or beneath himself into hell, yet he is a justified one, and nothing can be laid to his charge. Who can condemn? Who can condemn? Yes, echo oh you skies; reverberate, you caverns of the deep. Who can condemn when Christ has died, has risen from the dead, is enthroned on high, and intercedes?
16. But all things pass away. I see the heavens on fire, rolling up like a scroll — I see sun, moon, and stars now grow pale with feeble light — the earth is tottering; the pillars of heaven are rocking; the grand assize is commenced — the herald angels descend, not to sing this time, but with thundering trumpets to proclaim, “He comes, he comes to judge the earth in righteousness, and the people in equity.” What does the believer say now? He says, “I do not fear that assize, for who can condemn me?” The great white throne is set, the books are opened, men are trembling, fiends are yelling, sinners are shrieking — “Rocks hide us, mountains fall on us”; these make up an awful chorus of dismay. There stands the believer, and looking around on the assembled universe of men and angels, he cries, “Who shall lay anything to my charge?” and silence reigns through earth and heaven. Again he speaks, and fixing his eyes fully on the Judge himself, he cries, “who is he who condemns?” And lo, there upon the throne of judgment sits the only one who can condemn; and who is that? It is Christ who died, yes rather, who is risen again, who sits on the right hand of God, who makes intercession for him. Can those lips say, “Depart you cursed,” to the man for whom they once did intercede? Can those eyes flash lightnings on the man whom once they saw in sin, and with rays of love they lifted him up to joy, and peace, and purity? No! Christ will not perjure himself. He cannot reverse his grace; it cannot be that the throne of condemnation shall be exalted on the ruins of the cross. It cannot be that Christ should transform himself at last, but until he can do so, no one can condemn. No one but he has a right to condemn, for he is the sole judge of right and wrong, and if he has died shall he put us to death, and if he has risen for us, shall he thrust us downwards to the pit, and if he has reigned for us and has been accepted for us, shall he cast us away, and if he has pleaded for us, shall he curse us at the last? No! Come life, come death, my soul can rest on this. He died for me. I cannot be punished for my sin. He rose again, I must rise, and though I die, yet I shall live again. He sits at the right hand of God, and so must I. I must be crowned and reign with him for ever. He intercedes, and he must be heard. He beckons to me, and I must be brought at length to see his face, and to be with him where he is.
17. I will say no more; only may God give us all an interest in these four precious things. An angel’s tongue might fail to sing their sweetness, or tell their brightness and their majesty; mine has failed — but this is well. The excellency of the power is in the doctrine, and not in my preaching. Amen.
{a} Aegis: A shield, or defensive armour; applied in ancient mythology to that of Jupiter or Minerva. fig. A protection, or impregnable defence. OED.
{b} Encomium: A formal or elegant expression of praise; a eulogy, panegyric. OED.
The Scales Of Judgment
No. 257-5:257. A Sermon Delivered On Sunday Morning, June 12, 1859, By C. H. Spurgeon, At The Music Hall, Royal Surrey Gardens.
TEKEL; you are weighed in the balances, and are found wanting. {Daniel 5:27}
1. There is a weighing time for kings and emperors, and all the monarchs of earth, albeit some of them have exalted themselves to a position in which they do not appear to be accountable to man. Though they escape the scales on earth, they must surely be tried at the judgment bar of God. For nations there is a weighing time. National sins demand national punishments. The whole history of God’s dealings with mankind proves that though a nation may go on in wickedness; it may multiply its oppressions; it may abound in bloodshed, tyranny, and war; but an hour of retribution draws near. When it shall have filled up its measure of iniquity, then shall the angel of vengeance execute its doom. There cannot be an eternal damnation for nations as nations; the destruction of men at last will be that of individuals, and at the judgment bar of God each man must be tried for himself. Therefore the punishment of nations is national. The guilt they incur must receive its awful recompence in this present time. It was so with the great nation of the Chaldeans. They had been guilty of blood. The monuments which still remain, and which we have recently discovered, prove them to have been a cruel and ferocious race. They were a people of a strange language, and their deeds were even more strange. God allowed that nation for a certain period to grow and thrive, until it became God’s hammer, breaking in pieces many nations. It was the axe of the Almighty — his battle axe, and his weapon of war. By it he struck the loins of kings, yes, and killed mighty kings. But its time came at last. She sat alone as a queen, and said, “I shall see no sorrow,” nevertheless, the Lord brought her low, and made her grind in the dust of captivity, and gave her riches to the spoiler, and her pomp to the destroyer. Even so must it be with every nation of the earth that is guilty of oppression. Humbling itself before God, when his wrath is kindled only a little, it may for awhile arrest its fate; but if it still continues in its bold unrighteousness, it shall certainly reap the harvest of its own sowing. So likewise it shall be with the nations that now exist on the face of the earth. There is no God in heaven if the iniquity of slavery goes unpunished. There is no God existing in heaven above if the cry of the negro does not bring down a red hail of blood upon the nation that still holds the black man in slavery. Nor is there a God anywhere if the nations of Europe that still oppress each other and are oppressed by tyrants do not find out to their dismay that he executes vengeance. The Lord God is the avenger of everyone who is oppressed, and the executor of everyone who oppresses. I see, this very moment, glancing at the page of the world’s present history, a marvellous proof that God will take vengeance. Piedmont, the land which is at this time sodden with blood, is only at this hour suffering the vengeance that has long been hanging over it. The snows of its mountains were once red with the blood of martyrs. It is not yet forgotten how there the children of God were hunted like partridges on the mountains; and God has so directed it, that the nations that performed that frightful act upon his children, shall there meet, rend, and devour each other in the slaughter, and both sides shall be almost equal, and nothing shall be seen except that God will punish those who lift their hands against his anointed.
2. There has never been a deed of persecution — there has never been a drop of martyr’s blood shed yet, that shall not be avenged, and every land guilty of it shall yet drink the cup of the wine of the wrath of God. And it is especially certain that there an awful storm is gathering over the head of the empire of Rome — that spiritual despotism of the firstborn of hell. All the clouds of God’s vengeance are gathering into one — the firmament is reeling with thunder; God’s right arm is lifted up even now, and before long the nations of the earth shall eat her flesh and burn her with fire. Those who have been made drunk with the wine of her fornication, shall soon also have to drink with her from the wine of the fierceness of his wrath; and they shall reel to and fro, their loins shall be loose, their knees shall knock together, when God fulfils the old handwriting on the rock of Patmos.
3. Our duty at this time is to take heed to ourselves as a nation that we purge ourselves of our great sins. Although God has given so much light, and kindly favoured us with the dew of his Spirit, yet England is a hoary sinner. God still regards her favourably with mercy, so that each Christian should try to shake off the sins of his nation from his own skirt, and let each one to the utmost of his ability labour and strive to purify this land of blood and oppression, and of everything evil that still clings to her. So may God preserve this land; and may its monarchy endure until he shall come, before whom both kings and princes shall cheerfully surrender their power even as the stars fade when the king of light — the sun — lifts up its golden head.
4. With this brief preface, I will leave nations and kings all to themselves, and consider the text principally as it relates to each of us; and may God grant that when we go out of this hall most of us may be able to say, “I thank God I have a good hope, that when weighed in the scales at last I shall not be found wanting.”
