How saints may help the devil

“That thou mayest bear thine own shame, and mayest be confounded in all that thou hast done, in that thou art a comfort unto them.” Ezekiel 16:54

Suggested Further Reading: Nehemiah 5:1-9

The church of Christ appears to be as worldly as the world itself, and professors of religion have become as sharp in trade and as ungenerous in their dealing as those that have never professed to serve him. And now what does the world say? It throws this in our teeth. If it is accused of loving the things of time and sense, it answers, “And so do you.” If we tell the world that it has set its hopes upon a shadow, it replies, “But we have set our hope upon the selfsame thing in which you are trusting; you are as worldly, as grasping, as covetous as we are; your protest has lost its force; you are no longer witnesses against us—we are accusers of you.” Another point in which the sinner often excuses himself is the manifest worldliness of many Christians. You will see Christian men and women as fond of dress, and as pleased with the frivolities of the age, as any other persons possible could be; just as anxious to adorn their outward person, so as to be seen of men; just as ambitious to win the praise which fools accord to fine dressing, as the most silly fop or the most gaudy among worldly women. What saith the world, when we turn round to it, and accuse it of being a mere butterfly, and finding all its pleasures in gaudy toys? “Oh! Yes,” it says, “we know your cant, but it is just the same with you. Do you not stand up and sing,

‘Jewels to thee are gaudy toys,
And gold is sordid dust’

And yet you are just as fond of glittering as we are; your doctors of divinity pride themselves just as much in their D.D. as any of us in other titles.”

For meditation: Do your deeds give the world reasons to glorify God (Matthew 5:16) or excuses to blaspheme God (Romans 2:24)?

Sermon no. 264
24 July (1859)