A Revival
‘Turn you. afc my reproof: behold, I will pour out my Spirit unto you.” — i. 23.
TJRN you at my reproof: behold, I will pour out my Spirit;” — the command and the promise joined, and constituting one harmonious whole. How strictly in concord are the several intimations of the Scriptures! “Work out your own salvation; for it is God that worketh in you” (Phil, ii 1 2). To him that hath shall be given, and he shall have abundance. It is to those who turn that the promise of the Spirit is addressed. These two reciprocate. The Spirit poured out arrests a sinner, and turns him; then, as he turns, he gets more of the Spirit poured out. The sovereignty of God and the duty of men are both alike real; and each has its own place in the well-ordered covenant. It is true, that unless a man turn, he will not get God’s Spirit poured out; and it is also true, that unless he get God’s Spirit poured out, he will not turn. When the dead is recalled to life, the blood, sent circling through the system, sets the valves of the heart a-beating; and the valves of the heart, by their beating, send the life-blood circling throughout the frame. It would be in vain to inquire what was the point in the reciprocating series to which the life-giving impulse was first applied. The mysteries of the human spirit are deeper still than those of the body. The way of God, in the regeneration of man, is past finding out. One {art of it he keeps near himself, concealed by the clouds and darkness that surround his throne; another part of it he has clearly revealed to our understandings, and pressed on our hearts. His immediate part is to pour out the Spirit; our immediate part is to turn at his reproof. If, instead of simply doing our part, we presumptuously intrude into his, we shall attain neither. If we reverently regard the promise, and diligently obey the command, we shall get and do — we shall do and get. We shall get the Spirit, enabling us to turn; and turn, in order to get more of the Spirit. The command is given, not to make the promise unnecessary, but to send us to it for help. The promise is given, not to supersede the command, but to encourage us in the effort to obey. Turn at his reproof, and hope in his promise j hope in his promise, and turn at his reproof.
Religion, when it is real, is altogether a practical thing. It disappoints Satan; it crucifies the flesh; it sanctifies the character; it glorifies God. It is a thing that acts, and acts mightily. It is a thing, not of words, but of deeds. There is an enormous amount of mere imitation religion amongst us. If there were as great a proportion of counterfeit coin circulating in the kingdom, we would be all on the alert to detect and destroy it. We would feel the danger of being ourselves deceived, and losing the riches for which we care. There ought to be greater jealousy of a spiritless form, a gilded word religion, passing current in the Church; for he who is taken in by this “name to live,” though he should gain the whole world, will lose his own souL
A valorous hand to hand struggle with inherent corruptions is distressingly rare in the wide-spread religious profession of the day. You read and pray, and worship in the assembly, and complain that, notwithstanding, your souls do not prosper; you have not comfort; you are not sensible of growth in grace. But all this is mere hypocrisy, if you be not “turning” — tearing yourself asunder from besetting sins, as from a right arm or a right eye. The evil speaking, watch it, catch it on your lips, crush it as it swells and germinates in the seed-bed of your thoughts within. The equivocations, the half-untruths, down with them. Out with the very truth, although it should break off the nearly completed bargain — although it should freeze the friendship that seems necessary to your success. Anger, malice, envy, — seize these vipers, that twist and hiss in your bosom; strangle them outright there. Your religion is nothing better than a cheat, if you are not busy with the work of ceasing to do evil. “Herein do I exercise myself,” said Paul, “that I may have a conscience void of offence.” How can the feeblest learners of the truth attain, by an idle wish, that actual progressive purification which its greatest human teacher only strove after by incessant exercise ]
In the manifold diversities of sin there is such a thing as the pride of self-righteousness: you fall into this error when you pretend to turn from evil without trusting in God. You fall into the opposite snare of hypocrisy, when you pretend to trust in God, and do not turn at his command. Getting freely and doing faithfully, together constitute true religion. Get and do, do and get. Nor is it a partitioning of salvation between God and man, as if a part of it were his gift, and a part of it man’s act. The turning which constitutes salvation is, supremely, all God’s gift, and, subordinately, all the doing of the man. From the spring-head in the heart, to the outermost streams of life, he makes all things new; and yet the man himself must, at God’s bidding, turn from all iniquity.
We speak of a revival; we pray for it: perhaps we long for it. But ah this, and an hundredfold more in the same direction, will not bring it about. God’s arm is not shortened: his ear is not heavy. Our iniquities separate between us and him. The way to invite his presence is to put away the evil of our doings; for he cannot dwell with sin. And if any one, conscious of his knowledge and jealous of orthodoxy, should say in opposition, it is God’s presence, sovereignly vouchsafed, that makes the visited man put away his evil; we answer, that is a glorious truth, but is not an argument against our injunction. That is the upper end of a revealed truth which reaches from earth to heaven: it is too high for us: if you put forth your hand to touch it at the top, it will consume you. That high thing is for God to handle, and not man. The end that leans on earth and lies to your hand is — “Turn you at my reproof” The only safe way of moving the heaven-high extreme of the divine sovereignty for revival is, by throwing ourselves with our whole weight on this which is the visible, tangible, lower end of that incomprehensible mystery — this timing from our own evil in obedience to the command of God.
The grand hinderance to a revival by the Spirit poured out is the general conformity of Christians to the fashion of the world. The short road to a revival is to turn from the error of our ways. If there were more of the doing which religion demands, there would be more of the getting which it promises.
Turn at my reproof. God looketh on the heart: he measures the motive as well as the deed. There is such a thing as a proud, atheistic morality, which is as offensive to God as more vulgar vice. To abstain from common and gross transgressions, is not holiness: it is a partial process: it is to diminish the bulk of wickedness on one side, by directing all the stream of internal corruption to the other side. When a man turns from wickedness because God hates it, he will turn alike from every sin. If we reform ourselves, we will select despised and shameful lusts of the flesh to be sacrificed, but retain and cherish certain favourite lusts of the mind. If we permit God’s word to search, and God’s authority to rule, idols alike of high and low degree will be driven forth of the temple. If the turning be at his reproof, it will be a turning both complete in its comprehension and true in its character — a turning without partiality and without hypocrisy.
When we turn at his reproof, he wih pour out his Spirit: when he pours out his Spirit we will turn at his reproof; — blessed circle for saints to reason in. He formed the channel wherein grace and duty chase each other round. He supplied the material alike of the getting and the doing. He set the stream in motion, and he will keep it going, until every good work begun shall be perfect in the day of Christ Jesus.
Hear that voice from heaven, “I will pour out.” Yea, Lord; tli en, we must draw away. We are placed at the open orifice in the lowest extremity of the outbranching channel: the fountain head is with God on high. When he pours out, we draw forth; when we draw forth, he pours out. It is because there is a pressure constant and strong from that upper spring of grace, that we can draw any here below for the exercises of obedience but the covenant is ordered so, that if we do not draw for the supply of actual effort, none will gravitate toward us from the fountain head. It is the still, stagnant, dead mass of inert profession, sticking in the lower lips of the channel, that checks the flow of grace, and practically seals for us its unfathomable fountain. If there were a turning, a movement, an effort, an expenditure, a need, a vacancy, at our extremity below, there would be a flow of the divine compassion to make up the want, and charge every vessel anew with fresh and full supply. Prove him now herewith; exert and expend in his service, and see whether he will not open the windows of heaven and pour out a blessing, greater than tha room made vacant to receive it,
Sotohtg gTisobtbieritt, Reaping Jfutrgtwnt.