The Dying Thief in a New Light

“But the other answering rebuked him, saying, Dost not thou fear God, seeing thou art in the same condemnation? And we indeed justly; for we receive the due reward of our deeds: but this Man hath done nothing amiss. And he said unto Jesus, Lord, remember me when Thou comest into Thy kingdom.” — LUKE xxiii. 40-42.

A GREAT many persons, whenever they hear of the conversion of the dying thief, remember that he was saved in the very article of death, and they dwell upon that fact, and that alone. He has always been quoted as a case of salvation at the eleventh hour; and so, indeed, he is. In his case it is proven that, as long as a man can repent, he can obtain forgiveness. The cross of Christ avails even for a man hanging on a gibbet, and drawing near to his last hour. He who is “mighty to save” was mighty, even during His own death, to pluck others from the grasp of the destroyer, though they were in the act of expiring.

But that is not everything which the story teaches us; and it is always a pity to look exclusively upon one point, and thus to miss everything else — perhaps miss that which is more important. So often has this been the case, that it has produced a sort of revulsion of feeling in certain minds, so that they have been driven in a wrong direction by their wish to protest against what they think to be a common error. I read, the other day, that this story of the dying thief ought not to be taken as an encouragement to death-bed repentance. Brethren, if the author meant — and I do think he did mean — that this ought never to be so used as to lead people to postpone repentance to a dying bed, he spoke correctly. No Christian man could or would use it so injuriously :. he must be hopelessly bad who would draw from God’s long-suffering an argument for continuing in sin. I trust, however, that the narrative is not often so used, even by the worst of men; and I feel sure that it will not be so used by any one of you. It cannot be properly turned to such a purpose: it might be used as an encouragement to thieving just as much as to the delay of repentance. I might say, “I may be a thief because this thief was saved,” just as rationally as I might say, “I may put off repentance because this thief was saved when he was about to die.” The fact is, there is nothing so good but men can pervert it into evil, if they have evil hearts: the justice of God is made a motive for despair, and His mercy an argument for sin. Wicked men will drown themselves in the rivers of truth as readily as in the pools of error. He that has a mind to destroy himself can choke his soul with the Bread of Life, or dash himself in pieces against the Rock of Ages. There is no doctrine of the grace of God so gracious that graceless men may not turn it into licentiousness.

I venture, however, to say that, if I stood by the bedside of a dying man to-night, and I found him anxious about his soul, but fearful that Christ could not save him because repentance had been put off so late, I should certainly quote the dying thief to him, and I should do it with a good conscience, and without hesitation. I should tell him that, though he was as near to dying as the thief upon the cross was, yet, if he repented of his sin, and turned his face to Christ believingly, he would find eternal life. I should do this with all my heart, rejoicing that I had such a story to tell to one at the gates of eternity. I do not think that I should be censured by the Holy Spirit for thus using a narrative which He has Himself recorded, — recorded with the foresight that it would be so used. I should feel, at any rate, in my own heart, a sweet conviction that I had treated the subject as I ought to have treated it, and as it was intended to be used for men /// extremis when their hearts are turning towards the living God. Oh, yes, poor soul, whatever your age, or whatever the period of life to which you have come, you may now find eternal life by the exercise of faith in the Lord Jesus Christ! Altering Cowper’s hymn a very little, we may truly say —

“The dying thief rejoiced to see

That fountain in his day;
And there may you, though vile as he,
Wash all your sins away.”

Many good people think that they ought to guard the gospel; but it is never so safe as when it stands out in its own naked majesty. It wants no covering from us. When we protect it with provisos, and guard it with exceptions, and qualify it with observations, it is like David in Saul’s armour: it is hampered and hindered, and you may even hear it cry, “I cannot go with these.” Preach the gospel just as it is, and it will prove itself to be “the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth.” Qualify it, and the salt has lost its savour. I will venture to put the matter to you thus. I have heard it said that few are ever converted in old age; and this is thought to be a statement which will prove exceedingly arousing and impressive to the young. It certainly wears that appearance; but, on the other hand, it is very discouraging to the aged. I demur to the frequent repetition of such statements, for I do not find their counterpart in the teaching of Christ and His apostles. Assuredly, our Lord spoke of some who entered the vineyard at the eleventh hour of the day; and His miracles included, not only healing for those who were dying, but even resurrection for the dead. Nothing can be concluded from the words of the Lord Jesus against the salvation of men at any hour or any age. I tell you that, in the business of your acceptance with God, through faith in Christ Jesus, it does not matter what age you have now reached. The command, for the present moment, to every one of you is, “To-day if ye will hear His voice, harden not your hearts;” and whether you are in the earliest stage of life, or are within a few hours of eternity, if now you fly for refuge to the hope set before you in the gospel, you shall be saved. The gospel that I preach excludes none on the ground of either age or character. Whoever you may be, “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved,” is the message we have to deliver to you. If we address to you the longer form of the gospel, “He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved,” this is true of every living man, be his age whatever it may. I am not afraid that this story of the dying and repenting thief, who went straight from the cross to the crown, will be used by you amiss; but if you are wicked enough to misuse it, I cannot help it. Such conduct will only fulfil that solemn Scripture which saith that preachers of the gospel are the

THE DYING THIEF IN A NEW LIGHT. S/

“savour of death unto death” to some, while they are the “savour of life unto life” to others.

But I do not think, dear friends, that the only speciality about the thief is the lateness of his repentance. So far from that being the only point of interest, it is not even the chief point. To some minds, at any rate, other points will be even more remarkable. I want to show you, very briefly, first, that there was a speciality in his case as to the means of his conversion; secondly, a speciality in his faith; thirdly, a speciality in the result of his faith while he was here below; and, fourthly, a speciality in the promise won by his faith-^ the promise fulfilled to him in Paradise.

I. First, then, I think you ought to notice very carefully

THE SINGULARITY AND SPECIALITY OF THE MEANS BY WHICH THE THIEF WAS CONVERTED.

HOAV do you think it was? Well, we do not know. We cannot tell. It seems to me that the man was an unconverted, impenitent thief when they nailed him to the cross, because Matthew says, that when the chief priests, scribes, and elders mocked the suffering Saviour, saying, “He trusted in God; let Him deliver Him now, if He will have Him: for He said, I am the Son of God. The thieves also, which were crucified with Him, cast the same hi His teeth” I know that this may have been a general statement, and that it is reconcilable with its having been done by one thief only, according to the methods commonly used by critics; but I am not enamoured of critics even when they are friendly. I have such respect for revelation that I never in my own mind permit the idea of discrepancies and mistakes; and when the Evangelist says “they”, I believe he means thieves, and that both these malefactors did at first rail at the Christ with whom they were crucified. It would appear that, by some means or other, this thief must have been converted while he was on the cross. Assuredly, nobody preached a sermon to him, no evangelistic address was delivered at the foot of his cross, and no meeting, of which we have any record, was held for special prayer on his account. He does not even seem to have had an instruction, or an invitation, or an expostulation addressed to him; and yet he became a sincere and accepted believer in the Lord Jesus Christ.

Dwell upon this fact, if you please, and note its practical bearing upon the cases of many around us. There are many among my hearers who have been instructed from their childhood, who have been admonished, and warned, and entreated, and invited, and yet they have not come to Christ; while this man, without any of these advantages, nevertheless believed in the Lord Jesus Christ, and found eternal life. O you who have lived under the sound of the gospel from your childhood, the dying thief does not comfort you, but he accuses you! Why do you abide so long in unbelief? Will you never believe the testimony of divine love?

What do you think must have converted this poor thief? It strikes me that it may have been — it must have been — the sight of our great Lord and Saviour. There was, to begin with, our Saviour’s wonderful behaviour on the way to the cross. Perhaps the robber had mixed in all sorts of society; but he had never seen a man like this Man. Never had a cross been carried by a Cross-Bearer of His form and fashion. The robber might well marvel who this meek and majestic Personage could be. He heard the women weep, and he may have wondered within himself whether anybody would ever weep for him. He thought that this must be some very singular Person that the people should crowd around Him with tears in their eyes. When he heard that mysterious Sufferer say so solemnly, “Daughters of Jerusalem, weep not for Me, but weep for yourselves, and for your children,” he must have been struck with wonder. When he came to think, in his death-pangs, of the singular look of pity which Jesus cast on the women, and of the self-forgetfulness which gleamed from His eyes, he must have been smitten with a strange relenting: it was as if an angel had crossed his path, and opened his eyes to a new world, and to a new form of manhood, the like of which he had never seen before. He and his companion were coarse, rough fellows: but their fellow-Sufferer was a delicately-fashioned Being, of a superior order to them; yes, and of a superior order to any other of the sons of men. Who could He be? What must He be? Though the thief could see that Jesus suffered and fainted as He went along, he marked that there was no word of complaining, no note of execration, in return for the revilings cast upon Him. His eyes looked love even on those who glared upon Him with hate. Surely that march along the Via Dolorosa was the first part of the sermon which God preached to that bad man’s heart. It was preached to many others who did not regard its teaching; but upon this man, by God’s special grace, it had a softening effect when he came to think over it, and consider it. Was it not a likely and convincing means of grace?

When he saw the Saviour surrounded by the Roman soldiery — saw the executioners bring forth the hammers and the nails, and lay him down upon His back, and drive the nails into His hands and feet — this crucified criminal was startled and astonished as he heard Him say, “Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do.” He himself, probably, had met his executioners with a curse; but he heard this Man breathe a prayer to the great Father; and, as a Jew, as he probably was, he understood what was meant by such a prayer. But it did astound him to hear Jesus pray for His murderers. That was a petition the like of which he had never heard, nor even dreamed of. From whose lips could it come but from the lips of a divine Being? Such a loving, forgiving, God-like prayer, proved Him to be the Messias. Who else had ever prayed so? Certainly not David and the kings of Israel, who, on the contrary, in all honesty and heartiness, imprecated the wrath of God upon their enemies. Elias himself would not have prayed in that fashion; rather would he have called fire from heaven on the centurion and his company. It was a new, strange sound to the malefactor. I do not suppose that he appreciated it to the full; but I can well believe that it deeply impressed him, and made him feel that his fellow-Sufferer was a Being about whom there was an exceeding mystery of goodness.

And when the central cross was lifted up, that thief, hanging on his own cross, looked around, and I suppose he could see Pilate’s inscription written in Hebrew, Greek, and Latin, — “Jesus of Nazareth, the King of the Jews.” If so, that writing was his little Bible, his New Testament, and he interpreted it by what he knew of the Old Testament. Putting this and that together — that strange Person, incarnate loveliness, all patience and all majesty, that strange prayer, and now this singular inscription, surely he who knew the Old Testament, as I have no doubt he did, would say to himself, “Is this HE? Is this truly the King of the Jews? This is He who wrought miracles, and raised the dead, and said that He was the Son of God; is it all true, and is He really our Messiah?” Then he would remember the words of the prophet Isaiah, “He is despised and rejected of men: a Man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief.” “Surely He hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows.” “The chastisement of our peace was upon Him.” “Why,” he would say to himself, “I never understood that passage in the prophet Esaias before, but it must point to Him! Can this be He who cried in the Psalms,.’ They pierced My hands and My feet’?” As he looked at Him again, he felt in his soul, “It must be He? Could there be another so God-like, so divine?” He felt conviction creeping over his spirit. Then he looked again, and he marked how all men down below rejected, and despised, and hissed at Him, and hooted Him; and all this would make the case the more clear. “All they that see Me laugh Me to scorn: they shoot out the lip, they shake the head, saying, He trusted on the Lord that He would deliver Him: let Him deliver Him, seeing He delighted in Him.”

Peradventure, the dying thief learned the gospel from the lips of Christ’s enemies. They said, “He saved others.” “Ah!” thought he, “did He save others? Why should he not save me?” What a grand bit of gospel that was for the dying thief — “He saved others “! I think I could swim to heaven on that plank — “He saved others;” because, if He saved others, He can of a surety save me. Thus, the very things that Christ’s enemies disdainfully threw at Him would be gospel to this poor dying man. When I have been obliged to read any of the wretched prints that are sent us out of scorn, in which our ‘Lord is held up to ridicule, I have thought, “Why, perhaps those who read these loathsome blasphemies may, nevertheless, learn the gospel from them!” You may pick a diamond from a dunghill, and find its brilliance undiminished; and you may hear the gospel from a blasphemous mouth, and it shall be none the less the gospel of salvation. Perad venture, this man learned the gospel from those who jested at our dying Lord; and so the servants of Satan were unconsciously made to be the servants of the Saviour.

But, after all, surely that which won him most must have been to look at Jesus again, as He was hanging upon the cruel tree. Possibly nothing about the physical person of Christ would be attractive to him, for His visage was more marred than that of any man, and His form more than the sons of men; but yet there must have been in that blessed face a singular charm. Was it not the very image of perfection? As I conceive the face of Christ, it was very different from anything that any painter has yet been able to place upon his canvas. It was all goodness, and kindness, and unselfishness; and yet it was a royal face. It was a face of superlative justice and unrivalled tenderness. Righteousness and uprightness sat upon His brow; but infinite pity and good-will to men had also there taken up their abode. It was a face that would have struck you at once as one by itself, never to be forgotten, never to be fully understood. It was all sorrow, yet all love; all meekness, yet all resolution; all wisdom, yet all simplicity; the face of a child, or an angel, and yet peculiarly the face of a man. Majesty and misery, suffering and sacredness, were therein strangely combined; He was evidently the Lamb of God, and the Son of man. As the robber looked, he believed. Is it not singular that the sight of the Saviour won him? The sight of the Lord in agony, and shame, and death!

Scarcely a word; certainly no sermon; no attending worship on the Sabbath; no reading of gracious books; no appeal from mother, or teacher, or friend; but the sight of Jesus won him. I put it down as a very singular thing, a thing for you and for me to recollect, and dwell upon, with quite as much vividness as we do upon the lateness of this robber’s conversion.

Oh, that God of His mercy might convert everybody in this Tabernacle! Oh, that I might have a share in it by the preaching of the Word! Yet I will be equally happy if you get to heaven anyhow; ay, if the Lord should take you there without any outward ministry, leading you to Jesus by some simple method such as He adopted with this thief. If you do but get there, He shall have the glory of it, and His poor servant will be overjoyed. Oh, that you would now look to Jesus, and live! Before your eyes He is set forth, evidently crucified among you. Look to Him, and be saved, even this very hour.

II. But now I want you to think with me a little upon THE SPECIALITY OF THIS MAN’S FAITH, for I think it was a very singular faith that this thief exerted towards our Lord Jesus Christ. I greatly question whether the equal and the parallel of the dying thief s faith will be readily found outside the Scriptures, or even in the Scriptures.

Observe, that this man believed in Christ when he literally saw Him dying the death of a felon, under circumstances of the greatest personal shame. You have never realized what it was to be crucified. None of you could do that, for the sight has never been seen in England in our day. There is not a man or woman here who has ever fully realized what the actual death of Christ was. It stands beyond us. This man saw it with his own eyes, and for him to call Him “Lord” who was hanging on a gibbet, was no small triumph of faith. For him to ask Jesus to remember him when He came into His kingdom, though he saw that Jesus bleeding His life away, and hounded to the death, was a notable act of reliance. For him to commit his everlasting destiny into the hands of One who was, to all appearance, unable even to preserve His own life, was a noble achievement of faith. I say that this dying thief leads the van in the matter of faith, for what he saw of the circumstances of the Saviour was calculated to contradict rather than help his confidence, for he saw our Lord in the very extremity of agony and death, and yet he believed in Him as the King shortly to come into His kingdom.

Recollect, too, that at that time, when the thief believed in Christ, all the disciples had forsaken Him, and fled. John might have been lingering at a little distance, and holy women may have stood farther off; but no one was present bravely to champion the dying Christ. Judas had sold him, Peter had denied Him, and the rest had forsaken Him; and it was then that the dying thief called Him “Lord”, and said, “Remember me when Thou comest into Thy kingdom.” I call that glorious faith. Why, some of you do not believe, though you are surrounded by Christian friends — though you are urged on by the testimony of those whom you regard with love; but this man, all alone, comes out, and calls Jesus his Lord! No one else was confessing Christ at that moment: no revival was taking place amid enthusiastic crowds: he was all by himself as a confessor of his Lord. After our Lord was nailed to the tree, the first to bear witness for Him was this thief. The centurion bore witness afterwards, when Jesus expired; but this thief was a lone confessor, holding on to the Saviour when nobody would say “Amen” to what he said. Even his fellow-thief was mocking at the crucified Christ, so that this man shone as a lone star in the midnight darkness. Oh, sirs, dare you be Daniels? Dare you stand alone? Would you dare to stand out amidst a ribald crew, and say, “Jesus is my King. I only ask Him to remember me when He comes into His kingdom “? Would you be likely to avow such a faith when priests and scribes, princes and people, were all mocking at the Christ, and deriding Him? Brethren, the dying robber exhibited marvellous faith, and I beg you to think of this next time you speak of him.

And it seems to me that another point adds splendour to that faith, namely, that he himself iv as in extreme torture. Remember, he was crucified. It was a crucified man trusting in a crucified Christ. Oh, when the whole frame is racked with pain, when the tenderest nerves are tortured, when the body is hung up to die by we know not what length of torment, then to forget the present and live in the future is a grand achievement of faith! While dying, to turn one’s eye to Another dying at your side, and trust your soul with Him, is very marvellous faith. Blessed thief, because they put thee down at the bottom, as one of the least of saints, I think that I must bid thee come up higher, and take one of the uppermost seats among those who by faith have glorified the Christ of God!

Why, see, dear friends, once more, the speciality of this man’s faith was that he saw so much, though his eyes had been opened for so short a time! He saw the future world. He was not a believer in annihilation, or in the possibility of a man not being immortal. He evidently g6 THE DYING THIEF IN A NEW LIGHT.

expected to be in another world, and to be in existence when the dying Lord should come into His kingdom. He believed all that, and it is more than some do nowadays. He also believed that Jesus would have a kingdom, a kingdom after He was dead, a kingdom though He was crucified. He believed that He was winning for Himself a kingdom by those nailed hands and pierced feet. This was intelligent faith, was it not? He believed that Jesus would have a kingdom in which others would share, and therefore he aspired to have his portion in it. But yet he had right views of himself, and therefore he did not say, “Lord, let me sit at Thy right hand;” or, “Let me share the dainties of Thy palace;” but he said only, “Remember me. Think of me. Cast an eye my way. Think of Thy poor dying comrade on the cross by Thy side. Lord, remember me! Lord, remember me!” I see deep humility in the prayer, and yet a sweet, joyous, confident exaltation of the Christ at the time when the Christ was in His deepest humiliation.

Oh, dear sirs, if any of you have thought of this dying thief only as one who put off repentance, I want you now to think of him as one who did greatly and grandly believe in Christ; and oh, that you would do the same! Oh, that you would put great confidence in my great Lord! Never did a poor sinner trust Christ too much. There was never a case of a guilty one, who believed that Jesus could forgive him, and afterwards found that He could not — who believed that Jesus could save him on the spot, and then woke up to find that it was a delusion. No; plunge into this river of confidence in Christ Here you will find waters to swim in, not to drown in. Never did a soul perish that glorified Christ by a living, loving faith in Him. Come, then, with all your sin, whatever it may be, with all your deep depression of spirit, with all your agony of conscience, and trust in Christ. Come along with you, and grasp my Lord and Master with both the hands of your faith, and He shall be yours, and you shall be His.

“Turn to Christ your longing eyes,
View His bloody sacrifice:
See in Him your sins forgiven;
Pardon, holiness, and heaven;
Glorify the King of kings,
Take the peace the gospel brings.”

I think that I have shown you something special in the means of the thiefs conversion, and in his faith in our dying Lord.

III. But now, thirdly, as God shall help me, I wish to show you another speciality, namely, in THE RESULT OF ms FAITH.

I have heard people say, “Well, you see, the dying thief was converted; but then he was not baptized. He never went to communion, and never joined the church.” He could not do either; and that which God Himself I renders impossible to us, He does not demand of us. The poor man was nailed to the cross; how could he be baptized? But he did a great deal more than that; for if he could not carry out the outward signs, he most manifestly exhibited the things which they signified, which, in his condition, was better still.

The dying thief first of all confessed the Lord Jesus Christ; and that is the very essence of baptism. He confessed Christ. Did he not acknowledge Him to his fellow-thief? It was as open a confession as he could make. Did he not acknowledge Christ before all that were gathered around the cross, within hearing of his voice?

H — 8

It was as public a confession as he could possibly cause it to be. Yet certain cowardly fellows claim to be Christians, though they have never confessed Christ to a single person, and then they quote this poor thief as an excuse! Are they nailed to a cross? Are they dying in agony? Oh, no; yet they talk as if they could claim the exemption which these circumstances would give them. What a dishonest piece of business!

The fact is, our Lord requires an open confession as well as a secret faith; and if you will not render it, there is no promise of salvation for you, but a threat of being denied at the last. The apostle puts it, “If thou shall confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised Him from the dead, thou shalt be saved.” It is stated in another place upon this wise, — “He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved,” — that is Christ’s way for his disciples to confess Him. If there be a true faith, there must be a declaration of it. If you are candles, and God has lit you, “Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven.” Soldiers of Christ must, like her Majesty’s soldiers, wear their regimentals; and if they are ashamed of their uniform, they ought to be drummed out of the regiment. They are not true soldiers who refuse to march in rank with their V comrades. The very least thing that the Lord Jesus Christ can expect of us is, that we do confess Him to the best of our power. If you are nailed up to a cross, I will not invite you to be baptized. If you are fastened up to a tree to die, I will net ask you to come into this pulpit, and declare your faith, for you cannot. But you are required to do what you can do, namely, to make as distinct and open an avowal of the Lord Jesus Christ as may be suitable to your present condition.

I believe that many Christian people get into a deal of trouble through not being honest to their convictions. For instance, if a man goes into a workshop, or a soldier into a barrack-room, and if he does not fly his flag from the first, it will be very difficult for him to run it up afterwards. But if he immediately and boldly lets all know, “I am a Christian man, and there are certain things that I cannot do to please you, and certain other things that I cannot help doing though they displease you,” — when that is clearly understood, after a while the singularity of the thing will be gone, and the man will be let alone; but if he is a little sneaky, and thinks that he is going to please the world and please Christ too, he is in for a rough time, let him depend upon it. His life will be that of a toad under a harrow, or a fox in a dog-kennel, if he tries the way of compromise. That will never do. Come out boldly on the Lord’s side. Show your colours. Let it be known who you are, and what you are; and although your course will not be smooth, it will certainly not be half so rough as if you tried to run with the hare and hunt with the hounds — a very difficult task that.

This man came out, then and there, and made as open an avowal of his faith in Christ as was possible.

The next thing he did was to rebuke his fellow-sinner. He spoke to him in answer to the ribaldry with which he had assailed our Lord. I do not know what the unconverted convict had been blasphemously saying, but his converted comrade spoke very honestly to him: “Dost not thou fear God, seeing thou art in the same condemnation? And we indeed justly; for we receive the due reward of our deeds: but this Man hath done nothing amiss.” It is more than ever needful in these days that believers in Christ should not allow sin to go unrebuked; and yet a great many of them do so. Do you not know that a person who is silent, when a wrong thing is said or done, may become a participator in the sin? If you do not rebuke sin — I mean, of course, on all fit occasions, and in a proper spirit — your silence will give consent to the sin, and you will be an aider and abettor in it. A man who saw a robbery, and who did not cry “Stop, thief!” would be thought to be in league with the thief; and the man who can hear swearing, or see impurity, and never utter a word of protest, may well question whether he is right himself. Our “other men’s sins” make up a great item in our personal guilt unless we rebuke them as we have opportunity. This our Lord expects us to do. The dying thief did it, and did it with all his heart; and therein far exceeded large numbers of those who hold their heads high in the church.

Next, the dying thief made a full confession of his guilt. He said to him who was hanged with him, “Dost not thou fear God, seeing thou art in the same condemnation? And we indeed justly” Not many words, but what a world of meaning was in them — “we indeed justly.” “You and I are dying for our crimes,” said he, “and we deserve to die.” When a man is willing to confess that he deserves the wrath of God — that he deserves the suffering which his sin has brought upon him — there is evidence of sincerity in him. In this man’s case, his repentance glittered like a holy tear in the eye of his faith, so that his faith was bejewelled wiih the drops of his penitence. As I have often told you, I suspect the faith which is not born as a twin with repentance; but there is no room for suspicion in the case of this penitent confessor. I pray God that you and I may have such a thorough work as this in our own hearts as the result of our faith in Christ.

Then, see, this dying thief defends his Lord right manfully. He says, “We indeed justly, but this Man hath done nothing amiss.” Was not that beautifully said? He did not say, “This Man does not deserve to die,” but “This Man hath done nothing amiss.” He means that He is perfectly innocent. He does not even say, “He has done nothing wicked,” but he even asserts that He has not acted unwisely or indiscreetly: “This Man hath done nothing amiss.” This is a glorious testimony of a dying man to One who was numbered with the transgressors, and was being put to death because His enemies falsely accused Him. Beloved, I only pray that you and I may bear as good witness to our Lord as this thief did. He outruns us all. We need not think much of his conversion coming so late in life; we may far rather consider how blessed was the testimony which he bore for his Lord when it was most needed. When all other voices were silent, one suffering penitent spake out, and said, “This Man hath done nothing amiss.”

See, again, another mark of this man’s faith. He prays; and his prayer is dirccied to Jesus: “Lord, remember me when Thou comest into Thy kingdom.” True faith is always praying faith. “Behold, he prayeth,” is one of the surest proofs of the new birth. Oh, friends, may we abound in prayer, for thus we shall prove that our faith in Jesus Christ is what it ought to be! This converted robber opened his mouth wide in prayer; he prayed with great confidence as to the coming kingdom, and he sought that kingdom first, even to the exclusion of all else. He might have asked for life, or for ease from pain; but he preferred the kingdom. This is a high mark of grace.

In addition to thus praying, you will see that he adores and worships Jesus, for he says, “Lord, remember me when Thou comest into Thy kingdom.” The petition is worded as if he felt, “Only let Christ think of me, and it is enough. Let Him but remember me, and the thought of His mind will be effectual for everything that I shall need in the world to come.” This is to impute Godhead to Christ. If a man can cast his all upon the mere memory of a person, he must have a very high esteem of that person. If to be remembered by the Lord Jesus is all that this man asks, or desires, he pays to the Lord great honour. I think that there was about his prayer a worship equal to the eternal hallelujahs of cherubim and seraphim. There was in it a glorification of his Lord which is not excelled even by the endless symphonies of angelic spirits who surround the throne. Thief, thou hast well done!

Oh, that some penitent spirit here might be helped thus to believe, thus to confess, thus to defend his Master, thus to adore, thus to worship; then the age of the convert would be a matter of the smallest imaginable consequence.

IV. Now, my last remark is this: There was something very special about the dying thief as to OUR LORD’S

PROMISE TO HIM CONCERNING THE FUTURE. JeSUS Said tO

him, “To-day shalt thou be with Me in Paradise.” He only asked the Lord to remember him, but he obtained this surprising answer: “To-day shalt thou be with Me in Paradise.” In some respects I envy this dying thief, for this reason, that, when the Lord pardoned me, and pardoned the most of you who are present, He did not give us a place in Paradise that same day. We are not yet come to the rest which is promised to us. No, we are waiting here. Some of us have been waiting very long. It is thirty years with many of us. It is forty years, it is fifty years, with many others, since the Lord blotted out your sins, and yet you are not with Him in Paradise. There is a dear member of this Church who, I suppose, has known the Lord for seventy-five years, and she is still with us, having long passed the ninetieth year of her age. The Lord did not admit her to Paradise on the day of her conversion. He did not take any one of us from nature to grace, and from grace to glory, in a single day.

We have had to wait a good while, and some of us may have to wait much longer. Why is this? There is something for us to do in the wilderness, so we are kept out of the Heavenly Garden. I remember that Mr. Richard Baxter said that he was not in a hurry to go to heaven; and a friend called upon Dr. John Owen, who had been writing about the glory of Christ, and asked him what he thought of going to heaven. That great divine replied, “I am longing to be there.” “Why!” said the other, “I have just spoken to holy Mr. Baxter, and he says that he would prefer to be here, since he thinks that he can be more useful on earth.” “Oh!” said Dr. Owen, “my brother Baxter is always full of practical godliness; but for all that, I cannot say that I am at all desirous to linger in this mortal state. I would rather be gone.” Each of these men seems to me to have been the half of Paul. Paul was made up of the two, for he was desirous to depart, but he was willing to remain because it was needful for the people. We would put both together; and, like Paul, have a strong desire to depart, and to be with Christ, and yet be willing*lo wait if we can do service to our Lord and to His Church.

Still, I think he had the best of it who was converted and entered heaven the same night. This robber breakfasted with the devil, but he dined with Christ on earth, and supped with Him in Paradise. This was short work, but blessed work. What a host of troubles he escaped! What a world of temptation he missed! What an evil world he quitted! He was just born, like a lamb dropped in -the field, and then he was lifted into the Shepherd’s bosom straight away. I do not remember the Lord ever saying this to anybody else. I dare say it may have happened that souls have been converted and have gone home at once; but I never heard of anybody who had, at the time of conversion, such an assurance from Christ as this man had, “Verily I say unto thee;” — such a personal assurance — “Verily I say unto thee. To-day shalt tJwu be with Me in Paradise? Dying thief, thou wert favoured above many, “to be with Christ, which is far better,” and to be with Him so soon!

Why is it that our Lord does not thus emparadise all of us at once? It is because there is something for us to do on earth. My brethren, are you doing it? Are you doing it? Some good people are still on earth; but why? What is the use of them? I cannot make it out. If they are indeed the Lord’s people, what are they here for? They get up in the morning, and eat their breakfast, and in due course they eat their dinner, and their supper, and go to bed and sleep; at a proper hour they get up the next morning, and do the same as on the previous day. Is this living for Jesus? Is this life? It does not come to much. Can this be the life of God in man? Oh, Christian people, do justify your Lord in keeping you waiting here! How can you justify Him but by Serving Him to the utmost of your power?

The Lord help you to do so! Why, you owe as much to Him as the dying thief! I know I owe a great deal more. What a mercy it is to have been converted while you were yet a boy, to be brought to the Saviour while you were yet a girl! What a debt of obligation young Christians owe to the Lord! And if this poor thief crammed a lifetime of testimony into a few minutes, ought not you and I, who have been spared for years after our conversion, to perform good service for our Lord? Come, let us wake up if we have been asleep! Let us begin to live if we have been half dead. May the Spirit of God make something of us yet; so that we may go as industrious servants from -the labours of the vineyard to the pleasures of Paradise! To our once-crucified but now glorified Lord be praise for ever and ever! Amen.

Preached at the Afetropolitan Tabernacle, in October, 1875. “There go the ships.” — Ps. civ. 26.

I WAS walking the other day by the side of the sea, looking out upon the English Channel. It so happened that there was a bad wind for the vessels going down the Channel, and they were lying in great numbers between the shore and the Goodwins. I should think I counted more than a hundred, all waiting for a change of wind. On a sudden the wind shifted to a more favourable quarter, and it was interesting to see with what rapidity all sails were spread, and the vessels began to disappear like birds on the wing. It was a sight such as one might not often see, but worth travelling a hundred miles to gaze upon, to see them all sail like a gallant squadron, and disappear southward on their voyages. “There go the ships,” was the exclamation that naturally rose to one’s lips. The psalmist thought it worth his while to pen the fact which he too had noticed, though it is very questionable whether David had ever seen anything like the number of vessels which pass our coasts, certainly he had seen none to be compared with them for tonnage.

The first lesson which may be learned from the ships and the sea is this — every part of the earth is made with some design. The land, of course, yields “grass for the cattle and herb for the service of man “; but what about the broad acres of the sea? We cannot sow them, nor turn them into pasturage. The reaper fills not his arm from the briny furrows; they give neither seed for the sower nor bread for the eater; neither do herds of cattle cover them as they do the thousand hills of earth. Remorselessly swallowing up all that is cast upon it, the thankless ocean makes no return of fruit or flower. Is not the larger part of the world given up to waste?” No,” says David, and so say we — “There go the ships.’’ The sea benefits man by occasioning navigation, and yielding besides an enormous harvest of fishes of many kinds. Besides which, as the blood is needful for the body, so is it necessary for this world that there should be upon its surface a vast mass of water in perpetual motion. That measureless gathering together of the waters is an amazing instance of divine wisdom in its existence, its perpetual ebb and flow, and even in its form and quantity. In the ocean there is not a drop of water too much, nor a drop too little. There is not a single mile of sea more than there ought to be, nor less than there should be. An exact balance and proportion is maintained; and we little know how the blooming of the tiny flower or the flourishing of the majestic cedar would be affected were the balance disturbed. Between the tiny drop of dew upon each blade of grass and the boundless main there is a rela-Ktion and proportion such as only an Infinite Mind could lave arranged. Remember also that the ocean’s freshness tends to promote life and health among the sons of men. It is good that there is sea, or the land might devour its inhabitants by sickness. ,Godhas mae nothing jn vain. Ignorance gazes on the stormy deep, and judges it to be a “THERE GO THE SHIPS.” Ill

vast disorder, the mother of confusion and the nurse of storms; but better knowledge teaches us, what revelation had before proclaimed, namely, that in wisdom has the Lord made all things.

But does not the ocean grievously separate lovers and friends? Many a wife thinks of her husband on the far-off Pacific; many a mother casts an anxious thought towards her sailor boy; and both are half inclined to think it a mistake to place so vast a portion of the globe as a cruel dividing gulf between loving hearts. Others evidently thought so in years gone by, for among the figurative excellences of the new earth we are told that “there shall be no more sea.” But what a mistake it is to think th.it the sea is only a divider! It is the great uniter of the races of men, for “there go the ships.” It is the highway of nations, by which they reach each other far more readily than they could have done had no sea existed, and arid deserts or towering mountains had intervened. This is one instance in which we do not understand God’s designs, for we judge them upon the surface. As the sea apparently divides, but really unites nations, so often in providence things look one way, but go another. We say, “All these things are against me,” when all things are working together for our good. We judge that to be a curse which, in the deep intent of God, is a rich blessing; and we write that down among the ills of life which, in God’s esteem, is reckoned to be amongst its choicest mercies. Judge not according to the sight of the eyes, or the changeful feelings of the heart; but unstaggeringly believe in the infallible goodness of our great Father in heaven. As the child mistakes God’s design in the sea, so will you also mistake His designs in providence, if you set up yourself as the measurer of the Infinite.

“Judge not the Lord by feeble sense

But trust Him for His grace;
Behind a frowning providence
He hides a smiling face.”

Our subject, however, shall not be the uses of the sea, but this one simple matter — “There go the ships.”

I. And, first, WE SEE THAT THE SHIPS GO. “There go the ships.” The ships arc made to go. The ship is not made to lie for ever upon the stocks, or to be shut up in the docks. It is generally looked upon as an old hulk of little service when it has to lie up in ordinary, and rot in the river. But a ship is made to go; and, as you see that it goes, remember that you also were made to go. Activity in Christian work is the result and design of grace in the soul. How I wish we could launch some of you! You are, we trust, converted; but you as yet serve but slender uses. Very quiet, sluggish, and motionless you lie on the stocks by the month together, and we have nearly as much trouble to launch you as Brunei had with The Great Eastern. I have tried hard to knock away your blocks, and remove your dogshores, and grease your ways, but you need hydraulic rams to stir you. When will you feel that you must go, and learn to “walk the water as a thing of life “? Oh, for a grand launch! Hundreds are lying high and dry, and to them I would give the motto, “Launch out into the deep.” The ships go; when will you go, too?

The ships in going at last disappear from view. The vessel flies before the wind, and very speedily it is gone: and such is our destiny ere long. Our life is gone as the swift ships. We think ourselves stationary, but we are always moving on. As we sit in these pews so quietly, the angel of time is bearing us between his wings at a speed more rapid than we guess. Every single tick of the clock “THERE GO THE SHIPS.” It 3

is but a vibration of his mighty wings; and he bears us on, and on, and on, and never stays to rest either by day or night. Swift as the arrow from the bow we are always speeding towards the target. How short time is! How very short our life is! Let each one say, “How short my life is!” No man knows how near he is to his grave. Perhaps if he could see it, he would be alarmed to find it is just before him: I almost wish he could see it, for a yawning grave might make some men start to reason and to thought. That yawning grave is there, though they perceive it not.

“A point of time, a moment’s space,
Removes me to yon heavenly place,
Or shuts me up in hell.”

“There go the ships,” and there go you also; you are never in one stay. You are always flying, swift as the eagle cleaves the air; or, to come back to the text, as the swift ship flies over the water, you are speeding towards the end of your life. Yet “all men think all men mortal but themselves.” The oldest man here probably thinks he will outlive some of the younger ones. The man who is soonest to die may be the very man who has the least thought of death of us all; and he that is nearest to his departure is, perhaps, the man who least thinks of it. Just as, in that ancient Mediterranean ship, all were awake, and every man praying to his God except Jonah, on whose account the storm was raging, so does it often happen that, in a congregation, every man may be aroused and made to think of his latter end except the one man, the marked man, who will never see to-morrow’s sun. As you see the ships, think of your mortality.

The ships as they go are going upon business. Some few ships go hither and thither upon pleasure; but for the most

1-8 part the ships have something serious to do. They have a charter, and they are bound for a certain port; and this teaches us how we should go on the voyage of life with a fixed, earnest, weighty purpose. May I ask each one of you — Have you something to do, and is it worth doing? You are sailing, but are you sailing like a mere pleasure yacht, whose port is everywhere, which scuds and flies before every fitful wind, and is a mere butterfly with no serious work before it? You may be as heavily-laden and dingy as a collier, there may be nothing of beauty or swiftness about you; but, after all, the main thing is the practical result of your voyage. Dear friend, what are you doing? What have you been doing? And what do you contemplate doing? I should like every young man here just to look at himself. Here you are, young man; you certainly were not sent into this world merely to wear a coat, and to stand so many feet in your stockings; you must have been sent here with some intention. A noble creature like man — and man is a noble creature as compared with the animal creation — is surely made for something. What were you made for? Not merely to enjoy yourself. That cannot be. You certainly are not “a butterfly born in a bower,” neither were you made to be creation’s blot and blank. Neither can you have been created to do mischief. It were an evil thing for you to be a mere serpent in the world, to creep in the grass, and wound the traveller. No, you must be made for something. What is that something? Are you answering your end? For God’s glory we were made. Nothing short of this is worthy of immortal beings. Have we sought that glory? Are we seeking it now? If not, I commend to your consideration this thought, that, as the ships go on their business, so ought men to live with a fixed and worthy purpose. I would say this, not only to young men, but with greater earnestness still to men who may have wasted forty years. Oh, how could I dare to stand before this congregation to-night, and have to say, “Friends, I have had no object: I have lived in this world for myself alone; I have had no grand purpose before me “? I should be utterly ashamed if that were the fact. And if any man is obliged to feel that his purpose is such that he dares not avow it, or that he has only existed to make so much money, or gain a position in life, or to enjoy himself, but he has never purposed to serve his God, I would say to him,” Wake up, wake up, I pray you, to a noble purpose, worthy of a man. May God, the ever-blessed Spirit, set this before you in the light of eternity, and in the light of Jesus’ dying love, and may you be aroused to solemn, “earnest purpose and pursuit!” ‘•’ There go the ships,” but not idly: they go upon business. These ships, however, whatever their errand be, sail upon a changeful sea. To-day the sea is smooth like glass: the ship, however, makes very small headway. To-morrow there is a breeze, which fills out the sails, and the ship goes merrily before it. Perhaps, before night comes on, the breeze increases to a gale, and then rushes from a gale into a hurricane. Let the mariner see to it when the storm-winds are out, for the ship need be staunch to meet the tempest. Mark how in the tempestuous hour the sea mingles with the clouds, and the clouds with the sea. See how the ship mounts up to heaven on the crest of the wave, and then dives into the abyss in the furrow between the enormous billows, until the mariners reel to and fro, and stagger like drunken men. Anon they have weathered the storm, and perhaps to-morrow it will be calm again. “There go the ships,” on an element which is a proverb for fickleness, for we say, “false as the smooth, deceitful sea.” “They go,” say you,” upon the sea; but I dwell

upon the solid earth.” Ah, good sir, there is not much to choose! There is nothing stable beneath yon waxing and waning moon. We say “terra firma” but where, where is terra firtna? What man is he who has found out the rock immovable? Certainly not he who looks to this world for it. He has it not who thinks he has, for many plunge from riches into poverty, from honour to disgrace, from power to servitude. Who says, “My mountain standeth firm, I shall never be moved”? He speaks as the foolish speak. It is a voyage, sir, and even with Christ on board it is a voyage in which storms will occur, a voyage in which you may have to say, “Master, carest Thou not that we perish?” Expect changes, then. Do not hold anything on earth too firmly. Trust in God and be on the watch, for who knoweth what may be on the morrow? “There go the ships.”

IT. But now, having spoken upon that, our second point is, HOW GO THE SHIPS? What makes them go? For there are lessons here for Christian men. We leave our steam-ships out of the question, as they were not known in David’s day, and therefore were not intended. But how go the ships? Well, they must go according to the wind. They cannot make headway without favouring gales. And if our port be heaven, there is no getting there except by the blessed Spirit’s blowing upon us. He bloweth where He listeth, and we need that He should breathe upon us. We never steer out of the port of destruction upon our venturesome voyage till the heavenly wind drives us out to sea; and when we are out upon the ocean of spiritual life, we make no progress unless we have His favouring breath. We are dependent upon the Spirit of God, even more than the mariners upon tile breeze. Let us all know this, and therefore cry —

“Celestial breeze, no longer stay,
But fill my sails, and speed my way.”

It is not possible to insist too much on the humbling truth, spoken by our Lord to His disciples, “Without Me ye can do nothing.” It helps to check self-confidence, and it exalts the Holy Ghost. Unless we honour Him, He will not honour us; therefore let us cheerfully acknowledge our absolute dependence upon Him.

Still, the mariner does not go by the wind without exertion on his own part, for the sails must be spread and managed so that the wind may be utilized. One man will go many knots, while another with the same breeze goes but few; for there is a good deal of tacking about wanted sometimes, to use the little wind, or the cross wind, which may prevail. Sometimes all the sails must be spread, and at other times only a part. Management is required. If some were spread, they might take the wind out of others, and so the ship might lose instead of gaming. There is a deal of work on board a ship. I believe that some people have a notion that the ship goes of itself, and that the sailors have nothing to do but sit down, and enjoy themselves; but if you have ever been to sea as an able-bodied seaman, you have discovered that, if you want an easy life, you must not be one of a ship’s crew. So, mark you, we are dependent upon the Spirit of God; but He puts us in motion and action; and if Christian men sit down and say, “Oh, the Spirit of God will do the work!” you will find the Spirit of God will do nothing of the sort. The only operation which He will be likely to perform will be to convince you that you are a sluggard, and that you will come to poverty. The Spirit of God makes men earnest, fervent, living, and intense. He “works in us to will and to do of His own good pleasure.” We have sails to manage to catch the favouring breeze, and we shall want all the strength we can obtain if we are to make good headway in the voyage of life. Some professors say, “God will save His own people.” I am afraid He will never save them. They expect there will come good times when a great number of the elect will be gathered in; but they fold their arms, and do nothing at all to promote the spread of the gospel. When they see others a little busy, they say, “Ah, mere excitement!” and so on, and they tell us God will have His own, to which I generally reply that I know He will, but I do not believe He will have f/iem, because if they were His own they would not talk in that fashion, for those who are God’s own people have a zeal for God and a love for souls. Do you not remember what God said to David? “When thou hearest the sound of a going in the tops of the mulberry-trees, then shalt thou bestir thyself.” Not, “Then shalt thou sit still, and say, ‘God will do it.’” When David heard the angels coming over the tops of the trees to fight the Philistines, and when he heard their soft tread amongst the leaves, like the rustling of the wind, then he was to bestir himself: and so, when God’s Spirit comes to work in the Church, the Christian must bestir himself, and not sit still. “There go the ships.” They go with the wind; but they are the scene of great industry, or else the wind would whistle through the yards, and the ship would make no voyages. Thus, brethren, we see dependence and energy united; faith sweetly showing itself in good works.

“There go the ships.” How do they go? Well, they have to be guided and steered by the helm. The helm is a little thing, but yet it rules the vessel. As the helm is turned, so is the vessel guided. Look ye well to it, Christian men, that your motives and purposes are always right. Your love is the helm of the vessel: where your affection is, your thoughts and actions tend. If you love the world, you will drift with the world; but if the love of the Father be in you, then will your vessel go towards God and towards divine things. Oh, see to it that Christ has His hand on the tiller, and that He guides you towards the haven of perfect peace!

The ship being guided by the helm, he who manages the helm seeks direction from charts and lights. “There go the ships,” but they do not go of themselves, without management and wisdom. Thought is exercised, knowledge and experience are needed. There is an eye on deck which at night looks out for yonder revolving light, or the coloured ray of the lightship just ahead there, and the thoughtful brain says, “I must steer south-west of such a light,” or “to the north of such a light, or I shall be upon the sands.” Besides mere outlooks upon the sea, that anxious eye also busies itself with the chart, scans the stars, and takes observations of the moon. The captain’s mind is exercised to learn exactly where the vessel is, and where she is going, lest the good ship should come to mischief unawares. And so, dear brethren, if we are to get to heaven, we must study the Scriptures, we must look well to every warning and guiding light of the Spirit’s kindling, and ask for direction from above; for as the ships go not at haphazard, so neither will any Christian find his way to heaven unless he shall watch and pray, and look up daily, saying, “Teach me Thy way, O Lord, and lead me in a plain path.”

The voyage of a ship on the main ocean seems to me to be an admirable picture of the life of faith. The sailor does not see a road before him, or any landmark or seamark, yet he is sure of his course. He relies upon fixed lights in heaven, for far out he can see no beacon or light on the sea. His calculations, based on the laws of the heavenly bodies, are sure guides on a wild wilderness where no keel ever leaves a furrow to mark the way. The late Captain Basil Hall, one of the most scientific officers in the navy, tells the following interesting incident. He once sailed from San Bias, on the west coast of Mexico; and after a voyage of eight thousand miles, occupying eighty-nine days, he arrived off Rio de Janeiro, having in this interval passed through the Pacific Ocean, rounded Cape Horn, and crossed the South Atlantic, without making land or seeing a single sail except an American whaler. When within a week’s sail of Rio, he set seriously about determining by lunar observations the position of his ship, and then steered his course by those common principles of navigation which may be safely employed for short distances between one known station and another. Having arrived within what he considered from his computations fifteen or twenty miles of the coast, he hove to, at four o’clock in the morning, to await the break of day, and then bore up, proceeding cautiously, on account of a thick fog. As this cleared away, the crew had the satisfaction of seeing the great Sugar Loaf Rock, which stands on one side of the harbour’s mouth, so nearly right ahead, that they had not to alter their course above a point, in order to hit the entrance of the port. This was the first land they had seen for nearly three months, after crossing so many seas, and being carried backwards and forwards by innumerable currents and foul winds. The effect upon all on board was electric, and, giving way to their admiration, the sailors greeted the commander with a hearty cheer. And what a cheer will we give when, after many a year’s sailing by faith, we at last see the pearly gates right straight ahead, and enter into the fair havens without needing to shift a point. Glory be to the Captain of our salvation, it will be all well with us when the fog of this life’s care shall lift, and we shall see in the light of heaven!

Once more, how go the ships? They not only go according to the wind, guided by the helm and the chart, but some ships will go better than others, according to their build. With the same amount of wind, one vessel makes more way than another. Now, it is a blessed thing when the grace of God gives a Christian a good build. There are some Church-members, who are so queerly shaped, that somehow they never seem to cut the water, and even the Holy Spirit does not make much of them. They will get into the harbour at last, but they will need a world of tugging. The snail did get into the ark: I often wonder how he did it; he must have got up very early that morning. However, the snail got in as well as the greyhound; and there are many Christian people who will get to heaven, but God alone knows how they will do it, for they are such queer people that they seem to make no progress in the divine life. I would sooner live in heaven with them for ever than be fifteen minutes with them here below. God seems to shape some Christian minds in a more perfect model than others, so that, having simplicity of character, warmth of heart, zealous temperaments, and generous spirits, when the wind of the Spirit comes they cut through the foam like a first-class clipper; while others lie like logs upon the water.

Now, I suspect that some good people have by degrees become like The Great Eastern was a short time since, when she was covered with barnacles. I know many Christian people — I could point some out to-night, but I will not — who are covered with barnacles. They cannot go, because of some secret inconsistency, or love of the things of this world rather than the love of God. They want laying up and cleaning a bit, so as to get some of the barnacles off. It is a rough process, but it is one to which some of God’s vessels have to be exposed. What headway they would make towards heaven if that which hinders were removed! Sometimes, when a man is on a bed of sickness, he is losing his barnacles; and sometimes, when a man has been rich and wealthy, and he has lost all he had, it takes off the barnacles. When we have lost friends we love, of whom we have made idols, we have been sorry to lose them, but it has cleaned off our barnacles; and when we have got out to sea, there has been greater ease about the going, and we have scarcely known how it was; but God knew that He had made us more fit for His service by the trials to which He had exposed us.

That is how the ships go. There are many mysteries about them, and there are many in us. God makes us go by the gales of His Spirit. Oh, that we may be trim for going, buoyant, and swift to be moved, and so may we make a grand voyage to heaven with Christ Jesus at the helm!

III. Thirdly and briefly, when I saw these ships go, I happened to be near a station of Lloyd’s, and I noticed that they ran up flags as the vessels went by, to which the vessels replied. I suppose they were asking questions — to know their names, and what their cargo was, and where they were going, and so on. Now, I am going to act as Lloyd’s agent did, and to hoist some flags, and ask you something about yourselves. The third point will then be — the ships

gO, LET US SIGNAL THEM.

And, first, who is your owner? “There go the ships,” but who is your owner? You do not reply, but I think I can make a guess. There are some hypocrites about, who make fine pretensions, but they are not holy-living people; they even dare to come to the Lord’s table, and yet they drink of the cup of devils. They will sing pious hymns with us, and then sing lascivious ditties with their familiars. I would say to such a man,” You are a rotten vessel, you do not belong to King Jesus. Every timber is staunch in His vessels. They are not all what we should like them to be, and, as I have said already, they too often are covered with barnacles, but still they are all sincere. The Lord builds His vessels with sound timber, and unless we are sincere, true, and right, Christ is not our owner, but Satan is. The painted hypocrite is known through the disguise he wears.

There is another vessel over there, a fine vessel too. Look, she is newly-painted, and looks spick and span. You can see nothing amiss with her. What white sails! See how many flags she flies? Take the glass, and read the vessel’s name, and you will see in bold letters, “Self -righteousness.” Ah, I know that the owner is not the Lord Jesus Christ, for all the ships that belong to Him carry the red-cross flag, and cannot endure the flaunting rag of self-righteousness. All God’s people own that they must be saved by sovereign grace, and anything like righteousness of their own they pump overboard as so much leakage and bilge-water. I see another vessel over yonder, with her sails all spread, and every bit of her colours flying. There, there, what a show she makes! How proud she seems as she scuds over the water! That vessel is “The Pride” from the port of Self-Conceit, Captain Ignorance. I do not know where she is oftenest to be seen, but sometimes she crosses this bit of water. I should not wonder if she is in sight here now, and you may be sure she does not belong to our Lord Jesus. Whether it is pride of money, or person, or rank, or talent, it cometh of evil, and Jesus Christ does not own it. You must get rid of all pride if you belong to Him. God grant us to be humble in heart! I could mention some more vessels that I see here to-night, but I will not. I will rather beg each man to ask himself, “Can I put my hand on my heart, and say, ‘I am not my own, I am bought with a price ‘? Did Jesus buy me with His precious blood, and do I own that there is not a timber, spar, rope, or bolt in this ship but what belongs to Him?” Blessed be His name, some of us can say there is not a hair of our head or a drop of our blood but what belongs to Him! Thine are we, Thou Son of David, and all that we have!

I hope there are vessels here which are owned by the Lord Jesus Christ. Let them never be ashamed to confess their Owner. A vessel on proper business is never ashamed to answer signals. If there should be a smuggler or pirate in the offing, the crews would not be likely to answer signals 5 but those who are on honest business are ready to reply. And so, brethren, be ye ready to give a reason for the hope that is in you with meekness and fear; never show in your actions that you are ashamed of Jesus, but ever let the broad flag be flying in whatever waters you are — “Christ is mine, and I am His. For Him I live, His reproach would I bear, and His honour would I maintain.”

Our next enquiry is, What is your cargo? “There go the ships,” but what do they carry? You cannot tell from looking at them far out at sea, except that you can be pretty sure that some of them do not carry much. Look at that showy brig! You can tell by the look of her that she has not much on board; from the fact that she floats so high it is clear that her cargo is light. Big men, very important individuals, very high-floating people are common; but there is nothing in them. If they had more on board, they would sink deeper in the water. The more grace a man has, the lower he will lie before his God. Well, brethren, what cargo have you got? I am afraid some of you, who lie down rather deeply in the water, are not kept down by any very precious cargo, but I fear you are in ballast. I have gone aboard some Christians; I thought there was a good deal in them, but I have not been able to find it. They have a deal of trouble, and they always tell you about it. There is a good old soul I call in to see sometimes: I begin to converse with her, and her talk is always about rheumatism — nothing else: you cannot get beyond rheumatism: that good sister has more ballast than cargo. There is another friend of mine, a farmer. If you talk with him, it is always about the badness of the times: that brother is in ballast, too. There are many tradesmen who, though they are Christians, cannot be made to talk of anything but the present dulness of business. I wish they could get that ballast out, and fill up with something better, for it is not worth carrying. You must have it sometimes, I suppose; but it is infinitely better to carry a load of praises, prayers, good wishes, holy doctrines, charitable actions, and generous encouragements.

Some ships, I think, carry a cargo of powder. You cannot go very near them without feeling that you are in danger; they are so very apt to misjudge and take offence. I wish that such persons were made to carry a red flag, that we might give them a wide berth.

It is well to be loaded with good things. Young people, study the^Word of God, ask to be taught by experience, and, wherever you go, seek to carry the precious commodities which God has made dear to your own soul, that others may be enriched thereby. It is an interesting sight to see those immense ships laden with passengers for the colonies. I cannot help praying, as I look at them, “God grant that no harm may come to them, but may they safely reach their desired haven!” When I look at some of our brethren whom God is blessing, so that they have a cargo of precious souls on board, consisting of hundreds who have been brought to Jesus by them, I would to God we had many more. Thank God, I have sometimes had my decks crowded with passengers who have from my ministry received the gospel! The Lord has brought them on board, and oh, I trust, before I die, He will give me thousands more who will have to praise the Lord that they heard the gospel from these lips! May we be emigrant vessels, bearing souls away into the glory-land, where the days of their mourning shall be ended! Of course, we can only be humble instruments; but still, what honour God puts upon His instruments when He makes use of them for this object! “There go the ships.” Not ships of war are we, with guns to carry death; but missionary vessels, carrying tidings of peace and glad news to the utmost ends of the earth.

Our last signal asks the question — Where go the ships? Where go the ships? Oh yes, they went merrily down the Channel the other day, but where are they now? In a year’s time, who will report all the good vessels which just “THERE GO THE SHIPS.” I2/

now passed by our coast? I am looking out upon all of you, anxious to know for what port you are making. Some of you are bound for the port of peace. Swiftly may the winds convey you over the waters, and safely may you voyage under the convoy of the Lord Jesus! I will try and keep pace with you. I hope that you will sail in company with others of my Master’s vessels; but if you have to sail alone over a’ sea in which you cannot see another sail, may God, the blessed One, protect and guard you! Bound for the port of peace, with Christ on board, insured for glory, bound for life eternal, let us bless the name of the Lord.

But alas, alas, many ships, which sailed for the desired haven, are lost on the rocks! Some soul-destroying sin causes their swift destruction. Others, equally fair to look upon, are lost on the sands. They seemed bound for heaven, but they were not the Lord’s. The sands are very dangerous; but they are only a mass of little atoms, soft and yielding, yet as many ships are lost on the sands as on the rocks. Even so, there are ways and habits of evil which are deceptive — there is nothing very bad about them apparently; nothing heart-breaking, like rocks, but oh, the multitudes of souls that have been sucked in by sandy temptations! Dear brother, I hope you are not going that way. God grant you grace to avoid little sins, and I am sure you will keep off the rocks of great sin! In any case, may we turn out to be the Lord’s own, and so be kept to the end! Woe unto us if we should prove to be mere adventurers, and perish in our presumption!

Among the ships that go to sea are some that founder. One does not know always how it happens, but they sail all right for a time, and then are never heard of more. They were sighted on such a day, but never more shall we hear any tidings of them. How is that? I have known some of the members of this Church go down in mid-ocean. I never thought it could have happened, but they have gone. I can only imagine how it was. They seemed seaworthy vessels; but they were doubtless rotten through and through. Oh, brethren, may God keep you from foundering, as some do by some mysterious sin, which seems as if it clasped the soul, and dragged it down to the deeps of hell!

Some vessels have I known, too, that have become derelict — waifs and strays upon the sea — men that were the hope of Churches, but who have abandoned themselves to reckless living. They used to worship with the people of God, and seemed to be very earnest and zealous; and now, perhaps, at this very moment they are passing through the gin-palace door, or spending this evening in vices which we dare not mention. Oh, it is dreadful! Many start on their voyage, and look as if they were Christ’s own vessels, and yet for some strange, unreasonable reason they give all up, and they will be met with, in years to come, drifting about, rudderless, captainless, crewless, dangerous to others, and miserable to themselves. God save you from this, young man! And you, my friend, though you have been a member of this Church for twenty years, God save you from despairing, and sinning furiously; for there sometimes come over men strange momenls of insanity, in which they reverse the whole of their lives, lay violent hands upon an excellent character, and become castaways. The grace of God will save the truly regenerate from this; but, alas, how many high professors never were regenerate at all!

Where will some of the vessels I see before me go? It is a fine fleet I am looking upon. Brothers and sisters, I hope all of us will be found in that great harbour in heaven which can accommodate all His Majesty’s fleet. Oh, it will be a great day when we all arrive! Will you give me a hail when you get into port? Will you know me? I shall look out for some of you. I cannot help believing that we .shall know each other. We have been in rough waters together these twenty years, and we have had some glorious weather too, have we not? We have seen the works of the Lord, and His wonders in the deep: I hope we shall keep together till we reach that blessed haven, where our fellowship will be eternal. How we will glorify Him who gets us there, even Jesus, the Lord High Admiral of the seas! Christ shall never hear the last of it if I get to heaven. I remember preaching once, when half of my congregation quarrelled with me after I had done preaching, because I had said in my sermon —

“Then loudest of the crowd I’ll sing,
While heaven’s resounding mansions ring
With shouts of sovereign grace.”

As I came downstairs, I met one who said, “You will not sing loudest, for I owe more to grace than you do;” and I found that all the Lord’s people said the same. Well, we will have it out when we get to heaven: we will try this contention among the birds of Paradise, and see which of us can sing the most loudly to the praise of redeeming grace. Till then, let us trust the Lord Jesus, and obey His orders, for He is our Captain, and it is our duty to do His bidding.

But it would be a dreadful supposition — and yet, mayhap, it may be worse than a supposition — that some of you will have to cast anchor for ever in the Dead Sea, whose waves are fire, where every vessel is a prison, where every passenger feels a hell. What must it be to be in hell an hour! I wish some of you could think it over. What must it be to be

K — 8 shut up in despair for one single day! If you have the toothache a few minutes, how wretched you are, and how anxious to get rid of it; but what must it be to be in hell even if it were for a time, — even if it were but for a time! Oh, if it came to an end, still would I say, by all the humanities that are in my soul, I charge you, brother, do not risk the wrath of God; go not down to the pit! Pull down that black flag, man: pull it down, and cast off your old owner. Ask Christ to be your Owner. Run up the red flag of the cross, and give yourself to Jesus; for if you do not, your voyage must lead to the gulf of black despair, where you will surfer for ever the result of your sin. God have mercy upon us, and may we never have to pass through the straits of judgment into the gulf of damnation! May it never be said, “There goes one of the ships that the Tabernacle pilot signalled; it is gone to destruction!” May it rather be said, of all of us, all in full sail together, as we go towards heaven, “There go the ships:” not one of them is drifting to the gulf of destruction! Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, and all will be well with you. Reject Him, and all will go ill with you. May He, by His grace, enable you to make a right choice to-night, for His love’s sake! Amen.

SUPPOSING HIM TO BE
THE GARDENER.”

“SUPPOSING HIM TO BE
THE GARDENER.”

Preached at the Metropolitan Tabernacle, December 31, 1882. “Supposing Him to be the gardener.” — JOHN xx. 15.

THIS is the last day of the year, and yet I was sitting a fortnight ago in a very lovely garden, in the midst of all kinds of flowers which were blooming in delightful abundance all around! Screening myself from the heat of the sun under the overhanging boughs of an olive, I cast my eyes upon palms and bananas, roses and camellias, oranges and aloes, lavender and heliotrope. The garden was full of colour and beauty, perfume and fruitfulness. Surely the gardener, whoever he might be, who had framed, and fashioned, and kept in order that lovely spot, deserved great commendation! So I thought, and then it came to me to meditate upon the Church of God as a garden, and 1 :> suppose the Lord Jesus to be the Gardener, and then to think of what would most assuredly happen if it were so. “Supposing Him to be the Gardener,” my mind conceived of a Paradise where all sweet things flourish, and all evil things are rooted up. If an ordinary worker had produced such beauty as I then saw and enjoyed on earth, what beauty and glory must surely be brought forth “supposing Him to be the Gardener”!

You know the “Him” to whom we refer, the ever-blessed Son of God, whom Mary Magdalene in our text mistook for the gardener. We will for once follow a saint in her mistaken track; and yet we shall find ourselves going in a right way. She was mistaken when she fell into the error of “supposing Him to be the gardener” of the garden in which He was buried; but if we are under His Spirit’s teaching, we shall not make a mistake if now we indulge ourselves in a quiet meditation upon our ever-blessed Lord, “supposing Him to be the Gardener.”

It is not an unnatural supposition, surely; for if we may truly sing —

“We are a garden walled around,
Chosen and made peculiar ground,”

that enclosure needs a Gardener. Are we not all the plants of His right-hand planting? Do we not all need watering and tending by His constant and gracious care? He says, “I am the true Vine, and My Father is the Husbandman.” That is one view of it but we may also sing, “My Well-beloved hath a vineyard in a very fruitful hill: and He fenced it, and gathered out the stones thereof, and planted it with the choicest vine;” that is to say, He acted as Gardener to it. Thus has Isaiah taught us to sing a song to the Well-beloved touching His vineyard. We read of our Lord just now under these terms, “Thou that dwellest in the gardens, the companions hearken to Thy voice.” To what purpose does He dwell in the vineyards but that He may see how the vines flourish, and care for all the plants? The image, I say, is so far from being unnatural that it is most pregnant with suggestions, and full of useful teaching. We are not going against the harmonies of nature when we are “supposing Him to be the Gardener.”

Neither is the figure unscriptural; for in one of His own parables our Lord makes Himself to be the Dresser of the vineyard. We read just now that parable so full of warning. When the “certain man” came in, and saw the fig-tree that brought forth no fruit, He said unto the Dresser of His vineyard, “Cut it down: why cumbereth it the ground?” Who was it that intervened between that profitless tree and the axe but our great Intercessor and Interposer? He it is who continually comes forward with, “Let it alone this year also, till I shall dig about it and dung it.” In this case He takes upon Himself the character of the Vine-dresser, and we are not wrong in “supposing Him to be the Gardener.”

If we would be supported by a type, our Lord takes the name of “the Second Man.” The first man, Adam, was a gardener. Moses tells us that the Lord God placed the man in the garden of Eden, to dress it and to keep it. Man in his best estate was not to live in this world in a paradise of indolent luxury, but in a garden of recompensed toil. Behold, the Church is Christ’s Eden, watered by the river of life, and so fertilized that all manner of fruits are brought forth unto God; and He, our second Adam, walks in this spiritual Eden, to dress it and to keep it; and so, by a type, we see that we are right in “supposing Him to be the Gardener.” Thus also Solomon thought of Him when He described the royal Bridegroom as going down with His spouse to the garden, when the flowers appeared on the earth, and the fig-tree had put forth her green figs; He went out with His beloved for the preservation of the gardens, saying, “Take us the foxes, the little foxes, that spoil the vines: for our vines have tender grapes.” Neither nature, nor Scripture, nor type, nor song forbids us to think of our adorable Lord Jesus as One who careth for the flowers and fruits of His Church. We err not when we speak of Him, “supposing Him to be the Gardener.” And so I sat me still, and indulged the suggested line of thought, which I now repeat in your hearing, hoping that I may open many roads of meditation for your hearts also. I shall not attempt .to think out such a subject thoroughly, but only to indicate in which direction you may look for a vein of precious ore.

I. “Supposing Him to be the Gardener,” we have here THE KEY TO MANY WONDERS in the garden of His Church.

The first wonder is that there should be a Church at all in the world; that there should be a garden blooming in the midst of this sterile waste. Upon a hard and flinty rock the Lord has made the Eden of His Church to grow. How came it to be here — an oasis of life in a desert of death? How came faith in the midst of unbelief, and hope where there is servile fear, and love where hate abounds? “Ye are of God, little children, and the whole world lieth in the wicked one.” Whence this being “of God” where all beside is fast shut up in the devil? How came there to be a people for God, separated, and sanctified, and consecrated, and ordained to bring forth fruit unto His name? Assuredly, it could not have been so at all if the doing of it had been left to man. We understand its existence, “supposing Him to be the Gardener;” but nothing else can account for it. He can cause the fir-tree to flourish instead of the thorn, and the myrtle instead of the briar; but no one else can accomplish such a change. The garden in which I sat was made on the bare face of the rock, and almost all the earth of which its terraces were composed had been brought up there, from the shore below, by hard labour, and so upon the rock a soil had been created. It was not by its own nature that the garden was found in such a place; but by skill and labour it had been formed: even so [the Church of God has had to be constructed by the Lord Jesus, who is the Author as well as the Perfecter of His garden. Painfully, with wounded hands, has He built each terrace, and fashioned each bed, and planted each plant. All the flowers have had to be watered with His bloody sweat, and watched by His tearful eyes: the nail-prints in His hands, and the wound in His side, are the tokens of what it cost Him to make a new Paradise. He has given His life for the life of every plant that is in the garden, and not one of them had been there on any other theory than “supposing Him to be the Gardener.”

Besides, there is another wonder. How comes the Church of God to flourish in such a climate? This present evil world is very uncongenial to the growth of grace, and the Church is not able by herself alone to resist the evil influences which surround her. The Church contains within itself elements which tend to its own disorder and destruction if left alone; even as the garden has present in its soil all the germs of a tangled thicket of weeds. The best Church that ever Christ had on earth would, within a few years, apostatize from the truth if deserted by the Spirit of God. The world never helps the Church; it is all in arms against it; there is nothing in the world’s air or soil that can fertilize the Church even to the least degree. How is it, then, that, notwithstanding all this, the Church is a fair garden unto God, and there are sweet spices grown in its beds, and lovely flowers are gathered by the divine hand from its borders? The continuance and prosperity of the Church can only be accounted for by “supposing Him to be the Gardener.” Almighty strength is put to the otherwise impossible work of sustaining a holy people among men; almighty wisdom exercises itself upon this otherwise insuperable difficulty. Hear ye the word of the Lord, and learn hence the reason for the growth of His Church below: “I, the Lord, do keep it: I will water it every moment; lest any hurt it, I will keep it night and day.” That is the reason for the existence of a spiritual people still in the midst of a godless and perverse generation. This is the reason for an election of grace in the midst of surrounding vice, and worldliness, and unbelief. “Supposing Him to be the Gardener,” I can see why there should be fruitfulness, and beauty, and sweetness even in the centre of the wilderness of sin.

Another mystery is also cleared up by this supposition. The wonder is that ever you and I should have been placed among the plants of the Lord. Why are we allowed to grow in the garden of His grace? Why me, Lord? Why me? How is it that we have been kept there, and borne with in our barrenness, when He might long ago have said, “Cut it down: why cumbereth it the ground?” Who else would have borne with such waywardness as ours? Who could have manifested such infinite patience? Who could have tended us with such care; and when the care was so ill-rewarded, who would have renewed it so long from day to day, and persisted in designs of boundless love? Who could have done more for His vineyard? Who could or would have done so much? Any mere man would have repented of his good intent, provoked by our ingratitude. None but God could have had patience with some of us! That we have not long ago been slipped off as fruitless branches of the vine; that we are left still upon the stem, in the hope that we may ultimately bring forth fruit, is a great marvel. I know not how it is that we have been spared, except upon this ground, “supposing Him to be the Gardener;” for Jesus is all gentleness and grace, so slow with His knife, so tardy with His axe, so hopeful if we do but show a bud or two, or, perchance, yield a little sour berry — so hopeful that these may be prognostics of something better by-and-by. Infinite patience! Immeasurable long-suffering! where are ye to be found save in the breast of the Well-beloved? Surely the hoe has spared many of us simply and only because He who is meek and lowly in heart is the Gardener.

Dear friends, there is one mercy with regard to this Church which I have often had to thank God for, namely, that evils should have been shut out for so long a time. During the period in which we have been together as Pastor and people, and that is now some twenty-nine years, we have enjoyed uninterrupted prosperity, going from strength to strength in the work of the Lord. Alas! we have seen many other Churches, that were quite as hopeful as our own, rent with strife, brought low by declension, or overthrown by heresy. I hope we have not been apt to judge their faults severely; but we must be thankful for our own deliverance from the evils which have afflicted them. I do not know how it is that we have been kept together in love, helped to abound in labour, and enabled to be firm in the faith, unless it be that special grace has watched over us. We are full of faults; we have nothing to boast of; and yet no Church has been more divinely favoured: I wonder that the blessing should have lasted so long, and I cannot make it out except when I fall into “supposing Him to be the Gardener.” I cannot trace our prosperity to the Pastor, certainly; nor even to my beloved friends, the elders and deacons, nor even to the best of you, with your fervent love and holy zeal. I think it must be that Jesus has been the Gardener, and He has shut the gate when I am afraid I have left it open; and He has driven out the wild boar of the wood just when he had entered to root up the weaker plants. He must have been about at nights to keep off the prowling thieves, and He must have been here, too, in the noontide heat to guard those of you who have prospered in worldly goods, from the glare of too bright a sun. Yes, He has been with us, blessed be His name! Hence all this peace, and unity, and enthusiasm. May we never grieve Him so that He shall turn away from us; but rather let us entreat Him, saying, “Abide with us. Thou that dwellest in the gardens, let this be one of the gardens in which Thou dost deign to dwell, until the day break, and the shadows flee away.” Thus our supposition is a key to many wonders.

II. Let your imaginations run along with mine while I say, in the second place, that “supposing Him to be the Gardener” should be A SPUR TO MANY DUTIES.

One of the duties of a Christian is joy. That is a blessed religion which among its precepts commands men to be happy. When joy becomes a duty, who would wish to neglect it? Surely it must help every little plant to drink in the sunlight when it is whispered among the flowers that Jesus is the Gardener. “Oh,” you say, “I am such a little plant; *fel do not grow well; I do not put forth so much leafage, nor are there so many flowers on me as on many round about me!” It is quite right that you should think little of yourself: perhaps to droop your head is a part of your beauty: many flowers had not been half so lovely if they had not practised the art of hanging their heads. But “supposing Him to be the Gardener,” then He is as much a

Gardener to you as He is to the most lordly palm in the whole domain. In the Mentone garden, right before me grew the orange and the aloe, and others of the finer and more noticeable plants; but on a wall to my left grew common wallflowers and saxifrages, and tiny herbs such as we find on our own rocky places. Now, the gardener had cared for all of these, little as well as great; in fact, there were hundreds of specimens of the most insignificant growths all duly labelled and described. The smallest saxifrage could say, “He is my gardener just as surely as he is the gardener of the Gloire de Dijon or Marechal Neil.” Oh, feeble child of God, the Lord taketh care of you! Your heavenly Father feedeth ravens, and guides the flight of sparrows: should He not much more care for you, O ye of little faith? Oh, little plants, you will grow rightly enough! Perhaps you are growing downward just now rather than upward. Remember that there are plants of which we value the underground root much more than we do the haulm above ground. Perhaps it is not yours to grow very fast; you may be a slow-growing shrub by nature, and you would not be healthy if you were to run to wood. Anyhow, be this your joy, you are in the garden of the Lord, and, “supposing Him to be the Gardener,” He will make the best of you. You cannot be in better hands.

Another duty is that of valuing the Lord’s presence, and praying for it. We ought, whenever the Sabbath morning dawns, to pray our Well-beloved to come into His garden, and eat His pleasant fruits. What can we do without Him? All day long our cry should go up to Him, “O Lord, behold and visit this vine, and the vineyard which Thy right hand hath planted!” We ought to agonize with Him that He would come and manifest Himself to us as He does not unto the world. For what is a garden if the gardener never comes near it? What is the difference between it and the wilderness if he, to whom it belongs, never lifts up spade or pruning-hook upon it? So that it is our necessity that we have Christ with us, “supposing Him to be the Gardener;” and it is our bliss that we have Christ walking between our beds and. borders, watching every plant, training, tending, maturing all. “Supposing Him to be the Gardener,” it is well, for from Him is our fruit found. Divided from Him, we are nothing; only as He watches over us can we bring forth fruit. Let us have done with confidence in man; let us forego all attempts to supply the loss of His spiritual presence by routine or rant, ritualism or. rowdyism; but let us pray our Lord to be ever present with us, and by that presence to make our garden grow.

“Supposing Him to be the Gardener,” there is another duty, and that is, let each one of us yield himself up entirely to Him. A plant does not know how it ought to be treated; it knows not when it should be watered, or when it should be kept dry: a fruit-tree is no judge of when it needs to be pruned, or digged, or dunged. The wit and wisdom of the garden lie not in the flowers and shrubs, but in the gardener. Now, then, if you and I are here to-day with any self-will and carnal judgment about us, let us seek to lay it all aside that we may be absolutely at our Lord’s disposal. You might not be willing to put yourself implicitly into the hand of any mere man (pity that you should); but, surely, thou plant of- the Lord’s right-hand planting, thou mayest put thyself without a question into His dear hand. “Supposing Him to be the Gardener,” thou mayest well say, “I would neither have will, nor wish, nor wit, nor whim, nor way; but I would be as nothing in the Gardener’s hands.

that He may be to me my wisdom and my all. Here, kind Gardener, thy poor plant bows itself to Thy hand; train me as Thou wilt.” Depend upon it, happiness lives next door to the spirit of complete acquiescence in the will of God, and it will be easy to exercise that perfect acquiescence pvhen we suppose the Lord Jesus to be the Gardener. If the Lord hath done it; what has a saint to say? Oh, thou afflicted one, the Lord hath done it: wouldest thou have it otherwise? Nay, art thou not thankful that it is even so, because it is the will of Him in whose hand thy life is, and whose are all thy ways? The duty of submission is very plain, “supposing Him to be the Gardener.”

One more duty I would mention, though others suggest themselves. “Supposing Him to be the Gardener,” then let us bring forth fntit to Him. I do not address a people this morning who feel no care as to whether they serve God or not. I believe that most of you do desire to glorify God; for being saved by grace, you feel a holy ambition to show forth His praises who has called you out of darkness into His marvellous light. You wish to bring others to Christ, because you yourselves have been brought to life and liberty in Him. Nosv, let this fact that Jesus is the Gardener be a stimulus to your fruit-bearing. Where you have brought forth a single cluster, bring forth a hundred, “supposing Him to be the Gardener.” If He is to have the honour of it, then labour to do that which will give Him great renown. If our spiritual state were to be attributed to ourselves, or to our minister, or to some of our fellow-Christians, we might not feel that we were under a great necessity to be fruitful; but if Jesus be the Gardener, and is to bear the blame or the honour of what we produce, then let us use up every drop of sap, and strain every fibre, that.

to the utmost of which our manhood is capable, we may produce a fair reward for our Lord’s travail Under such tutorship and care we ought to become eminent scholars. Doth Christ train us? Oh, let us never cause the world to think meanly of our Master! Students feel that their alma mater deserves great things of them, so they labour to make their university renowned. And so, since Jesus is Tutor and University to us, let us feel that we are bound to reflect credit upon so great a Teacher, upon so divine a name. I do not know how to put it, but surely we ought to do something worthy of such a Lord. Each little flower in the garden of the Lord should wear its brightest hues, and put forth its rarest perfume, because Jesus cares for it. The best of all possible good should be yielded by every plant in our Father’s garden, supposing Jesus to be the Gardener.

Thus much, then, on those two points — a key to many wonders, and a spur to many duties.

III. Thirdly, I have found in this supposition A RELIKF FROM CRUSHING RESPONSIBILITY. One has a work given him of God to do, and if he does it rightly, he cannot do it carelessly. The first thing when he wakes, he asks, “How is the work prospering?” and the last thought at night is, “What can I do to fulfil my calling?” Sometimes the anxiety even troubles his dreams, and he sighs, “O Lord, send now prosperity!” How is the garden prospering which we are set to tend? Are we broken-hearted because nothing appears to flourish? Is it a bad season; or is the soil lean and hungry? It is a very blessed relief to an excess of care if we can fall into the habit of “supposing Him to be the Gardener.” If Jesus be the Master and Lord in all things, it is not mine to keep all the Church in order. I am not responsible for the growth of every Christian, nor for every backslider’s errors, nor for every professor’s faults of life. This burden must not lie on me so that I shall be crushed thereby. “Supposing Him to be the Gardener,” then the Church enjoys a better oversight than mine; better care is taken of the garden than could be taken by the most vigilant watchers, even though by night the frost devoured them, and by day the heat.

“Supposing Him to be the Gardener,” then all must go well. He that keepeth Israel doth neither slumber nor sleep; we need not fret and despond. I beg you earnest workers, who are becoming depressed, to think this out a little. You see it is yours to work under the Lord Jesus 3 but it is not yours to take the anxiety of His office into your souls as though you were to bear His burdens. The under-gardener, the workman in the garden, needs not fret about the whole garden as though it were all left to him. No, no j let him not take too much upon himself. I pray yoUj bound your anxiety by the facts of the case. So you have a number of young people around you, and you are watching for their souls as they that must give account. This is well; but do not be worried and wearied; for, after all, the saving and the keeping of those souls is not in your hands; but it rests with One far more able than yourself. Just think that the Lord is the Gardener. I know it is so in matters of providence. A certain man of God, in troublous times, became quite unable to do his duty because he laid to heart so much the ills of the age; he became depressed and dis* turbed, and he went on board ‘a vessel, wanting to leave the country, which was getting into such a state that he could no longer endure it. Then one said to him, “Mr. Whitelock, are you the manager of the world?” No, he was not

L-8 quite that. “Did not God get on pretty well with it before you were born, and don’t you think He will do very well with it when you are dead?” That reflection helped to relieve the good man’s mind, and he went back to do his duty. I want you thus to perceive the limit of your responsibility: you are not the Gardener himself; you are only one of the Gardener’s boys, set to run on errands, or to do a bit of digging, or to sweep the paths. The garden is well enough managed even though you are not head manager in it.

While this relieves us of anxiety, // makes labour for Christ very sweet, because, if the garden does not seem to repay us for our trouble, we say to ourselves, “It is not my garden, after all. ‘Supposing Him to be the Gardener,’ I am quite willing to work on a barren piece of rock, or tie up an old withered bough, or dig in worthless soil; for if it only pleases Jesus, the work is for that one sole reason profitable to the last degree. It is not mine to question the wisdom of my task, but to set about it in the name of my Master and Lord. ‘Supposing Him to be the Gardener ’ lifts the ponderous responsibility of it from me, and my work becomes pleasant and delightful.”

In dealing with the souls of men, we meet with cases which are extremely difficult. Some persons are so timid and fearful that you do not know how to comfort them; others are so fast and presumptuous that you hardly know how to help them. A few are so double-faced that you cannot understand them, and others so fickle that you cannot hold them. Some flowers puzzle the ordinary gardener: we meet with plants which are covered with prickles, and when you try to train them, they wound the hand that would help them. These strange growths would make a great muddle for you if you were the gardener; but “supposing Him to be the Gardener,” you have the happiness of being able to go to Him constantly, saying, “Good Lord, I do not understand this singular creature; it is as odd a plant as I am myself. Oh, that Thou wouldest manage it, or tell me how to do so! I have come to tell Thee of it”

Constantly our trouble is that we have so many plants to look after that we have not time to cultivate any one in the best manner, because we have fifty more all wanting attention at the time; and then, before we have done with the watering-pot, we have to fetch the hoe and the rake and the spade, and we are puzzled with these multitudinous cares, even as Paul was when he said, “That which cometh upon me daily, the care of all the churches.” Ah! then it is a blessed thing to do the little we can do, and leave the rest to Jesus, “supposing Him to be the Gardener.”

In the Church of God there is a discipline which we cannot exercise. I do not think it is half so hard to exercise discipline as it is not to be able to exercise it when yet you feel that it ought to be done. The servants of the householder were perplexed when they might not root up the tares. “Didst Thou not sow good seed in Thy field? From whence then hath it tares?” “An enemy hath done this.” “Wilt Thou, then, that we go and gather them up?” “Not so,” said He, “lest ye root up the wheat with them.” This afflicts the Christian minister when he must not remove a pestilent, hindering weed. Yes, but “supposing Him to be the Gardener,” and it is His will to let that weed remain, what have you and I to do but to hold our peace? He has a discipline more sure and safe than ours, and in due time the tares shall know it In patience let us possess our soul.

And then, again, there is that succession in the garden which we cannot keep up. Plants will die down, and others must be put into their places, or the garden will grow bare; but we know not where to find these fresh flowers. We say, “When yonder good man dies, who will succeed him?” That is a question I have heard many a time, till I am rather weary of it. Who is to follow such a man? Let us wait till he is gone and needs following. Why sell the man’s coat when he can wear it himself? We are apt to think, when this race of good brethren shall die out, that none will arise worthy to unloose the latchets of their shoes. Well, friend, I could suppose a great many things; but this morning my text is, “Supposing Him to be the Gardener,” and on that supposition I expect that the Lord has other plants in reserve which you have not yet seen, and these will exactly fit into our places when they become empty, and the Lord will keep up the true apostolical succession till the day of His Second Advent. In every time of darkness and dismay, when the heart sinks and the spirits decline, and we think it is all over with the Church of God, let us fall back on this, “Supposing Him to be the Gardener,” and expect to see greater and better things than these. We are at the end of our wits, but He is not at the beginning of His yet: we are nonplussed, but He never will be; therefore let us wait and be tranquil, “supposing Him to be the Gardener.”

IV. Fourthly, I want you to notice that this supposition will give you A DELIVERANCE FROM MANY GLOOMY FEARS. I walked down the garden, and I saw a place where all the path was strewn with leaves, and broken branches, and stones, and I saw the earth upon the flower-beds tossed about, and roots lying quite out of the ground: all was in disorder. Had a dog been amusing himself; or had a mischievous child been at work? If so, it was a great pity. But no; in a minute or two I saw the gardener come back, and I perceived that he had been making all this disarrangement. He had been cutting, and digging, and hacking, and mess-making; and all for the good of the garden. It may be it has happened to some of you that you have been a good deal clipped lately, and in your domestic affairs things have not been in so fair a state as you could have wished: it may be in the Church we have seen ill weeds plucked up, and barren branches lopped, so that everything is en deshabille. Well, if the Lord has done it, our gloomy fears are idle. “Supposing Him to be the Gardener,” all is well.

As I was talking over this theme with my friend, I said to him, “Supposing Him to be the Gardener,” then the serpent will have a bad time of it. Supposing Adam to be the gardener, then the serpent gets in, and has a chat with his wife, and mischief comes of it; but supposing Jesus to be the Gardener, woe to thee, serpent: there is a blow for thy head within half a minute if thou dost but show thyself within the boundary! So, if we are afraid that the devil should get in among us, let us always in prayer entreat that there may be no space for the devil, because the Lord Jesus Christ fills all, and keeps out the adversary. Other creatures besides serpents intrude into gardens; caterpillars and palmenvorms, and all sorts of destroying creatures are apt to devour our Churches. How can we keep them out? The highest wall cannot exclude them: there is no protection except one, and that is, “supposing Him to be the Gardener.” Thus it is written, “I will rebuke the devourer for your sakes, and he shall not destroy the fruits of your ground; neither shall your vine cast her fruit before the time in the field, saith the Lord of hosts.”

I am sometimes troubled by the question, What if roofs of bitterness should spring up among us to trouble us? We are all such fallible creatures, supposing some brother should permit the seed of discord to grow in his bosom, then there may be a sister in whose heart the seeds will also spring up, and from her they will fly to another sister, and be blown about till brethren and sisters are all bearing rue and wormwood in their hearts. Who is to prevent this? Only the Lord Jesus by His Spirit. He can keep out this evil, “supposing Him to be the Gardener.” The root which beareth wormwood will grow but little where Jesus is. Dwell with us, Lord, as a Church and people: by Thy Holy Spirit reside with us and in us, and never depart from us, and then no root of bitterness shall spring up to trouble us!

Then comes another fear. Suppose the living waters of God’s Spirit should not come to water the garden, what then? We cannot make them flow, for the Spirit is a Sovereign, and He flows where He pleases. Ah! but the Spirit of God will be in our garden, supposing our Lord to be the Gardener. There is no fear of our not being watered when Jesus undertakes to do it. “He will pour water on him that is thirsty, and. floods upon the dry ground.” But what if the sunlight of His love should not shine on the garden? If the fruits should never ripen, if there should be no peace, no joy in the Lord? That cannot happen “supposing Him to be the Gardener;” for His face is the sun, and His countenance scatters those health-giving beams, and nurturing warmths, and perfecting influences which are needful for maturing the saints in all the sweetness of grace to the glory of God. So, “supposing Him to be the Gardener” at this the close of the year, I fling away my doubts and fears, and invite you who bear the Church upon your heart to do the same. It is all well with Christ’s cause because it is in His own hands. “He shall not fail nor be discouraged;” “The pleasure of the Lord shall prosper in His hand.”

V. Fifthly, here is A WARNING FOR THE CARELESS, — “supposing Him to be the Gardener.” In this great congregation, many are to the Church what weeds are to a garden. They are not planted by God; they are not growing under His nurture, they are bringing forth no fruit to His glory. My dear friend, I have often tried to get at you, to impress you, but I cannot. Take heed; for one of these days, “supposing Him to be the Gardener,” He will reach you, and you shall know what that word meaneth, “Every plant which My heavenly Father hath not planted shall be rooted up.” Take heed to yourselves, I pray.

Others among us are like the branches of the Vine which bear no fruit. We have often spoken very sharply to these, speaking honest truth in unmistakable language, and yet we have not touched their consciences. Ah! but, “supposing Him to be the Gardener,” He will fulfil that sentence: “Every branch in Me that beareth not fruit He taketh away.” He will get at ycru, if we cannot. Would God, ere this old year were quite dead, you would turn unto the Lord with full purpose of heart; so that, instead of being a weed, you might become a choice flower; that, instead of a dry stick, you might be a sappy, fruit-bearing branch of the Vine! The Lord make it to be so; but if any here need the caution, I pray them to take it to heart at once! “Supposing Him to be the Gardener,” there will be no escaping from His eye; there will be no deliverance from His hand. As “He will throughly purge His floor, and burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire,” so He will throughly cleanse His garden, and cast out every worthless thing.

VI. Another set of thoughts may well arise as A QUIETUS TO THOSE WHO COMPLAIN, — “supposing Him to be the Gardener.” Certain of us have been made to suffer much physical pain, which often bites into the spirits, and makes the heart to stoop; others have suffered heavy temporal losses, having had no success in business, but, on the contrary, having had to endure privation, perhaps even to penury. Are you ready to complain against the Lord for all this? I pray yon, do not so. Take the supposition of the text into your mind this morning. The Lord has been pruning you sharply, cutting off your best boughs, and you seem to be like a thing despised, that is constantly tormented with the knife. Yes, but “supposing Him to be the Gardener,” suppose that your loving Lord has wrought it all, that from His own hand all your grief has come, every cut, and every gash, and every slip: does not this alter the case? Hath not the Lord done it? Well, then, if it be so, put your finger to your lip, and be quiet, until you are able from your heart to say, “The Lord gave, and the Lord hath taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord.” I am persuaded that the Lord hath done nothing amiss to any one of His people; that no child of His can rightly complain that he has been whipped with too much severity; and that no one branch of the Vine can truthfully declare that it has been pruned with too sharp an edge. No; what the Lord has done is the best that could have been done, the very thing that you and I, if we could have possessed infinite wisdom and love, would have wished to have done; therefore let us stop each thought of murmuring, and say, “The Lord hath done it,” and be glad.

Especially I speak to those who have suffered bereavement. I can hardly express to you how strange I feel at this moment when my sermon revives a memory so sweet, dashed with such exceeding bitterness. I sat with my friend and secretary in that garden some fifteen days ago, and we were then in perfect health, rejoicing in the goodness of the Lord. We returned home, and within five days I was smitten with disabling pain; and worse, far worse than that, he was called upon to lose his wife. We said to one another, as we sat there reading the Word of God and meditating, “How happy we are! Dare we think of continuing so? Must it not speedily end?” I little thought I should have to say to him, “Alas, my brother, thou art brought very low, for the delight of thine eyes is taken from thee!” But here is our comfort: the Lord hath done it. The best rose in the garden is gone. Who has taken it? The Gardener came this way, and gathered it. He planted it, and watched over it, and now He has taken it. Is not this most natural? Does anybody weep because of that? No; everybody knows that it is right, and according to the order of nature, that He should come and gather the best in the garden. If you are sore troubled by the loss of your beloved, yet dry your grief by “supposing Him to be the Gardener.” Kiss the hand that has wrought you such grief. Brethren beloved, remember, the next time the Lord comes to your part of the garden, and He may do so within the next week, He will only gather His own flowers, and would you prevent His doing so even if you could?

VII. <( Supposing Him to be the Gardener,” then there is AN OUTLOOK FOR THE HOPEFUL.” Supposing Hilll tO

be the Gardener,” then I expect to see in the garden where He works the best possible prosperity; I expect to see no flower dried up, no tree without fruit: I expect to see the richestj rarest fruit with the daintiest bloom upon it, daily presented to the great Owner of the garden. Let us expect that in this Church, and pray for it. Oh, if we have but faith, we shall see great things! It is our unbelief that straitens God. Let us believe great things from the work of Christ by His Spirit in the midst of His people’s hearts, and we shall not be disappointed.

“Supposing Him to be the Gardener,” then, dear friends, we may expect divine intercourse of unspeakable preciousness. Go back to Eden for a minute. When Adam was the gardener, what happened? The Lord God walked in the garden in the cool of the day. But “supposing HIM to be the Gardener,” then we shall have the Lord God dwelling among us, and revealing Himself in all the glory of His power and the plenitude of His Fatherly heart; making us to know Him, that we may be filled with all the fulness of God. What joy is this!

One other thought: “Supposing Him to be the Gardener,” and God to come and walk among the trees of the garden, then I expect He will remove the whole of the garden upward with Himself to fairer skies; for He rose, and His people must rise with Him. I expect a blessed transplantation of all these flowers below to a clearer atmosphere above, away from all this smoke and fog and damp, up where the sun is never clouded, where flowers never wither, where fruits never decay. Oh, the glory we shall then enjoy up yonder, on the hills of spices in the garden of God! “Supposing Him to be the Gardener,”

what a garden will He form above, and how shall you and I grow therein, developing beyond imagination! “It doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when He shall appear, we shall be like Him; for we shall see Him as He is.” Since He is the Author and Finisher of our faith, to what perfection will He conduct us, and to what glory will He bring us! Oh, to be found in Him! God grant that we may be! To be plants in His garden, “supposing Him to be the Gardener,” is all the heaven we can desire.