How to Please God - Charles Spurgeon Sermons

how to please God this sermon was first preached on August 20th in the year 1885 by Charles Haddon Spurgeon the text for this morning comes from the book of hebrews hebrews chapter 11 verse 6 without faith it is impossible to please God because anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek Him without faith the text says it is impossible to please God yet not all men have faith even among those who have heard the gospel many have not obeyed it Isaiah is not the only one who has had to cry out who has believed our message and to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed if it is true that without faith it is impossible to please God then what becomes of the multitude who have heard but have not believed to whom the word of this salvation has come but who have rejected it it is to be feared that God may again swear his wrath they will not enter into my rest the Israelites could not enter into Canaan because of unbelief and today men and women cannot enter into the privileges of the gospel because of unbelief let us pity and pray for those who do not have faith all that God would hear the cries of his children and bring about faith in men and women for this also is the gift of God not only the blessing which he promises but even the hand whereby we receive it must come from him there are some who have a kind of faith and these are perhaps in a more dangerous condition than those who have no face at all because they are apt to deceive themselves and believe that they are in a state of grace whereas they are still in a state of nature the faith which pleases God is no mock faith no dead faith no false faith no faith in a lie it is faith in the truth it is true faith it is spiritual faith the faith that saves the soul and makes it pleasing before God is real faith many say they believe a certain thing but they do not truly believe it it is not real to them they say yes such and such a doctrine is true and they write it down in their Creed and put the Creed away on the top shelf of their bookcase and there it lies covered with dust a man only believes that which affects his life if it is an important truth if he has really believed that it will touch every nerve of his being it will often hold him back from one course and with equal force impel him to another true faith is the most active driving power in the whole world faith which works by love works all sorts of Wonders and where there is this true faith it will prove its reality by its practicalness the faith of God's elect is not a dead faith God is not the god of the dead but of the living neither is he the god of dead faith but he is the God of living faith God grants that each one of us may possess this real odd given blessing but if we have merely a theoretical nominal historical faith which does not affect our lives at all then we are in the same condition as those who have no faith and we come under the description of the text without faith and without faith it is impossible to please God before I enter upon the exposition of the text I would like to make a quick search throughout this place to find out any who are without faith without faith you are without God for God is only apprehended by faith without faith you are without hope for a true hope can only spring out of a true faith and you are without Christ consequently without a Savior without the means of the removal of your sin without the help with which to fight daily the battle of life against sin without Christ oh it would be infinitely better to be without your eyes without your hearing without wealth without food without clothing without a home rather than to be without the faith which brings everything that the soul requires without faith we are indeed spiritually naked and poor and miserable lost and condemned and without a hope of escape without faith could that be written as a correct label and hung upon your back you might not perhaps be ashamed to wear it but if an angel can see it on your forehead as the description of your character I am sure that he is greatly concerned about you but your fellow man who would happily speak to you so that you will not leave this place without face feels troubled that there should be anyone in this land of Bibles this land of Sunday worship this land of revivals this land of the gospel who would have developed discretion and yet should be so sadly indiscreet as to live without faith the text says without faith it is impossible to please God and I'm going to keep to the text so first of all note dear friends the necessity of faith declared after we have declared it we will pass on to the necessity of faith proven that you may see each one with his own mental eye that it must be sold that without faith it is impossible to please God and then we will close with the necessity of faith used for profit we will try to gather some lessons from it for our own practical guidance first here is the necessity of faith declared without faith it is impossible to please God the necessity of faith declared you notice that there is no limit put on this declaration without faith it is impossible to please God this law applies universally to every person under the gospel dispensation there are a great many people who are very anxious to know about the future of the heathen but we may well lead them to the great judge of all earnestly desiring to bring them to the faith which is in Christ Jesus it is much more practical for us to think of those to whom faith is possible because the gospel has come to them and they have heard it the declaration of our text without faith it is impossible to please God applies to every person whoever that person may be see how men are buried nowadays a man has been a so of course his funeral must be one of the most religious majesty and though his soul loaded with a thousand crimes has sunk deep into the pit of hell yet there are many who suppose that he went to heaven because he was a king and if a man is a poet and can write fine verses though they are steeped in lust yet there are some who suppose that such a cultured person cannot be lost surely said a blasphemous man God will think twice before he dammed such a gentleman as that and what the skeptics spoke sarcastically is no doubt a common notion of many people that is men happen to be in what are called the higher ranks of society or happen to be largely gifted with a certain faculty or happened to have been eminently successful in life or to have been great inventors and so forth it must be well with their soul but let it be known to one and all that without faith it is impossible to please God but says someone men have been very sincere in the pursuit of external religion and they have been moral and kind and benevolent haven't they please God it is not for me to use flattering speeches for my text is very sweeping without faith it is impossible impossible to please God he who has missed this faith has missed the vital point had he begun with that his kindness his morality his benevolence would have been acceptable because in them there would have been the Flower of Life the face that makes them live but without this they are cold soulless then mere carcasses of virtue devoid of life without faith in any case and in every case it is impossible to please God just as the text is universal to persons so it is Universal as to every form of work and worship no matter what is done without faith it is impossible to please God it was a fine row of home for the poor that sprang out of that man's magnificent request but those homes for the poor never pleased God for they were not built with any faith in him likewise it was a generous gift that was bestowed upon the church yes and those who received it were grateful for such help but God never accepted it for he who gave it hope to somehow buy forgiveness or purchase a place in heaven or make some atonement for his oppression of the poor without state though millions were poured into the treasury of the church without faith it is impossible to please God I may say a faith what Paul said of love if I give all I possess to the poor and surrender my body to the flames but have not love I gain nothing the most self-sacrificing and most heroic deeds whenever they have been performed from any other motive than that of pleasing God and without confidence in God have remained outside his acceptance without faith it is impossible to please God this is not a popular teaching but we never wish to teach a popular theology it is not one that will commend itself to the natural mind of in we never thought it would we would have been shocked if our preaching had been admired by such persons and we would have gone home and felt that we were not called by God to preach at all but nevertheless this is true without faith it is impossible to please God observed that the text mentions two things it says anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek Him that is to say in coming to God and in seeking God there must be faith in coming to God if there is prayer what is that prayer worth which is offered without any faith in God if a man prays to a God whom he does not know as really existing is he not even from his own point of view engaged in a very senseless exercise and to God himself it must be a piece of dreadful mockery old friends there must be faith or else prayer certainly becomes the most meaningless waste of time and as to praise how can we praise an unknown God if we have no faith that there is a God how can we praise Him how can our lives extol a being about whose very existence we raise a question no more than that I cannot praise God unless I know that he is mine how can I bless another man's God how can I offer to another man's God Thanksgivings for mercies that I have never tasted and for favors in which I had never had a share there must be a sense of a personal relationship to God and personal obligation and personal confidence and laying hold of him or else the Foam is sung in vain even to the noblest music and I do believe dear friends that if I come to God in the matter of preaching and bearing testimony yet if I do it without faith my work cannot be acceptable to God and I do not think that it would be acceptable to you for very long to me it would be slavery to have to preach what I did not believe if I had a shadow of a doubt about it I would hide myself until I had something to say about which I felt sure how can we expect the blessing of God on the testimony of his son even though it would be in the very words of Scripture and be doctrinally correct to a hair's breadth unless faith is mixed with it by him who preaches it and by him who hears it without faith in any act whatsoever however religious devout and self-denying it is impossible to please God further dear friends notice that while the text is up sweeping in its application it is also very positive in its assertion it does not say without faith it is difficult to please God or without faith it must require great monastic self-denial rigid discipline austerity and misery in order to please God know for those things do not please him at all but it says without faith it is impossible to please God it does not as I have sometimes seen in the country put a flimsy wooden gate across the road and paint on it the word private no rather it builds a brick wall across the road or it digs a gulf across the road and says it is impossible without faith it is impossible our Savior speaks of what is nearly impossible the difficulty of a rich man entering the kingdom of heaven and compares it to a camel going through the eye of a needle and then he says with men this is impossible but with God all things are possible but our text deals with something which is an impossibility with God Himself without faith it is impossible to please God it is a double impossibility for an unbelieving man to please God and for God to be pleased with an unbelieving man it is not possible that he would be pleased with works done in unbelief or with men living in unbelief notice also that there is another strong word in the text an imperative word for he that comes to God must believe it is not he that comes to God should believe and in proportion as he believed he will get a blessing and if he is unbelieving he will only get a smaller blessing no but it is he that comes to God must must is the word of a king or an emperor it is an imperial truth and an authoritative truth that anyone who comes to God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek Him we are sometimes said to be dogmatic is there any dogmatism that can be more intense than what we have in our text it says impossible it says much these are words that are not to be bent and twisted some men have a great gift in distorting words and twisting expressions they seem to bend them across their knee and snap their meaning in two but this text does not bend nor can it be snapped into without faith it is impossible to please God because anyone who comes to him must believe further observe that the text not only makes this positive assertion but it is intended to be a message perpetually in force without faith it is impossible to please God evidently refers to the past read the previous verse and you will see that it is true by faith Enoch was taken from this life so that he did not experience death he could not be found because God had taken him away for before he was taken he was commanded as one who pleased God and without faith it is impossible to please God it was always true under that old dispensation with those mighty patriarchs and kings and prophets it was impossible to please God without faith so it is now and so it always will be until the end of time the immutable decree still stand he that believes and is baptized will be saved but he that does not believe will be damned that is the gospel equivalent of this apostolic declaration without faith it is impossible to please God it is always so dear friends and it will always be so there is no hope of any other gate ever being opened for those who refuse to enter the door of faith yet once more the text speaks most constructively it tells us that there are certain things that really are and certain things which are imperative anyone who comes to God must believe that he exists anyone who comes to God must believe that he exists if you would come to God you must believe that there is a God and you must believe that God is what he says he is otherwise if you make God to be other than he says he is you make God to be an idol your God is an imaginary being you must accept God as he is revealed in the scripture what he says he is that he is and what he is you must believe believing that he is and that he is God oh but how easy it is for a man to drift away from that elementary truth and to say oh yes I believe in God but do you believe in inflexible justice do you believe in God's mercy do you believe in an omniscient God that sees everything do you believe in the omnipresent of God that means that he is everywhere you are do you believe all this because if not you do not believe in God you may believe in your own idea of God but you do not really believe in God if you would come to God you must believe that he is what he says he is in his word he reveals himself as one God Father Son and Holy Spirit will you accept his statements about himself then when you pray will you cease speaking words into the air and rather speak into God's ear believing that he hears every word you utter and more that he is reading the thoughts that lie at the back of your words that is the right way to seek Him to come to him we must come to him as the Living God having a real existence a true personality otherwise we not come to him at all and further we must believe that he rewards those who earnestly seek him he rewards those who earnestly seek Him for that is the meaning of the Greek word we must believe that God will reward the person who seeks him that therefore God is worth seeking that although it may be costly to follow after God and obey Him yet it will pay you that there is a great reward in keeping his Commandments that he done to your prayer and that he does grant great blessings to those who truly seek Him we must believe this for else there is no real seeking of him it is imperative if we would come to God that we must believe that he is and that he rewards those who earnestly seek Him but God cannot reward them that seek him on the ground of their merit for they have none it must therefore be upon the ground of grace this introduces into our faith as a point of necessary belief that we believe in Jesus Christ by whose merit we are accepted that diligently seeking God we find him in Christ and this brings to us the great gospel reward God bestows upon us his favour His grace and the blessings of his covenant has a gracious reward not because of our merit but because of the merit of His Son Jesus Christ this we must believe or we have not really come to God in the right manner this is the doctrine asserted in our text without faith it is impossible to please God now for today I want us to dwell for a few minutes upon the necessity of faith proven the necessity of faith proven what is the reason why there is such a necessity for faith in order to please God our answer is first God said so God said so let it be enough that these are the words of inspiration supported by many other similar words throughout the sacred and infallible book here it stands without faith it is impossible to please God God said so he knows what the truth is he can speak about what pleases him and we are therefore not to doubt what he declares still as a confirmation of our faith let it be observed that as to the nature of things it must be so no man can be pleased with another who does not believe in him if a person does not give you credit for decency and honesty he may profess to do your will and wish to please you but you feel at once that whatever he does he misses the Cardinal necessity for really pleasing you that a person had the conviction that you are unkind and unjust let him feel that he could not trust you well then I do not see how he can be a pleasing person to you or how you are likely to get along with him in your household whatever he may do this trust has divided men and women whose hearts seemed to be one where trust has died out love has always died out too and I can hardly conceive of a more intolerable misery than for a man and woman who have no trust in one another to be united together and the very nature of things if we are to be united with God by His grace one of the essential terms of the Union must be on our part the fullest belief in God I do not see how we can ever hope to be on speaking terms with God how we can and all be reconciled to God unless as a very beginning step we are resolved that we will believe God and that we will trust him without faith it is in the nature of things impossible to please God and dear friend the person who has no faith is unacceptable to God all through Scripture faith is spoken of as the great method of justification we are justified by faith through Jesus Christ if then we have no faith I am not accounted just before God and all the works of an unaccepted man must be unaccepted if that man is an enemy of God then it doesn't matter what he does for how can he please God you cannot expect that God would receive anything from your hands when you begin by declaring that you will not trust him it cannot be however much you multiply your good works with a view of saving yourself and thereby pleasing God you are distinctly aiming at a purpose which God has declared is not according to his mind no one will be declared righteous in his sight by observing the law if then you persist in doing good works to gain salvation you are pursuing a plan which God has declared he will never accept you must come to him as sinners to be justified by another righteousness better than your own or else it will happen to you as happened to ancient Israel they had a zeal for God but not according to knowledge and going about to establish themselves by their own righteousness they did not submit them selves to the righteousness of God and therefore they stumbled over that stone of stumbling and rock of offense and were broken in pieces and perished god save us from attempting to do what he says cannot be done without faith it is impossible to please God observed further that the man who is without faith in God grossly insults God and therefore cannot be pleasing to him the man who is without faith in God grossly in folk god and therefore cannot be pleasing to him he does in effect deny God's truth anyone who does not believe God has made him out to be a liar so says John the salsa speaking and most tender-hearted of all the Apostles anyone who does not believe God has made him out to be a liar because he does not believe the testimony God has given about his son now if a man begins by making God a liar how can God be pleased with him perhaps you say I don't doubt the truthfulness of God but I question his power to fulfill his promise to such a sinner as I but my friend don't you see that you have committed a gross insult against the Lord by such a statement he claims to be omnipotent he asked is there anything too hard for me to do he says turn to me and be saved all you ends of the earth for I am God and there is no other yet you dare to say that he cannot save you you have insulted his power therefore how can you please him oh but you say I I have no doubt that God can keep his promise and that God will but still I cannot think that he could forgive such a sinner as I am now you have insulted his goodness he is so good that you cannot suppose him to be any better he is so ready to forgive that he swears with an oath that he has no pleasure in the death of him that dies but that he turned to him and live you must know that you dare not mistrust the truth to power for the goodness of God or if you will do so then you cannot please him what would you think of a child who was always doubting his father saying father said so and so but I don't suppose it will come true my father promised to give me so and so but I don't expect that he will if a child stands up and says I find it difficult to believe my father oh my may God save us from having such children as that I do not see how they could possibly please us they would be in a state of mind which would be radically displeasing because it would be radically unjust and wrong how dare you distrust your God how dare you say that his testimony is not true God grants that I may never doubt God in the slightest degree I do feel that of all sins that I could ever commit against the majesty of heaven one of the most monstrous would be that of doubting one single syllable that comes from those divine lips let God be true and every man a liar he must keep his promise there is no if or buts about it otherwise he would cease to be God his very word of grace as strong as that which built the skies the voice that rolls the Stars alone speaks all the promises and we dare not doubt anything that he says brethren in a word faith is so much the root the source the mother of every good that he who is without faith is without anything that can please God how will I love him whom I do not believe how can I be patient under the rod of him whom I do not trust how can I have veal for him whose truth I doubt how can I rejoice in him whose promise i mistrust no this would lay the axe at the root of the fruit bearing trees and utterly destroy it if you will not believe neither will you be saved there are no good works except those that spring from a living loving lasting faith in God through Jesus Christ our Lord now lastly we are to consider the necessity of faith used for profit the necessity of faith used for profit what are the lessons this truth should teach us when we have spoken of them we will be done may God bless our testimony to your hearts the first lesson is for us to look carefully at our faith for us to look carefully at our faith is it the faith of God's elect is it childlike faith is it really faith in God or is it fate in our own knowledge or our own judgment is it confidence in God's Word or is it confidence in our own thinking and invention I don't quarrel with modern theology merely because of what it teaches I believe that it teaches a lie from top to bottom but I have another quarrel with it that it teaches a false principle it takes man away from what is written to what is thought it does not allow this of an authority of Revelation and in disallowing that their very foundations are removed and much of the abounding vice of this day is I believe the direct result of this abounding unbelief of God this philosophical mistrust of infinite wisdom is it philosophy is it philosophies falsely so-called mere madness put in some sort of a shape as for us let us come to the law and to the testimony to God into a spirit and test and try everything by what is spoken here and by our personal proving of it before God in our own experience making that to be true to ourselves which God says is true to his chosen ones the next lesson I would give you is this let us mix fate with all that we do let us mix faith with all that we do without faith it is impossible to please God so dear friend you're going to teach in your Sunday School class next Sunday well then teach with faith brother Minister you're going to preach the next Lord's Day to say to yourself by God's grace I will try to preach with faith because preaching without has not come to much do you remember the story that I've often told you of my very first student going out to preach and he came to me and said that he had preached earnestly several times and yet he had not seen any conversions I said to him and do you suppose that God is going to bless the people every time you choose to open your mouth he answered oh no sir I don't expect that ah then I replied that is why God did not bless you because you did not have faith in him you have confessed it I had caught him with my cleverness so dear brother you should believe that if you preach the gospel God must bless you that it is not a maybe or a mere possibility that he will but that if you deliver his message in the full conviction that somebody or other is going to get a blessing there will be a blessing for someone very often just in proportion to our faith is it done to us Oh how many churches there are that I know of where they hope that they may have some conversions and dear Souls if they do have two or three converts in a year some of the old members are frightened at the quantity they are afraid they cannot all be true conversion so many are coming in if they were ever to hear a brother preach so that 3000 were converted at once these dear old Saints would rise up and say now Peter you are nothing but a revival is sort of a preacher you are as bad as deal moody why look at all these people brought in we cannot possibly think of receiving so many into the church I am afraid that their God is a little God but all to believe in a great God and to preach in faith when everything is done in faith it will be accepted a woman says all that my children were converted she does not at all expect that they will be she is sure they will all grow up bad and she is teaching them with a view to their turning back when they get to be fifty years old my dear friend perhaps it will be sold but if you had faith and would believe that those dear children of yours need never to go out into the world of sin at all but by God's grace might be brought to him while they were yet at your knee wouldn't that be a great deal better without faith you see in bringing up your children it will be impossible for you to please God by the way that you talk let us put plenty of faith in all that we do there is a good prescription in the Old Testament you can find it when you get home today it says salt without prescribing how much that is you may put as much of the salt of faith as you like into all your work and you will never overdo it but it is leaving the salt out that prevents it from being pleasing to God Oh for more true confidence in God who deserves to be confided in to the very other most and lastly letters take care to trust God most when things are the worst let us take care to trust God most when things are the worst there is a brother here who is in a world of trouble all of his money is gradually melting away he does not know how he is to make ends meet now brother whatever you lose say if I do not please anybody else or do not please myself I will please my master walk with God as Enoch did how are you to do this listen without faith it is impossible to please God in the past you had no room for faith about making money it came so regularly now there is an opportunity for you to exercise your faith now you can trust in God you have elbow room now young fellows who enter the Army or the Navy like getting into a skirmish or even a great battle there is no chance of becoming a hero they say if there is no war and you enter Christ's service may justifiably say the same if I have no troubles where's the room for my faith how can I trust if I have nothing to trust about you cannot swim you know when the water is only up to your ankles you may go paddling about but there can be no swimming but plunge into deep water and then strike out like a man now you will learn what faith is when the last foot is off the ground and you are just trusting in the eternal God this will make a man of you this will educate you for higher and grander doing in times to come it will make you more fit to sing the song of angels before the eternal throne I remember before I came to London a man praying a very extraordinary prayer for me I did not understand it at the time and I hardly think that he ought to have prayed it in public in that manner he prayed that I might be able to swallow a bundle of twigs crossways it was a very strange prayer but I have done many times just what he asked that I might and it has wonderfully cleared my throat and there is many a man who cannot speak now for God who will be obliged to have some of the bundles of twigs thrust down his throat yet and when those great troubles come and he is obliged to swallow them then he will grow to be a man in Christ Jesus thus my dear friends I have tried as well as I can to show you God's remedy for sins problem but I always feel as if this talking about faith in Christ was saying the same thing over and over again yet we must keep to this one theme you know that when men tell us that they have 50 cures for our disease we shake our heads and say isn't there one specific cure because if you will give me one thing that will cure me you may keep the other 49 if you please so it is with the gospel of the grace of God according to what some say there are great many ways of being saved but is there one sure way because if there are many different ways to be saved you may if you will have the doubtful ones but I will be content with the one that is not doubtful I like to cry that old monk who had somehow or other found the gospel even in his monastery cell and when his mind could not get consolation from the Roman Catholic sacrament for the dying extreme unction and from all the paraphernalia of the Catholic Church he was heard to cry out to have owner ah Jesus to have onerous your wounds Jesus your wounds Jesus with that cry on his lips and that doctrine in his heart he could die in peace for he could find comfort nowhere else someone has contemptuously said that this is the gospel for old women and children well I am quite willing to be classed with them in this matter for it exactly suits me somebody wrote to me the other day to say that he had met with some blacks who had read and enjoyed my sermons and he obviously thought that it was no compliment to me when he added I should think that uneducated blacks are just the sort that you are picked to preach to I felt so glad to have such a compliment as that I liked to preach to uneducated people because if the gospel can save them it can also save the white face people who believe that they are so wonderfully well instructed is it not still true that often simple Souls find their way to heaven while others are fumbling for the latch but whatever men say or do not say this is the truth of God without faith it is impossible to please God get away all trust in yourself you are full of sin and you will never find any remedy in the disease go your way to Christ and to no one but Christ for in him and in him alone is salvation provided for you human nature's way of salvation is do and do and do but God's Way of salvation is done done it is all done you have only to rely by faith on the atonement which Christ accomplished on the cross you have only to accept God's Way of salvation and then Christ will save you and you can go in peace and rejoice forevermore the Lord will give grace to that man a woman who looks to Christ upon the cross and trust only in him there are hundreds of us here who can say at this moment he is my salvation he is all my salvation and all my desire the great searcher of hearts knows that we do not have a shadow of a shade of confidence anywhere but in the Lord Jesus Christ who died for us and who rose again and ascended to the right hand of the Majesty on high I am sure it is so and it may be so with you also dear friends a good man was once explaining to a poor humble Christian had in that precious text I will never leave you nor forsake you there are five- he said the Lord seems to say five times over I will not not not leave you I will never never forsake you there said the good man isn't that delightful to find God saying that five times over yes said the humble listener so it is but I would have believed it if he had only said it once what a blessed thing it is to have faith that takes God at his first word and does not wanted to say it over five times but it's perfectly satisfied that what he has promised he is able to perform what he is able to perform he will perform to the praise and glory of His grace wherein he has made us accepted in the beloved isn't this a sensible course which I am commending to you isn't this a reasonable thing to say to a rational man one might have supposed that if men once believed the Bible to be God's Word and Jesus Christ to be God's atoning sacrifice they would be eager to have Christ as their Savior but it is not so and often as I preach I am driven back to this conclusion at which I arrived along ago it is not your power sir feature that can save men and women you may preach and argue and reason as best you can but until the arm of the Lord is revealed and the power of the Holy Spirit sends home the argument that which as a mere matter of argument would be irresistible to a rational man yes as a spiritual force fails to have any influence over the carnal mind it is not by might nor by power but by the Spirit of the Lord that the work of salvation is accomplished whole spirit of the Living God send home the truth by your own almighty power for Jesus sake I've heard of a doctor who was somewhat severe in his method of treating his patients but he healed a great many persons a man who had a bad leg came to him well said the doctor I will adopt such in such a course with that leg and I will restore the use of it to you so that you will go away from this place perfectly hold he told the patient what he was going to do but the man says no I could not bear to have that done I will have to go to someone else have it your way said the doctor you are not bad enough for me to cure you yet when you get bad enough for me we'll come back and say do what you like with me doctor as long as you're guaranteed my restoration there is many a soul that is not in this sense bad enough for Christ yet that is to say he thinks himself still too good to be saved in Christ's way I have heard of a swimmer who went to rescue a man who was drowning the man was sinking and the spectators wondered why he did not reach out at once and grab hold of the man he swam near him but kept clear of him and let him go down a second time and after that he swam to him and brought him out someone asked him why did you let the man sink he answered he was too strong for me to rescue him at first while he was strong he would have pulled me down with himself so I let him begin to sink and lose all this strength and then I knew that I could get him ashore and like manner some of you will have to go down again a second time before you get weak enough to be saved it is not your strength it is your weakness it is not your righteousness it is your sin that qualifies you for Christ what I mean is this that just as poverty is the best qualification for charity as misery is the best qualification for mercy so the lower you are lying before Christ's cross the more sure may you be that the grace of God will come to you as soon as you trust in Christ's atoning work may God bless all of you with this faith which pleases him for the Lord Jesus Christ's sake amen

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Id: sDAGy1jXuqY

Length: 55min 14sec (3314 seconds)

Published: Mon Mar 06 2017