinity that is engaged for my salvation; it is not simply one person of the Godhead who vows that he will redeem me, but it is a glorious trio of Godlike ones, and the three declare, unitedly, “We will save man.”

Now, observe here, that each person is spoken of as performing a separate office.  “I will pray,” says the Son — that is intercession.  “I will send,” says the Father — that is donation.  “I will comfort,” says the Holy Spirit — that is supernatural influence.  Oh! if it were possible for us to see the three persons of the Godhead, we should behold one of them standing before the throne with outstretched hands crying day and night, “O Lord, how long?”  We should see one girt with Urim and Thummin, precious stones, on which are written the twelve names of the tribes of Israel; we should behold him crying unto his Father, “Forget not thy promises, forget not thy covenant,” we should hear him make mention of our sorrows, and tell forth our griefs on our behalf, for he is our intercessor.  And could we behold the Father, we should not see him a listless and idle spectator of the intercession of the Son, but we should see him with attentive ear listening to every word of Jesus, and granting every petition.  Where is the Holy Spirit all the while?  Is he lying idle?  Oh no, he is floating over the earth, and when he sees a weary soul, he says, “Come to Jesus, he will give you rest.”  When he beholds an eye filled with tears, he wipes away the tears, and bids the mourner look for comfort on the cross.  When he sees the tempest-tossed believer, he takes the helm of his soul and speaks the word of consolation, he helpeth the broken in heart, and bindeth up their wounds; and ever on his mission of mercy, he flies around the world, being everywhere present.

Behold how the three persons work together.  Do not then say, “I am grateful to the Son,” — so you ought to be, but God the Son no more saves you than God the Father.  Do not imagine that God the Father is a great tyrant, and that God the Son had to die to make him merciful.  It was not to make the Father’s love flow towards his people.  Oh, no.  One loves as much as the other; the three are conjoined in the great purpose of rescuing the elect from damnation.

But you must notice another thing in my text, which will show the blessed unity of the three — the one person promises to the other.  The Son says, “I will pray the Father.”  “Very well,” the disciples may have said, “We can trust you for that.”  “And he will send you.”  You see here is the Son signing a bond on behalf of the Father.  “He will send you another Comforter.”  There is a bond on behalf of the Holy Spirit, too.  “And he will abide with you forever.”  One person speaks for the other and how could they if there were any disagreement between them?  If one wished to save and the other not, they could not promise on one another’s behalf.  But whatever the Son says, the Father listens to, whatever the Father promises, the Holy Ghost works, and whatever the Holy Ghost injects into the soul, that God the Father fulfill.  So the three together mutually promise on one another’s behalf.  There is a bond with three names appended, — Father, Son and Holy Ghost.  By three immutable things, as well as by two, the Christian is secured beyond the reach of death and hell.  A Trinity of Securities, because there is a trinity of God.

III. Our third point is the INDWELLING of the Holy Ghost in believers. Now beloved, these first two things have been matters of pure doctrine, this is the subject of experience.  The indwelling of the Holy Ghost is a subject so profound, and so having to do with the inner man, that no soul will be able truly and really to comprehend what I say, unless it has been taught of God.  I have heard of an old minister, who told a Fellow of one of the Cambridge Colleges, that he understood a language that he never learnt in all his life.  “I have not,” he said, “even a smattering of Greek, and I know no Latin, but thank God I can talk the language of Canaan, and that is more than you can.”  So, beloved, I shall now have to talk a little of the language of Canaan.  If you cannot comprehend me, I am much afraid it is because you are not of Israelite extraction, you are not a child of God nor an inheritor of the kingdom of heaven.

We are told in the text, that Jesus would send the Comforter, who would abide in the saints forever; who would dwell with them and be in them.  Old Ignatius, the martyr, used to call himself Theophorus, or the God-bearer, “because,” said he, “I bear about with me the Holy Ghost.”  And truly every Christian is a God-bearer.  “Know ye not that ye are temples of the Holy Ghost? for he dwelleth in you.”  That man is no Christian who is not the subject of the indwelling of the Holy Spirit; he may talk well, he may understand theology and be a sound Calvinist; he will be the child of nature finely dressed, but not the living child.  He may be a man of so profound an intellect, so gigantic a soul, so comprehensive a mind, and so lofty an imagination, that he may dive into all the secrets of nature; may know the path which the eagle’s eye hath not seen, and go into depths where the ken of mortals reacheth not; but he shall not be a Christian with all his knowledge, he shall not be a son of God with all his researches, unless he understands what it is to have the Holy Ghost dwelling in him, and abiding in him, yea, and that forever.

Some people call this fanaticism, and they say, “You are a Quaker why not follow George Fox?”  Well we would not mind that much; we would follow any one who followed the Holy Ghost.  Even he, with all his eccentricities, I doubt not, was, in many cases, actually inspired by the Holy Spirit; and whenever I find a man in whom there rests the Spirit of God, the Spirit within me leaps to hear the Spirit within him, and he feels that we are one.  The Spirit of God in one Christian soul recognizes the Spirit in another.

I recollect talking with a good man, as I believe he was, who was insisting that it was impossible for us to know whether we had the Holy Spirit within us or not.  I should like him to be here this morning, because I would read this verse to him: “But ye know him, for he dwelleth with you, and shall be in you.”  Ah! you think you cannot tell whether you have the Holy Spirit or not.  Can I tell whether I am alive or not?  If I were touched by electricity, could I tell whether I was or not?  I suppose I should; the shock would be strong enough to make me know where I stood.  So, if I have God within me — if I have Deity tabernacling in my breast — if I have God the Holy Ghost resting in my heart, and making a temple of my body, do you think I shall know it?  Call ye it fanaticism if ye will; but I trust that there are some of us who know what it is to be always, or generally, under the influence of the Holy Spirit — always in one sense, generally in another.  When we have difficulties, we ask the direction of the Holy Ghost.  When we do not understand a portion of Holy Scripture, we ask God the Holy Ghost to shine upon us.  When we are depressed, the Holy Ghost comforts us.  You cannot tell what the wondrous power of the indwelling of the Holy Ghost is: how it pulls back the hand of the saint when he would touch the forbidden thing; how it prompts him to make a covenant with his eyes; how it binds his feet, lest they should fall in a slippery way, how it restrains his heart, and keeps him from temptation.  O ye who know nothing of the indwelling of the Holy Ghost, despise it not.  O despise not the Holy Ghost, for it is the unpardonable sin.  “He that speaketh a word against the Son of Man, it shall be forgiven him, but he that speaketh against the Holy Ghost, it shall never be forgiven him, either in this life, or that which is to come.”  So saith the Word of God.  Therefore, tremble, lest in anything ye despise the influences of the Holy Spirit.

But before closing this point, there is one little word which pleases me very much, that is, “forever.”  You knew I should not miss that; you were certain I could not let it go without observation.  “Abide with you forever.”  I wish I could get an Arminian here to finish my sermon.  I fancy I see him taking that word, “forever.” He would say, “for — forever;” he would have to stammer and stutter; for he never could get it out all at once.  He might stand and pull it about, and at last he would have to say, “the translation is wrong.”  And then I suppose the poor man would have to prove that the original was wrong too.  Ah! but blessed be God, we can read it — “He shall abide with you forever.”  Once give me the Holy Ghost and I shall never lose him till “forever” has run out; till eternity has spun its everlasting rounds.

IV. Now we have to close up with a brief remark on the reason why the world rejects the Holy Ghost. It is said, “Whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth him not, neither knoweth him.”  You know what is sometimes meant by “the world,” — those whom God, in his wondrous sovereignty, passed over when he chose his people: the ones; those passed over in God’s wondrous perdition — not the reprobates who were condemned to damnation by some awful decree, but those passed over by God, when he chose out his elect.  These cannot receive the Spirit.  Again, it means all in a carnal state are not able to procure themselves this divine influence; and thus it is true, “Whom the world cannot receive.”  The unregenerate world of sinners despises the Holy Ghost, “because it seeth him not.”  Yes, I believe this is the great secret why many laugh at the idea of the existence of the Holy Ghost — because they see him not.  You tell the worldling, “I have the Holy Ghost within me.”  He says, “I cannot see it.”  He wants it to be something tangible: a thing he can recognize with his senses.  Have you ever heard the argument used by a good old Christian against an infidel doctor?  The doctor said there was no soul and he asked, “Did you ever see a soul?”  “No,” said the Christian. “Did you ever hear a soul?”  “No.”  “Did you ever smell a soul?”  “No.”  “Did you ever taste a soul?”  “No.”  “Did you ever feel a soul?”  “Yes,” said the man — “I feel I have one within me.”  “Well,” said the doctor, “there are four senses against one: you have only one on our side.”  “Very well,” said the Christian, “Did you ever see a pain?”  “No.”  “Did you ever hear a pain?”  “No.”  “Did you ever smell a pain?”  “No.”  “Did you ever taste a pain?”  “No.”  “Did you ever feel a pain?”  “Yes,”  “And that is quite enough, I suppose, to prove there is a pain?”  “Yes.”

So the worldling says there is no Holy Ghost, because he cannot see it.  Well, but we feel it.  You say that is fanaticism, and that we never felt it.  Suppose you tell me that honey is bitter, I reply “No, I am sure you cannot have tasted it; taste it, and try.”  So with the Holy Ghost, if you did but feel his influence, you would no longer say there is no Holy Spirit, because you cannot see it.  Are there not many things, even in nature, which we cannot see?  Did you ever see the wind?  No; but ye know there is wind, when ye behold the hurricane tossing the waves about and rending down the habitations of men; or when in the soft evening zephyr it kisses the flowers, and maketh dewdrops hang in pearly coronets around the rose.   Did ye ever see electricity?  No, but ye know there is such a thing, for it travels along the wires for thousands of miles and carries our messages, though you cannot see the thing itself, you know there is such a thing.  So you must believe there is a Holy Ghost working in us, both to will and to do, even though it is beyond our senses.

But the last reason why worldly men laugh at the doctrine of the Holy Spirit is because they do not know it.  If they knew it by heart-felt experience, and if they recognized its agency in the soul; if they had ever been touched by it; if they had been made to tremble under a sense of sin; if they had had their hearts melted; they would never have doubted the existence of the Holy Ghost.  And now, beloved, it says, “He dwelleth with you, and shall be in you.”  We will close up with that sweet recollection — the Holy Ghost dwells in all believers, and shall be with them.

One word of comment and advice to the saints of God, and to sinners, and I have done.  Saints of the Lord! ye have this morning heard that God the Holy Ghost is a person; ye have had it proved to your souls.  What follows from this?  Why, it followeth how earnest ye should be in prayer to the Holy Spirit, as well as for the Holy Spirit.  Let me say that this is an inference that you should lift up your prayers to the Holy Ghost, that you should cry earnestly unto him, for he is able to do exceeding abundantly above all you can ask or think.  See this mass of people; what is to convert it?  See this crowd; who is to make my influence permeate through the mass?  You know this place has now a mighty influence, and God blessing us, it will have an influence, not only upon this city but upon England at large, for we now enjoy the press as well as the pulpit, and certainly, I should say before the close of the year, more than two hundred thousand of my productions will be scattered through the land — words uttered by my lips, or written by my pen.  But how can this influence he rendered for good?  How shall God’s glory be promoted by it?  Only by incessant prayer for the Holy Spirit; by constantly calling down the influence of the Holy Ghost upon us; we want him to rest upon every page that is printed, and upon every word that is uttered.  Let us then be doubly earnest in pleading with the Holy Ghost, that he would come and own our labors, that the whole church at large may be revived thereby, and not ourselves only, but the whole world share in the benefit.

Then to the ungodly, I have this one closing word to say.  Ever be careful how you speak of the Holy Ghost.  I do not know what the unpardonable sin is, and I do not think any man understands it; but it is something like this: “He that speaketh a word against the Holy Ghost, it shall never be forgiven him.”  I do not know what that means: but tread carefully!  There is danger; there is a pit which our ignorance has covered by sand, tread carefully! you may be in it before the next hour.  If there is any strife in your heart today, perhaps you will go to the ale-house and forget it.  Perhaps there is some voice speaking in your soul, and you will put it away.  I do not tell you you will be resisting the Holy Ghost and committing the unpardonable sin; but it is somewhere there.  Be very careful.  Oh ! there is no crime on earth so black as the crime against the Holy Spirit.  Ye may blaspheme the Father, and ye shall be damned for it unless ye repent, ye may blaspheme the Son, and hell shall be your portion, unless ye are forgiven; but blaspheme the Holy Ghost, and thus saith the Lord, “There is no forgiveness, neither in this world, nor in the world which is to come.”  I cannot tell you what it is, I do not profess to understand it; but there it is.  It is the danger signal, stop! man, stop!  If thou hast despised the Holy Spirit, if thou hast laughed at his revelations, and scorned what Christians call his influence, I beseech thee, stop! this morning seriously deliberate.

Perhaps some of you have actually committed the unpardonable sin; stop!  Let fear stop you; sit down.  Do not drive on so rashly as you have done, Jehu!  Oh! slacken your reins!  Thou who art such a profligate in sin, thou who hast uttered such hard words against the Trinity, stop!  Ah, it makes us all stop.  It makes us all draw up and say, “Have I not perhaps so done?”  Let us think of this, and let us not at any time trifle either with the words, or the acts, of God the Holy Ghost.

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“Be of good cheer; I have overcome the world.” John 16:33

When these words were spoken our Savior was about to leave his disciples to go to his death for their sakes.  His great anxiety was that they might not be too much cast down by the trials which would come upon them.  He desired to prepare their minds for the heavy sorrows which awaited them, while the powers of darkness and the men of the world wrought their will upon him.  Now observe, beloved, that our Lord Jesus, in whom dwells infinite wisdom, knew all the secret springs of comfort, and all the hallowed sources of consolation in heaven and under heaven, and yet in order to console his disciples he spoke, not of heavenly mysteries nor of secrets hidden in the breast of God, but he spoke concerning himself.  Doth he not herein teach us that there is no balm for the heart like himself, no consolation of Israel comparable to his person and his work?  If even such a divine Barnabas, such a first-born son of consolation as the Lord himself must point to what he himself has done, for only so can he make his followers to be of good cheer, then how wise it must be in ministers to preach much of Jesus by way of encouragement to the Lord’s addicted, and how prudent it is for mourners to look to him for the comfort they need.  “Be of good cheer,” he saith, “I” — something about himself — “I have overcome the world.”  So then, beloved, in all times of depression of spirit hasten away to the Lord Jesus Christ; whenever the cares of this life burden you, and your way seems hard for your weary feet, by to your Lord.  There may be, and there are, other sources of consolation, but they will not at all times serve your turn; but in Him there dwelleth such a fullness of comfort, that whether it be in summer or in winter the streams of comfort are always flowing.  In your high estate or in your low estate, and from whatever quarter your trouble may arise, you can resort at once to him and you shall find that he strengthens the hands that hang down and confirms the feeble knees.

A further remark suggests itself that the Lord Jesus must be more than man from the tone which he assumed.  There are certain persons who deny the godhead of our Lord and yet think well of Jesus as a man; indeed, they have uttered many highly complimentary things with regard to his character: but I wonder it should not strike them that there is a great deal of assumption, presumption, pride, egotism, and all that style of folly in this man if he be nothing more than a man.  For what good man whom you would wish to imitate would say to others, “Be of good cheer: I have overcome the world.”  This is altogether too much for a mere man to say.

The Lord Jesus Christ frequently spoke about himself and about what he has done and commended himself to his disciples as one who was only a man and of a lowly mind could never have done.  The Lord was certainly meek and lowly in heart, but no man of that character would have told others so.  There is an inconsistency here which none can account for but those who believe him to be the Son of God.  Understand him to be divine, put him in his true position as speaking down out of the excellency of his deity to his disciples, and then you can comprehend his so speaking,  Yea, it becomes infinitely seemly and beautiful.  Deny his Godhead, and I for one am quite unable to understand how the words before us, and others like them, could ever have fallen from his lips, for none will dare to say that he was boastful.  Blessed be thou, O, Son of man, thou art also Son of God, and therefore thou dost not only speak to us with the sympathizing tenderness of a brother man, but with the majestic authority of the Only Begotten of the Father.  Divinely condescending are thy words, “I have overcome the world.”

If you look at this claim of Jesus without the eye of faith, does it not wear an extraordinary appearance?  How could the betrayed man of Nazareth say, “I have overcome the world”?  We can imagine Napoleon speaking thus when he had crushed the nations beneath his feet and shaped the map of Europe to his will. We can imagine Alexander speaking thus when he had rifled the palaces of Persia and led her ancient monarchs captive.  But who is this that speaketh on this wise?  It is a Galilean, who wears a peasant’s garment and consorts with the poor and the fallen!  He has neither wealth nor worldly rank nor honor among men, and yet speaks of having overcome the world.  He is about to be betrayed by his own base follower into the hands of his enemies, and then he will be led out to judgment and to death, and yet he says, “I have overcome the world.”  He is casting an eye to his cross with all its shame, and to the death which ensued from it, and yet he saith, “I have overcome the world.”  He had not where to lay his head, he had not a disciple that would stand up for him, for he had just said, “Ye shall be scattered, every man to his own, and shall leave me alone;” he was to be charged with blasphemy and sedition and brought before the judge and find no man to declare his generation; he was to be given up to a brutal soldiery to be mocked and despitefully used and spat upon; his hands and feet were to be nailed to a cross, that he might die a felon’s death, and yet he saith, “I have overcome the world.”  How marvelous, and yet how true!  He spoke not after the manner of the flesh nor after the sight of the eye.  We must use faith’s optics here and look within the veil, and then we shall see not alone the despised bodily person of the Son of man, but the indwelling, noble, all-conquering soul which transformed shame into honor, and death into glory.  May God the Holy Spirit enable us to look through the external to the internal, and see how marvelously the ignominious death was the rough garment which concealed the matchless victory from the purblind eyes of carnal man.

During the last two Sabbath mornings, I have spoken of our Lord Jesus Christ: first, as the end of the law; and secondly, as the conqueror over the old serpent; now we come to speak of him as the overcomer of the world.  Addressing his disciples he said, “Be of good cheer; I have overcome the world.”

Now, what is this world that he speaks about? and how has he overcome it? and what good cheer is there in the fact for us?

I. WHAT IS THIS WORLD WHICH HE IS REFERRING TO? I scarcely know a word which is used with so many senses as this word “world.”  If you will turn to your Bibles, you will find the word “world” used in widely different significations, for there is a world which Christ made, “He was in the world and the world was made by him” — that is, the physical world.

There is a world which God so loved that he gave his only begotten Son that whosoever believeth in him might not perish.  There are several forms of this favorable signification.  Then there is a world, the world here meant, which “lieth in the wicked one,” a world which knows not Christ, but which is ever” more opposed to him: a world for which he says that he does not pray, and a world which he would not have us love — “Love not the world, neither the things which are in the world.”  Without going into these various meanings and shades of meaning which are very abundant, let us just say that we scarcely know how to define what is meant here in so many words, though we know well enough what is meant.  Scripture does not give us definitions, but uses language in a popular manner, since it speaks to common people.  “The world” is very much the equivalent of the “seed of the serpent,” of which we spoke last Sabbath day.  The world here means the visible embodiment of that spirit of evil which was in the serpent, and which now worketh in the children of disobedience; it is the human form of the same evil force with which our Lord contended when he overcame the devil; it means the power of evil in the unregenerate mass of mankind, the energy and power of sin as it dwells in that portion of the world which abideth in death and lieth in the wicked one.  The devil is the god of this world, and the prince of this world, and therefore he who is the friend of this world is the enemy of God.

The world is the opposite of the church.  There is a church which Christ has redeemed and chosen out of the world and separated unto himself, from among men, and of these as renewed by the power of divine grace, he says, “Ye are not of the world, even as I am not of the world,” and again “Because ye are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you.”  Now, the rest of mankind not comprehended amongst the chosen, the redeemed, the called, the saved, are called the world.  Of these our Lord said, “O, righteous Father, the world hath not known thee;” and John said, “The world knoweth us not because it knew him not.”  This is the power which displays a deadly enmity against Christ and against his chosen; hence it is called “this present evil world,” while the kingdom of grace is spoken of as “the world to come.”  This is the world of which it is said, “He that is born of God overcometh the world.”

You will see that “the world” includes the ungodly themselves, as well as the force of evil in them, but it marks them out, not as creatures nor even as men who have sinned, but as unregenerate, carnal and rebellious, and therefore as the living embodiments of an evil power which works against God; and so we read of “the world of the ungodly.”

Perhaps I ought to add that there has grown up out of the existence of unconverted men and the prevalence of sin in them certain customs, fashions, maxims, rules, modes, manners, forces, all of which go to make up what is called “the world,” and there are also certain principles, desires, lusts, governments and powers which also make up a part of the evil thing called “the world.”  Jesus says “My kingdom is not of this world.”  James speaks of keeping ourselves “unspotted from the world.” John says, “the world passeth away and the lust thereof;” and Paul says, “not conformed to this world, but be ye transformed.

“Moreover, I may say that the present constitution and arrangement of all things in this fallen state may be comprehended in the term “world,” for everything has come under vanity by reason of sin, and things are not to day according to the original plan of the Most High, as designed for man in his innocence.  Behold there are trials and troubles springing out of our very existence in this life of which it is said, “in the world ye shall have tribulation.”   To many a child of God, there have befallen hunger and disease and suffering, and unkindness, and various forms of evil which belong not to the world to come, nor to the kingdom which Christ has set up, but which come to them because they are in this present evil world, which has so become because the race of men have fallen under the curse and consequence of sin.

Now the world is all these matters put together, this great conglomeration of mischief among men, this evil which dwelleth here and there and everywhere wherever men are scattered — this is the thing which we call the world.  Every one of us know better what it is than we can tell to anybody else, and perhaps while I am explaining I am rather confounding than expounding.  You know just what the world is to some of you — it is not more than your own little family, as to outward form, but much more as to influence.  Your actual world may be confined to your own house, but the same principles enter into the domestic circle which pervade kingdoms and states.  To others the world takes a wide sweep as they necessarily meet with ungodly men in business, and this we must do unless we are to go altogether out of the world, which is no part of our Lord’s plan, for he says, “I pray not that thou shouldest take them out of the world.”  To some who look at the whole mass of mankind and are called thoughtfully to consider them all because they have to be God’s messengers to them, the tendencies and outgoings of the human mind towards that which is evil, and the spirit of men’s actions as done against God in all nations and ages — all these go to make up to them “the world.”

But be it what it may, it is a thing out of which tribulation will be sure to come to us, Christ tells us so.  It may come in the form of temporal trial of some shape or other; it may come in the form of temptation which will alight upon us from our fellow-men, it may come in the form of persecution to a greater or less extent according to our position: but it will come.  “In the world ye shall have tribulation.”  We are sojourners in an enemy’s country, and the people of the land wherein we tarry are not our friends, and will not help us on our pilgrimage to heaven.  All spiritual men in the world are our friends, but then, like ourselves, they are in the world but they are not of it.  From the kingdom of this world whereof Satan is lord, we must expect fierce opposition against which we must contend even unto victory if we are to enter into everlasting rest.

II. Now this brings me to the more interesting topic in the second place of HOW HAS CHRIST OVERCOME THE WORLD? And we answer, first he did so in his life: then in his death: and then in his rising and his reigning.

First, Christ overcame the world in his life.  This is a wonderful study, the overcoming of the world in the life of Christ.  I reckon that those first thirty years of which we know so little were a wonderful preparation for his conflict with the world, and that though only in the carpenter’s shop, and obscure, and unknown to the great outside world, yet in fact he was not merely preparing for the battle, but he was then beginning, to overcome it. In the patience which made him bide his time we see the dawn of the victory.  When we are intent upon doing good, and we see mischief and sin triumphant everywhere, we are eager to begin: but suppose it were not the great Father’s will that we should be immediately engaged in the fray, how strongly would the world then tempt us to go forward before our time.  A transgression of discipline may be caused by over zeal, and this as much breaks through the law of obedience as dullness or sloth would do.  The Roman soldier was accounted guilty who, when the army was left with the orders that no man should strike a blow in the leader’s absence, nevertheless stepped forward and slew a Gaul; the act was one of velour, but it was contrary to military discipline and might have had most baleful results, and so it was condemned.  Thus is it sometimes with us, before we are ready, before we have received our commission, we are in haste to step forward and smite the foe.  That temptation must have come to Christ from the world: many a time as he heard of what was going on in the reign of error and hypocrisy his benevolent impulses might have suggested to him to be up and doing, had it not been that he was incapable of wrong desires.

Doubtless he was willing to be healing the sick.  Was not the land full of sufferers?  He would fain be saving souls — were they not going down to the pit by thousands?  He would gladly have confuted error, for falsehood was doing deadly work, but his hour was not yet come.  Yet our Lord and Master had nothing to say till his Father bade him speak.  Strongly under an impulse to be at work we know he was, for when he went up to the temple he said, “Know ye not that I must be about my Father’s business?”  That utterance revealed the fire that burned within his soul, and yet he was not preaching nor healing, nor disputing, but still remained in obscurity all those thirty years, because God would have it so.  When the Lord would have us quiet we are doing his will best by being quiet, but yet to be still and calm for so long a time was a wonderful instance of how all his surroundings could not master him not even when they seemed to work with his philanthropy; he still remained obedient to God, and thus proved himself the overcomer of the world.

When he appears upon the scene of public action you know how he overcomes the world in many ways.  First, by remaining always faithful to his testimony.  He never modified it, not even by so much as a solitary word to please the sons of men.  From the first day in which he began to preach even to the closing sentence which he uttered it was all truth and nothing but truth, truth uncolored by prevailing sentiment, untainted by popular error.  He did not disguise his doctrine, but he came out with plain speaking and set himself in opposition to all the powers which ruled the thought and creed of the age.  He was no guarder of truth.  He allowed truth to fight her own battles in her own way, and you know how she bares her breast to her antagonist’s darts and finds in her own immutable, immortal, and invulnerable life her shield and her spear.  His speech was confident, for he knew that truth would conquer in the long run, and therefore he gave forth his doctrine without respect to the age or its prejudices.  I do not think that you can say that of anybody else’s ministry, not even of the best and bravest of his servants.  We can see, in looking at Luther, great and glorious Luther, how Romanism tinged all that he did more or less; and the darkness of the age cast some gloom even over the serene and steadfast soul of Calvin; of each one of the reformers we must say the same: bright stars as all of these were, yet they kept not themselves untarnished by the sphere in which they shone.  Every man is more or less affected by his age, and we are obliged, as we read history, to make continual allowances, for we all admit that it would not be fair to judge the men of former times by the standard of the nineteenth century.  But, sirs, you may test Christ Jesus if you will by the nineteenth century light, if light it be; you may judge him by any century, ay, you may try him by the bright light of the throne of God: his teaching is pure truth without any admixture, it will stand the test of time and of eternity.  His teaching was not affected by the fact of his being born a Jew, nor by the prevalence of the rabbinical traditions, nor by the growth of the Greek philosophy, nor by any other of the peculiar influences which were then abroad. His teaching was in the world, but it was not of it, nor tinged by it.  It was the truth as he had received it from the Father, and the world could not make him add to it, or take from it, or change it in the least degree, and therefore in this respect he overcame the world.

Observe him next in the deep calm which pervaded his spirit at times when he received the approbation of men.  Our Lord was popular to a very high degree at certain times.  How the people thronged around him as his benevolent hands scattered healing on all sides.  How they approved of him when he fed them; but how clearly he saw through that selfish approbation, and said, “Ye seek me because of the loaves and fishes.”  He never lost his self-possession: you never find him elated by the multitudes following him.  There is not an expression that he ever used which even contains a suspicion of self-glorification.  Amid their hosannas his mind is quietly reposing in God.  He leaves their acclamations and applause to refresh himself by prayer upon the cold mountains, in the midnight air.  He communed with God, and so lived above the praises of men.  He walked among them, holy, harmless, undefiled and separate from sinners, even when they would have taken him by force and made him a king.  Once he rides in triumph, as he might often have done if he had pleased, but then it was in such humble style that his pomp was far other than that of kings, a manifestation of lowliness rather than a display of majesty.  Amid the willing hosannas of little children, and of those whom he had blessed, he rides along, but you can see that he indulges none of the thoughts of a worldly conqueror, none of the proud ideas of the warrior who returns from the battle stained with blood.  No, he is still as meek and as gentle and as kindly as ever he was, and his triumph has not a grain of self-exaltation in it.  He had overcome the world.  What could the world give him, brethren?  An imperial nature like to his, in which the manhood held such close communion with Deity as is not readily to be imagined, what was there here below to cause pride in him?  If the trump of fame had sounded out its loudest note, what could it have been compared with the songs of cherubim and seraphim to which his ear had been accustomed throughout all ages?  No, allied with his deity, his manhood was superior to all the arts of flattery and to all the honors which mankind could offer him.  He overcame the world.

He was the same when the world tried the other plan upon him.  It frowned at him, but he was calm still.  He had scarcely commenced to preach before they would have cast him from the brow of the hill headlong.  Do you not expect, as they are hurrying him to the precipice, to see him turn round upon them and denounce them at least with burning words, such as Elias used?  But no, he speaks not an angry word; he passes away and is gone out of their midst.  In the synagogue, they often gnashed their teeth upon him in their malice, but if ever he was moved to indignation, it was not because of anything directed against himself; he always bore all, and scarcely ever spoke a word by way of reply to merely personal attacks.  If calumnies were heaped upon him he went on as calmly as if they had not abused him, nor desired to slay him.  When he is brought before his judges, what a difference there is between the Master and his servant Paul.  He is smitten, but he does not say like Paul, “God shall smite thee, thou wilted wall;” no, but like a lamb before her shearers he is dumb and openeth not his mouth.  If they could have made him angry, they would have overcome him; but he was loving still; he was gentle, quiet, patient, however much they provoked him.  Point me to an impatient word — there is not even a tradition of an angry look that he gave on account of any offense rendered to himself.  They could not drive him from his purposes of love, nor could they make him say anything or do anything that was contrary to perfect love.  He calls down no fire from heaven: no she bears come out of the wood to devour those who have mocked him.  No, he can say, “I have overcome the world,” for whether it smile or whether it frown, in the perfect peace and quiet of his spirit, in the delicious calm of  communion with God, the Man of Sorrows holds on his conquering way.

His victory will be seen in another form.  He overcame the world as to the unselfishness of his aims.  When men find themselves in a world like this, they generally say, “What is our market? what can we make out of it?”  This is how they are trained from childhood.  “Boy, you have to fight your own way, mind you look to your own interests and rise in the world.”  The book which is commended to the young man shows him how to make the best use of all things for himself; he must take care of “number one” and mind the main chance.  The boy is told by his wise instructors, “you must look to yourself or nobody else will look to you: and whatever you may do for others, be doubly sure to guard your own interests.”  That is the world’s prudence, the essence of all her politics, the basis of her political economy — every man, and every nation must take care of themselves: if you wish for any other politics or economics you will be considered to be foolish theorists and probably a little touched in the head.  Self is the man, the world’s law of self-preservation is the sovereign rule and nothing can go on rightly if you interfere with the gospel of selfishness so the commercial and political Solomons assure us.  Now, look at the Lord Jesus Christ when he was in the world and you will learn nothing of such principles, except their condemnation: the world could not overcome him by leading him into a selfish mode of action.  Did it ever enter into his soul, even for a moment, what he could do for himself?  There were riches, but he had not where to lay his head.  The little store he had he committed to the trust of Judas, and as long as there were any poor in the land they were sure to share in what was in the bag.  He set so little account by estate, and stock and funds that no mention is made of such things by either of his four biographers.  He had wholly and altogether risen above the world in that respect; for with whatever evil the most spiteful infidels have ever charged our Lord they have never, to my knowledge, accused him of avarice, greed, or selfishness in any form.  He had overcome the world.

Then again the Master overcame the world in that he did not stoop to use its power.  He did not use that form of power which is peculiar to the world even for unselfish purposes.  I can conceive a man even apart from the Spirit of God rising superior to riches, and desiring only the promotion of some great principle which has possessed his heart; but you will usually notice that when men have done so, they have been ready to promote good by evil, or at least they have judged that great principles might be pushed on by force of arms, or bribes, or policy.  Mahomet had grasped a grand truth when he said, “There is no God but God.”  The unity of the godhead is a truth of the utmost value; but then here comes the means to be used for the propagation of this grand truth — the scimitar.  “Off with the infidels’ heads!  If they have false gods, or will not own the unity of the godhead, they are not fit to live.”  Can you imagine our Lord Jesus Christ doing this?  Why then the world would have conquered him.  But he conquered the world in that he would not employ in the slightest degree this form of power.  He might have gathered a troop about him, and his heroic example, together with his miraculous power, must soon have swept away the Roman empire, and converted the Jew; and then across Europe and Asia and Africa his victorious legions might have gone trampling down all manner of evil, and with the cross for his banner and the sword for his weapon, the idols would have fallen, and the whole world must have been made to bow at his feet.  But no, when Peter takes out the sword, he says, “Put up thy sword into its sheath, they that take the sword shall perish with the sword.”  Well did he say, “My kingdom is not of this world, else would my servants fight.”

And he might if he had pleased have allied his church with the state, as his mistaken friends have done in these degenerate times, and then there might have been penal laws against those who dared dissent, and there might have been forced contributions for the support of his church and such like things.  You have read, I dare say, of such things being done, but not in the Gospels, nor in the Acts of the Apostles.  These things are done by those who forget the Christ of God, for he uses no instrument but love, no sword but the truth, no power but the Eternal Spirit, and, in the very fact that he put all the worldly forces aside, he overcame the world.

So, brethren, he overcame the world by his fearlessness of the world’s elite, for many a man who has braved the frowns of the multitude cannot bear the criticism of the few who think they have monopolized all wisdom.  But Christ meets the Pharisee, and pays no honor to his phylactery; he confronts the Sadducee and yields not to his cold philosophy, neither does he conceal the difficulties of the faith to escape his sneer; and he braves also the Herodian, who is the worldly politician, and he gives him an unanswerable reply.  He is the same before them all, master in all positions, overcoming the world’s wisdom and supposed intelligence by his own simple testimony to the truth.

And he overcame the world in his life best of all by the constancy of his love.  He loved the most unlovely men, he loved those who hated him, he loved those who despised him.  You and I are readily turned aside from loving when we receive ungrateful treatment, and thus we are conquered by the world, but he kept to his great object — “he saved others, himself he could not save;” and he died with this prayer on his lips, “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.”  Not soured in the least, thou blessed Savior, thou art at the last just as tender as at the first.  We have seen fine spirits, full of generosity, who have had to deal with a crooked and perverse generation, until they have at last grown hard and cold.  Nero, who weeps when he signs the first death warrant of a criminal, at last comes to gloat in the blood of his subjects.  Thus do sweet flowers wither into noxious corruption.  As for thee, thou precious Savior, thou art ever fragrant with love.  No spot comes upon thy lovely character, though thou dost traverse a miry road.  Thou art as kind to men at thy departure as thou wast at thy coming, for thou hast overcome the world.

I can only say on the next point that Christ by his death overcame the world because, by a wondrous act of self-sacrifice, the Son of God smote to the heart the principle of selfishness, which is the very soul and lifeblood of the world.  There, too, by redeeming fallen man he lifted man up from the power which the world exercises over him, for he taught men that they are redeemed, that they are no longer their own but bought with a price, and thus redemption became the note of liberty from the bondage of self-love, and the hammer which breaks the fetters of the world and the lusts thereof.

By reconciling men unto God through his great atonement, also he has removed them from the despair which else had kept them down in sin, and made them the willing slaves of the world.  Now are they pardoned, and, being justified, they are made to be the friends of God, and being the friends of God they become enemies to God’s enemies, and are separated from the world, and so the world by Christ’s death is overcome.

But chiefly has he overcome by his rising and his reigning, for when he rose he bruised the serpent’s head, and that serpent is the prince of this world, and hath dominion over it.  Christ has conquered the world’s prince and led him in chains, and now hath Christ assumed the sovereignty over all things here below.  God hath put all things under his feet.  At his girdle are the keys of providence; he ruleth amongst the multitude and in the council chambers of kings.  As Joseph governed Egypt for the good of Israel, so doth Jehovah Jesus govern all things for the good of his people.

Now the world can go no further in persecuting his people than he permits it.  Not a martyr can burn, nor a confessor be imprisoned without the permit of Jesus Christ who is the Lord of all; for the government is upon his shoulders and his kingdom ruleth over all.  Brethren, this is a great joy to us to think of the reigning power of Christ as having overcome the world.

There is yet this other thought that he has overcome the world by the gift of the Holy Spirit.  That gift was practically the world’s conquest.  Jesus has set up a rival kingdom now: a kingdom of love and righteousness; already the world feels its power by the Spirit.  I do not believe that there is a dark place in the center of Africa which is not to some extent improved by the influence of Christianity; even the wilderness rejoices and is glad for him.  This moment the stone cut out of the mountain without hands has begun to smite old Dagon, it is breaking his head and breaking his hands and the very stump of him shall be dashed in pieces yet.  There is no power in this world so vital, so potent as the power of Christ at this day.  I say naught just now of heavenly or spiritual things; but I speak only of temporal and moral influences — even in these the cross is to the front.  He of whom Voltaire said that he lived in the twilight of his day, is going from strength to strength.  It was true it was the twilight, but it was the twilight of the morning and the full noon is coming.  Every year the name of Jesus brings more light to this poor world; every year hastens on the time when the cross which is the Pharos of humanity, the world’s lighthouse amid the storm, shall shine forth more and more brightly over the troubled waters till the great calm shall come.  The word shall become more and more universally true, “I, if I be lifted up, will draw all men unto me.”  Thus hath he overcome the world.

III. Now, lastly, WHAT CHEER IS THERE HERE FOR US? Why, this first, that if the man Christ Jesus has overcome the world at its worst, we who are in him shall overcome the world too through the same power which dwelt in him.  He has put his life into his people, he has given his Spirit to dwell in them, and they shall be more than conquerors.  He overcame the world when it attacked him in the worst possible shape, for he was poorer than any of you, he was more sick and sad than any of you, he was more despised and persecuted than any of you, and he was deprived of certain divine consolations which God has promised never to take away from his saints, and yet with all possible disadvantages Christ overcame the world: therefore be assured we shall conquer also by his strength.  Besides, he overcame the world when nobody else had overcome it.  It was as it were a young lion which had never been defeated in fight: it roared upon him out of the thicket and leaped upon him in the fullness of its strength.  Now if our greater Samson did tear this young lion as though it were a kid and fling it down as a vanquished thing, you may depend upon it that now it is an old lion, grey and covered with the wounds which he gave it of old, we, having the Lord’s life and power in us, will overcome it too.  Blessed be his name!  What good cheer there is in his victory.  He does as good as say to us, “I have overcome the world, and you in whom I dwell, who are clothed with my spirit, must overcome it too.”

But then, next, remember he overcame the world as our Head and representative, and it may truly be said that if the members do not overcome, then the head has not perfectly gained the victory.  If it were possible for the members to be defeated, why then, the head itself could not claim a complete victory, since it is one with the members.  So Jesus Christ, our covenant Head and representative, in whose loins lay all the spiritual seed, conquered the world for us and we conquered the world in him.  He is our Adam, and what was done by him was actually done for us and virtually done by us.  Have courage then, for you must conquer; it must happen to you as unto your head: where the head is shall the members be, and as the head is so must the members be: wherefore be assured of the palm branch and the crown.

And now, brethren, I ask you whether you have not found it so?  Is it not true at this moment that the world is overcome in you?  Does self govern you?  Are you working to acquire wealth for your own aggrandizement?  Are you living to win honor and fame among men?  Are you afraid of men’s frowns?  Are you the slave of popular opinion?  Do you do things because it is the custom to do them?  Are you the slaves of fashion?  If you are, you know nothing about this victory.  But if you are true Christians I know what you can say: “Lord, I am thy servant, thou hast loosed my bonds; henceforth the world hath no dominion over me; and though it tempt me, and frighten me, and flatter me, yet still I rise superior to it by the power of thy Spirit, for the love of Christ constraineth me, and I live not unto myself and unto things that are seen, but unto Christ and to things invisible.”  If it be so, who has done this for you?  Who but Christ the Overcomer, who is formed in you the hope of glory: wherefore be of good cheer, for you have overcome the world by virtue of his dwelling in you.

So, brethren, let us go back to the world and its tribulations without fear.  Its trials cannot hurt us.  In the process we shall get good, as the wheat doth out of the threshing.  Let us go forth to combat the world, for it cannot overcome us.  There was never a man yet with the life of God in his soul whom the whole world could subdue; nay, all the world and hell together cannot conquer the weakest babe in the family of the Lord Jesus Christ.  Lo, ye are harnessed with salvation, ye are panoplied with omnipotence, your heads are covered with the aegis of the atonement, and Christ himself, the Son of God, is your captain.  Take up your battle cry with courage, and fear not, for more is he that is for you than all they that be against you.  It is said of the glorified saints, “They overcame through the blood of the Lamb;” “and this is the victory which overcometh the world, even our faith,” wherefore be ye steadfast, even to the end, for ye shall be more than conquerors through him that hath loved you.  Amen.

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