Hebrews 4

Hebrews 4:16

TO Hebrews 4:16. A TEXT of Scripture, like a picture, often takes its highest meaning from its peculiar setting; and he, who, in the study of some special object tears it from the painted landscape of which it was only a part, does no greater violence to the thought of the artist than does the Bible student to the thought of the inspired writer, when he tears a text from its scriptural connection. In truth there is a more decided coloring given by Scripture to Scripture than the field of art knows, a coloring which belongs alone to the lights and shadows of God’s revealed will. To wrest texts from their proper connection; to employ single sentences as if they were complete in their teaching, and every verse could be reckoned the ground of doctrine, is to behave after the manner of such infidels as Paine and Ingersoll, and by one method of Biblical quotation, bring the whole Book into disrepute.The world is full of ill-favored students who take no stock in the complete round of Christian doctrine. Their systems of faith are not brought from the Word of the Lord so much, are not based upon its essential teaching, but are bolstered up by single texts, and in them they take refuge whenever their positions are assailed. It is somewhat amusing, and yet rather sadly so, to see how multitudinous are the theories of life and death and immortality that the men of this century are making out and propping up by Scripture texts. The past year has brought to my study more books and pamphlets and papers on new religions than was required to complete the New Testament Canon.

All about us, men, from the ignorant crank who poses as a new Messiah, up to the man of learning who frightens us with his higher criticism, are making out their ideas, putting into them their preferences and then seeking to render them palatable to the public by sprinkling them with sacred texts.A careful study of their new theories of religion will prove them faulty and false simply because their authors too often forget that texts are only valuable as proof when they are employed in such a way as sets forth their original intention.The passage of Scripture about which we are to think for awhile this morning would discover only partial truth, and even that but poorly, if the preceding verses were unknown or ignored. In their light, however, it teaches some glorious lessons. Perhaps the first that should receive our attention is this.THE WORK OF CHRIST HAS THE THRONE OF GOD INTO A THRONE OF GRACE Jehovah is no longer under the necessity of sitting upon a throne of justice to execute the letter of that Law, so terrible to fallen man. “The soul that sinneth, it shall die” (Ezekiel 18:4).Jesus Christ, the great High Priest of our souls, has met the demands of that Law in that He bared His own bosom to the shaft of death and allowed it to bury itself there that we might escape the sting. Truly, “He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon Him; and with His stripes we are healed”, because “the Lord hath laid on Him the iniquity of us all” (Isaiah 53:5-6).It is strange that men start back in horror, almost, from the justice of God, as if instead of meaning the execution of righteousness, it referred only to a sort of vindictive spirit on Jehovah’s part. If God ceased to be just He must give up His throne. In the world, where all things are partial and imperfect, it has been difficult, even in an advanced republic, to get the principle of civil service applied. Notwithstanding the fact that no argument can be brought against the notion of allowing men to hold office only during good behavior and efficiency, still to effect the changes when officials are false to their oaths, is not easily accomplished But if, in the administration of the affairs of the universe, God Was unjust in the least, He would dethrone Himself. No matter if that injustice came in consequence of the triumph of mercy on His part, the very office of Judge of all the earth requires that God do right.

Is it right that sin go unpunished? If so, why do we complain when mayors and police allow gambling to consume every day in the week, and desecrate the holy Sabbath?

Why are we disturbed when the sheriff leaves the murderer unarrested? And why do we insist that the man who breaks up his neighbor’s home, ought to have meted out to him the full penalty of the law? And shall man be just and God unjust? But how to be just and yet merciful was the problem for the Divine mind, after the fall of man. This text shows how He settled it. He gave Himself in the Person of Christ to meet the demands of that Law, and that accomplished, it was possible to say with the Psalmist: “Mercy and Truth are met together; righteousness and peace have kissed each other” (Psalms 85:10).We know no possible way in which the fatherhood of God could ever have been made to appear so well as in this way of the Cross.

We knew a father who, by reason of official station, came into a strait of desires where he longed to be just on the one side, and must be merciful on the other. I sat in his study one night and watched his face while he tried to formulate a plan that would meet both these ends.

He was a college president. A gross deed had been perpetrated by some students. He had said to the injured subjects of the too intensely practical joke, “Only discover the guilty parties and my judgment shall be so severe that such an act will never be perpetrated in our school again.” When the offenders were found out, his boy was among them, and now how to be just and yet shield his son! It was a difficult task to be just and merciful. The measure he adopted at last of compelling them to pay the expense of having them hunted out by detectives, subject to a public rebuke and reprimand, and see their names published in the daily papers, was just, and yet in order to be merciful as well, he paid the debt which his son’s sin had incurred. You say, that was like a father.

Yes, and to that extent like the great Father God, whose throne demands justice, and yet whose mercy appears in that He Himself has met the righteous requirement in the gift of His only Son. In that fact lies the sinner’s hope.

Traill said truly enough, There is no court in all God’s dominions that a sinner can come to and find any mercy save at the throne of grace. If you talk of law or justice or equity these are all frightful courts to sensible sinners. They know their cause and their case is bad; and if they come to any bar but that of grace, they must be condemned. But at this throne of grace they that have nothing may get all things; they that deserve wrath may obtain mercy; they that are condemned at the court of justice may be acquitted and freed from all sentences, and, be adjudged to eternal life by the grace of God in Christ Jesus.”This is joy in the conversion of God’s throne through the work of Christ the Son and the gift of God the Father. But there is prevalent a custom among men to think of the grace of God as completely experienced in the article of salvation; to consider that it has exhausted itself when it effects our conversion. This text calls to attention additional advantages in this connection.THE THRONE OF GOD’S GRACE IS MORE THAN A OF MERCY SET FOR SINNERS: IT IS A SOURCE OF TO ALL WHO IT The redeemed, though washed from sin, are not freed from temptation; the saved, though secure, are not exempted from trial and persecution; the justified are not yet sanctified. How blessed then the assurance of this text, that the throne of God’s grace is a well-spring of seasonable assistance as well as a fountain of mercy. In it is stored up a wealth of grace, self-sufficient for every exigency of life; and believers may be supplied according to their need. We would count him truly favored who held secure against all dangers, riches sufficient to insure his every necessity. But what riches compare with the opulence of God’s mercy and the riches of His grace? I knew a well once which, with its millions of gallons of water, supplied a great city by invisible mains.

Thousands slaked their thirst from that source; hundreds employed it for purposes of cleanliness; even the dumb beasts that walked the streets drank from the ever-flowing fountains. By its gifts the atmosphere was purified and destructive fires were quenched before they had wrought their greater ruin.

And yet the gracious arrangement of pipes and faucets was such that we received water only as we needed it, and the supply was so great that it failed not. In this there is a faint illustration of that greater fountain of grace that floweth out from the throne of God, in which our souls are cleansed today; from which they may drink tomorrow and by which they are eternally satisfied.Guthrie said of the exhaustlessness of this Divine grace, this: “Myriads of leaves clothe the forest; myriads of flowers’ bespangle the meadows; myriads of insects dance in the sunbeams; myriads of birds sing in the woodlands; myriads of fish swim in stream and ocean; myriads of stars glitter in the mighty sky; and every leaf is as perfect in form, every flower as beautiful in color, every living creature fashioned with such skill, and every burning star guided through space with as much care as if it engrossed the entire attention of God and there was not another but itself within the bounds of the universe. The number of objects our hearts can hold or our arms embrace or our eyes watch or our fortunes enrich or our bounty pension is limited, confined within a narrow range, is small at the largest and few at the most. It is not so with Him who is mighty to save, abundant in goodness and truth. The type of His grace is seen in yonder sun, which, for thousands of years, has shed its light on seas and continents, on crowded cities and lonely solitudes, on palaces and cottages, on ragged beggars and sceptered kings, on all countries and classes of men, and with fires fed, we know not how, shines today as bright as ever.” With that fountain of grace open there can be no want to them that fear God and seek His help; none, either for the body or the soul; either for time or eternity. But best of all, this grace is promised to us as we need it, and will be given in the very hour when we need it most.

We can’t appreciate grace until we find ourselves in need. That is why God withholds its richest expression until the darkest day is on, and then, as you have seen the sun suddenly shine through the rift of the blackest cloud, God’s beneficent face breaks on the soul and His helping hand is thrust down from Heaven.

It may be in the hour of sickness, in the day of deep mental distress, in the time when the heart is loaded with sorrow and you feel you must be broken on the wheel, that His mercy shines forth and His help is felt as never before. That is according to the promise of this text: “Grace to help in time of need”. A gentleman who had been in our Civil War told Dr. Talmage how he had seen this text illustrated on the battle-field. He stood on the rail track at Carlisle, Pa. when the ammunition had given out at Antietam, and saw the train come from Harrisburg, freighted with shot and shell, as it went thundering on toward the battle-field. He said it stopped not for any crossing; it put down brakes for no grade; it slowed up for no peril.

The wheels seemed on fire from speed as it dashed past. The man who sat in the engineer’s cab and worked the levers that drove it on knew full well that if that ammunition reached there too late it had as well not get there at all.

So there are times in which God must help, at once, if we are helped at all. Is it not blessed to find it written in His Word that it is to be given for the time of need. God doesn’t exhaust Himself with one gracious effort in our behalf. Some people are benevolent to help an unfortunate fellow once, but after that they draw the line on charity in that direction. Especially is that apt if the one assisted has failed in any measure to show gratitude. But “The Lord is ** plenteous in mercy”, and often helping the sixth time, leaves a drawn check on Heaven’s bank in case a seventh trial should come.You have heard how the hymn, “More to Follow”, originated.

A wealthy man of Rowland Hill’s congregation gave to his pastor a roll of money to be given to a poor fellow of the same church, and he said to Hill, “Present in whatever sums and at Whatever intervals you deem best.” So Hill sent the man a few dollars and wrote a note saying, “Still there is more to follow.” Every week this same assistance came and this same gracious sentence. So it is with the grace of God, except that God’s gifts will fail not, though the weeks grow into years and years lengthen to the centuries that run on toward eternity.

The great beauty of Divine grace is its abundance.But what right has a man who has sinned to expect the help of this text. The text teaches here the third and the last needed lesson:THE OF CHRIST THE SINNER WITH THE OF When we remember that Christ humbled Himself and took upon Him the form of a man and became subject to like temptation with us, we start up in hope, saying with the Psalmist: “For He knoweth our frame; He remembereth that we are dust” (Psalms 103:14). Before the Apostle encouraged men to come boldly to a throne of grace he had said: “For we have not an High Priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities; but was in all points tempted like as we are”. We hardly know whether to rejoice the more in His greatness or His lowliness; in His Divinity or His humanity; in the power of the one or the perfect sympathy of the other.How it encourages in boldness in prayer to know that in Christ God learned the whole of human experiences, sin excepted. When the trials of life confront us, we care not for such comforters as Job had. No, but how we welcome those who, coming to us out of a kindred experience, press a heart against ours that has known a kindred sorrow. One never feels his inability to lend the bereaved sympathy needed so much as when he goes into a home where is a shadow such as never entered his own house.

When recently, in this city, one of our own number experienced the dark trial of a husband’s sudden and violent death, I felt as I tried to bear to her a message of good, and by it set sorrow aside and stimulate hope, that I was not equal to such a task, but might well step aside and yield my office to another who had suffered the sting of a similar sorrow, had such sympathizers been at hand. While it hurts us to remember it all, yet we can but rejoice in every disappointment, sorrow, sharp trial, bitter experience, sleepless night and suffering day that Christ passed through —the day of crucifixion included, because He learned how to sympathize with us, and was tempted in all points like as we are.After all, however, is not He the best sympathizer who comes to do more than help bear our burden, who seeks to remove it in part or entirely, as He sees best?

The story is told that while Henry the VIIIth was one night walking the streets of London in disguise, he was arrested. The night watchman little dreamed who it was, and not being satisfied with Henry’s explanation of his conduct, locked him up in the Poultry Compter, and left him all that wintry night without candle or fire. On his liberation he made gracious provision of food and fuel for the prisoners who languished there.That dark, cold night taught him to sympathize with, and brought from him a more substantial expression of interest in, the unfortunate fellows there than he would ever have shown but for the night-watchman’s blunder.In every hour of trial then, do we not know where to run for sympathy and relief? So long as the sympathetic Christ sits on the throne of God, or even at its right hand, it will be a throne of grace, which we may confidently approach in time of need.Why shouldn’t we come to it with boldness? Mr. Moody once said: “A while ago I learned from the Chicago papers that there had been a run on the banks there and many of them were broken.

What a good thing it would be to get up a run on the bank of Heaven. What a glorious thing to get up a run on the throne of grace.

Men fail because they do too large a business on too small a capital. So with Christians; but a Christian’s failure is without excuse. God has grace enough and capital enough. Come boldly to Heaven’s bank and draw on Him.” What would you think of a needy man, with a million in bank, drawing out the starving amount of a penny a day, and yet that is the way we behave. Oh, the riches of the grace of God! Why are we content to keep our souls poor, when it is our Father’s good pleasure to give us the Kingdom? I don’t know of any better words with which to conclude this talk than to repeat the prayer the poor man of England wrote upon a piece of paper and left beside his plate: “God give me grace to feel my need of grace, and give me grace to ask for grace, and give me grace to receive grace, and O God, when grace is given, give me grace to use it.”