and fears, as most of you have had; and where is the strong believer that has not sometimes wavered? I have said, within myself “Is this religion true, which, day after day, I incessantly preach to the people? Is it the correct one? Is it true that this religion has an influence upon mankind?” And I will tell you how I have reassured myself. I have looked upon the hundreds, no, upon the thousands whom I have around me, who were once the vilest of the vile — drunkards, swearers and such like — and I now see them “clothed and in their right mind,” walking in holiness and in the fear of God; and I have said, within myself “This must be the truth, then, because I see its marvellous effects.” It is true, because it is efficient for purposes which error never could accomplish. It exerts an influence among the lowest order of mortals, and over the most abominable of our humanity. It is a power, an irresistible agent of good; who then shall deny its truth. I take it that the highest proof of Christ’s power is not that he offers salvation, not that he bids you take it if you will, but that when you reject it, when you hate it, when you despise it, he has a power by which he can change your mind, make you think differently from your former thoughts, and turn you from the error of your ways. This I conceive to be the meaning of the text: “mighty to save.”
8. But it is not all the meaning. Our Lord is not just mighty to make men repent, to quicken the dead in sin, to turn them from their follies and their iniquities. But he is exalted to do more than that: he is mighty to keep them Christians after he has made them so, and mighty to preserve them in his fear and love, until he consummates their spiritual existence in heaven. Christ’s might does not lie in making a believer, and then leaving him to shift for himself afterwards; but he who begins the good work carries it on; he who imparts the first germ of life which quickens the dead soul, gives afterwards the life which prolongs the divine existence, and bestows that mighty power which at last bursts asunder every bond of sin, and lands the soul perfected in glory. We hold and teach, and we believe upon Scriptural authority, that all men to whom Christ has given repentance must infallibly hold on their way. We do believe that God never begins a good work in a man without finishing it; that he never makes a man truly alive to spiritual things without carrying on that work in his soul even to the end, by giving him a place among the choirs of the sanctified. We do not think that Christ’s power dwells in merely bringing me one day into grace, and then telling me to keep myself there, but in so putting me into a gracious state, and giving me such an inward life and such a power within myself that I can no more turn back than the very sun in the heavens can stop itself in its course, or cease to shine. Beloved, we regard this as signified by the terms “mighty to save.” This is commonly called Calvinistic doctrine; it is none other than Christian doctrine, the doctrine of the holy Bible; for despite that it is now called Calvinism, it could not be so called in Augustine’s days; and yet in Augustine’s works you find the very same things. And it is not to be called Augustinism; it is to be found in the writings of the apostle Paul. And yet it was not called Paulism, simply for this reason, that it is the expansion, the fulness of the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ. To repeat what we have before said, we hold and boldly teach, that Jesus Christ is not merely able to save men who put themselves in his way and who are willing to be saved, but that he is able to make men willing — that he is able to make the drunkard renounce his drunkenness and come to him — that he is able to make the despiser bend his knee, and make hard hearts melt before his love. Now, it is ours to show that he is able to do so.
9. II. HOW CAN WE PROVE THAT CHRIST IS “MIGHTY TO SAVE?”
10. We will give you the strongest argument first; and we shall need only one. The argument is, that he has done it. We need no other, it would be superfluous to add another. He has saved men. He has saved them, in the full extent and meaning of the word which we have endeavoured to explain. But in order to set this truth in a clear light, we will suppose the worst of cases. It is very easy to imagine, say some, that when Christ’s gospel is preached to some here who are amiable and lovely, and have always been trained up in the fear of God, they will receive the gospel in the love of it. Very well, then we will not take such a case. You see this South Sea Islander. He has just been eating a diabolical meal of human flesh; he is a cannibal; at his belt are slung the scalps of men whom he has murdered, and in whose blood he glories. If you land on the coast he will eat you too, unless you mind what you are after. That man bows himself before a block of wood. He is a poor ignorant debased creature, only slightly removed from the brute beast. Now, has Christ’s gospel power to tame that man, to take the scalps from his belt, to make him give up his bloody practices, renounce his gods, and become a civilised and Christian man? You know, my dear friends, you talk about the power of education in England; there may be a great deal in it; education may do very much for some who are here, not in a spiritual, but in a natural way; but what would education do with this savage: go and try. Send the best schoolmaster in England over to him: he will eat him before the day is up. That will be all the good of it. But if the missionary goes with Christ’s gospel, what will become of him? Why, in multitudes of cases, he has been the pioneer of civilisation, and under the providence of God has escaped a cruel death. He goes with love in his hands and in his eyes; he speaks to the savage. And notice, we are speaking facts now, not dreams. The savage drops his tomahawk. He says, “It is marvellous; the things that this man tells me are wonderful, I will sit down and listen.” He listens, and the tears roll down his cheeks; a feeling of humanity which never burned within his soul before is kindled in him. He says, “I believe in the Lord Jesus Christ,” and soon he is clothed and in his right mind, and becomes in every respect a man — such a man as we would desire all men to be. Now, we say, that this is proof that Christ’s gospel does not come to the mind that is prepared for it, but prepares the mind for itself; that Christ does not merely put the seed into the ground that has been prepared beforehand, but ploughs the ground too — indeed, and harrows it, and does the whole of the work. He is most able to do all this. Ask our missionaries who are in Africa, in the midst of the greatest barbarians in the world — ask them whether Christ’s gospel is able to save, and they will point to the kraal {a} of the Hottentot, and then they will point to the houses of the Kuraman, and they will say, “What has made this difference, but the word of the gospel of Christ Jesus?” Yes, dear brethren, we have had proofs enough in heathen countries; and why need we say more, but merely to add this — we have had proofs enough at home. There are some who preach a gospel which is very well fitted to train man in morals, but utterly unfitted to save him, a gospel which does well enough to keep men sober when they have become drunkards. It is a good thing enough to supply them with a kind of life, when they have it already, but not to quicken the dead and save the soul, and it can give up to despair the very characters whom Christ’s gospel was most of all intended to affect. I could a story unfold, of some who have plunged head first into the blackest gulfs of sin, which would horrify you and me, if we could allow them to recount their guilt. I could tell you how they have come into God’s house with their teeth set against the minister, determined that say what he would they might listen, but it would be to scoff. They stayed a moment; some word arrested their attention; they thought within themselves, “I will hear that sentence.” It was some pointed, terse saying, that entered into their souls. They did not know how it was, but they were spell bound, and stood to listen a little longer; and by and by, unconsciously to themselves, the tears began to fall, and when they went away, they had a strange, mysterious feeling about those who led them to their rooms. Down they fell on their knees; the story of their life was all told before God; he gave them peace through the blood of the Lamb, and they went to God’s house, many of them to say, “Come and hear what God has done for my soul,” and to
Tell to sinners round
What a dear Saviour they had found.
Remember the case of John Newton, the great and mighty preacher of St. Mary, Woolnoth, — an instance of the power of God to change the heart, as well as to give peace when the heart is changed. Ah! dear hearers, I often think within myself, “This is the greatest proof of the Saviour’s power.” Let another doctrine be preached: will it do the same? If it will, why not let every man gather a crowd around him and preach it. Will it really do it? If it will, then the blood of men’s souls must rest upon the man who does not boldly
