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  WRITINGS OF JOHN KENNEDY
  by John Kennedy
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A collection of theological writings, sermons, and essays by John Kennedy,
compiled for study and devotional reading.

  Chapters: 3

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  TABLE OF CONTENTS
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    1. 0.00. Kennedy, John - Library
    2. S. HYPER-EVANGELISM: ANOTHER GOSPEL, THOUGH A MIGHTY POWER
    3. S. The Father's Drawing

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  CHAPTER 1: 0.00. KENNEDY, JOHN - LIBRARY
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Kennedy, John - Library

S. Hyper-Evangelism Another Gospel, Though A Mighty Power

S. The Father’s Drawing


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  CHAPTER 2: S. HYPER-EVANGELISM: ANOTHER GOSPEL, THOUGH A MIGHTY POWER
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HYPER-EVANGELISM: ANOTHER GOSPEL, THOUGH A MIGHTY POWER: By John Kennedy
(1819-1884) Historical Introduction by Sherman Isbell In Reformed circles in
Scotland today, John Kennedy of Dingwall (1819-1884) is regarded as the greatest
champion of the Reformed faith in the Highlands during the latter years of the
nineteenth century. If Kennedy was outspoken about the dangers resulting from a
superficial presentation of the gospel, he had reason to understand that saving
faith can be lacking in a profession of faith made under the most orthodox of
ministries. Kennedy himself had only been converted in 1841 while in his second
year of academic preparation for the ministry, and after the death of his
father, who had exercised a compelling preaching ministry at Killearnan.
Licensed to preach soon after the Disruption, Kennedy was settled as pastor of
the Free Church of Scotland charge in the county town of Dingwall, in
Ross-shire, where he remained for his entire ministry. There he served a
congregation of over one thousand, half of whom were Gaelic speaking.

Through the years Kennedy was a stalwart opponent of the drift in Scottish
Presbyterianism away from the Westminster Confession, allying himself with Hugh
Martin and James Begg to resist erosion of the doctrine of the particular design
in Christ’s atoning work, and to contend for the propriety of a cooperative
association of church and state to promote the true religion. The essay here
reprinted appeared in 1874 in the wake of an evangelistic campaign by Dwight L.
Moody and Ira D. Sankey, whose 1873 tour wrought a revolution of sentiment in
Scotland. Scottish pastors, wishing to think the best, and inattentive to the
new trends of thought and practice, were caught up in the swell of excitement.
Though Kennedy was temperamentally disinclined to controversy, he was
constrained to raise his voice for a full-orbed proclamation of the biblical
gospel.

Kennedy’s words of warning have an undiminished relevance in our generation,
when constitutionally sound Presbyterian churches hear voices calling them to a
presentation of the gospel which abandons the characteristic traits of a
biblical and Reformed piety. Methods of church growth and evangelism, and
practices of worship which are alien to the historic Reformed faith, are offered
as helps to overcome the offense which sinners feel, and the indifference which
they display, toward the Scriptures and a godly life. The features of modern
American revivalism brought to Scotland by Moody are traceable to a man whose
influence over evangelistic practice in our time has been immense, the
Presbyterian minister Charles G. Finney (1792-1875). For an exceptionally fine
critique of Finney’s message and method, Iain H. Murray’s address on Finney at
the 1992 Banner of Truth Minister’s Conference is available on tape for $6
postpaid, from Sound Word Associates, P.O. Box 2035, Mall Station, Michigan
City, IN 46360. At Kennedy’s death, his friend C. H. Spurgeon—who had journeyed
to Dingwall in 1870 to preach at the opening of the Free Church’s new
building—wrote of him as one "whom I venerated as every inch a man of God. His
death was a loss to the Highlands greater than could have befallen by the death
of any other hundred men. True as steel and firm as a rock, he was also
wonderfully tender and sympathetic." Further information about Kennedy can be
found in Maurice Roberts’ address at the centenary of Kennedy’s death: "Dr John
Kennedy—A Memorial Sketch," Banner of Truth, Issue 251-252, Aug-Sept 1984. Two
books in which Kennedy wrote of the history of the Reformed faith in the
Highlands have been reprinted in Scotland in recent years: Days of the Fathers
in Ross-shire, and The Apostle of the North.

Hyper-Evangelism:

Another Gospel, Though A Mighty Power When a movement is in progress in our
land, during which many are awakened to thought and feeling as to eternal things
who were utterly unthinking and insensate before, when thousands think that they
have lately believed in Christ, and with the joy of assurance profess that they
have found Him, when from the church are seen issuing many who have enlisted as
recruits in a crusade against the ungodliness and unbelief of the world, when so
many who have a high position and commanding influence in the church declare
that it is a gracious work of God by which these results have been produced, and
when many more, believing this, are exceeding glad and abound in thanksgiving,
sad, yea strained to breaking, must be the heart of one who seeks the glory of
God and the salvation of souls, if he cannot share in the prevalent hopefulness
and joy. Being one of those to whom the present movement has hitherto yielded
more grief than gladness, I feel constrained to tell why I am a mourner and
apart.

Preliminary Remarks

1. Those who, ere the movement had been developed into its abiding fruits,
hastened to declare it to be a gracious work of God, must have laid claim to
inspiration; and only if that claim is good can their judging be allowable. It
may be legitimate to form an unfavorable judgment, even at the outset of a
religious awakening, if the means employed in producing it are such as the Lord
cannot be expected to bless; but a favorable verdict at that stage, no man, not
a prophet, has any right to pronounce. Only He who "trieth the hearts and reins"
can then judge. He allows His disciples to try to know men only by their fruits
(Matthew 7:20). Not at the outset, and not by the immediate results, but by the
fruits produced after the trial, does He allow them to form a favorable judgment
regarding a religious movement (John 8:31). It is not enough to justify such a
verdict, that souls are anxious, that anxious souls attain to a faith that is
assured, and to a joy that is exceeding, and that a change of conduct and
zealous service are for a season the result. All this was, once and again, under
the ministry of Jesus Himself, without any lasting and saving result; and men
are sadly forgetful and madly bold, who in the face of such a fact venture to
trace similar appearances at once to a gracious work of God (John 6:6, John 6:8
and John 6:12).

2. One is not compelled to affirm that a religious movement is not a work of
grace, if he refrains from saying that it is. This is a position into which some
men, more zealous than discerning, seek to drive those who do not share their
own blind sanguineness. I am not to judge, at the outset, except of the means
employed, and if these are unscriptural, I am forbidden to expect a good result
(Isaiah 8:20). If the means employed and the agents are unexceptionable, I can
legitimately form no decided opinion of the work, till its fruits are in due
time developed.

3. There is no necessity for regarding it as the great Deceiver’s work, if it is
considered not to be a gracious work of God. There are impressions, which are
not saving, produced by Divine influence in connection with the gospel (Hebrews
6:4-6). The temporary impressions produced by the preaching of Christ are
instances of this. But that Satan can produce counterfeit, as surely as the Lord
can make real, converts, I firmly believe. And when he is at work as "an angel
of light," he best succeeds when men blindly accept, instead of wisely testing
the results. There is surely some reason to fear that his hand is on the agents
as well as on the subjects of the work, when neither are careful to apply the
test of truth (John 3:20-21; 1 John 4:1).

4. If I regard with little hopefulness a movement over which so many are
chanting songs of joy, till all Christendom bends its ear to the voice of
gladness that thrills from our land, my saying so will suffice to make some men
decry me as opposed to a revival of the work of the Lord. To this I lay my
account. If the Lord knows that I am not, I feel not very anxious as to the
judgment of men. But which of us incurs the greatest responsibility—you, who
proclaim this movement to be a work of grace, or I, who cannot say that I as yet
do so regard it? You commit the credit of true religion to cases which have not
been proved—you point the attention of the ungodly to individuals whom you
declare to be converts, and you call on them to judge of godliness by these; you
tell those, who are suddenly impressed, that they have been born again, when you
know not whether they were or not; you tell the Church to count on a great
accession to her strength, when, so far as you know, only traitors may be added
to her ranks; you say, with the voice of thanksgiving to God, that He has done a
work which you cannot know that He will acknowledge to be His. Yours, at any
rate, is a tremendous responsibility. And if your estimate is false—and you
cannot as yet prove it to be true—how fearful the results must be! You will have
hardened in ungodliness an unbelieving world; you will have flattered into
delusive security precious perishing souls; you will have cheated the Church by
inducing her to form a false estimate of her strength; and you will have
dishonored God by ascribing to Him work which His hand had never wrought. I
merely refrain from judging anything "before the time." What I judge now, I am
required to judge. I form an opinion, as one bound to "try the spirits" of the
doctrines and modes of service which are the means of advancing the movement. If
I do so fairly, I am so far free from blame. If my estimate is proved to be
false as well as unfavorable, I am guilty, and if I formed it under the
influence of prejudice, I am very guilty; I suffer in the lack of the hope and
gladness by which the hearts of others are so greatly stirred; and I incur a
woe, if, under the influence of a biased opinion of the work, I refuse to take
part in it, though called to do so by the Lord (Judges 5:23).

5. Of the means employed in promoting such a work, one is bound to judge. I am
not to be blinded by dazzling results. A worthy end does not sanctify all the
means that may be used in attaining it, nor does a seemingly good result justify
all the means employed in producing it. Many seem to think that if they choose
to call a religious movement a work of grace, no fault should be found with any
instrumentality employed in advancing it. All must be right, they think, if the
result is to be regarded as a revival of the work of God. To censure any
doctrine preached or any mode of worship practiced, seems to them to be
opposition to the good work, and to tend to mar its progress. They may be of the
same opinion, as to the impropriety of some of the means which are employed,
with those who do not refrain from condemning them, but for the work’s sake they
tolerate them. As if the Lord’s work could receive aid from ought that was
unscriptural! An enemy’s hand is surely here. May it not be, that under cover
such as this, the deceiver is introducing into the creed and worship of the
Church what shall be statedly obstructive to a real work of grace? Some there
are who have this fear. It were well if all were careful lest this should be the
result of acquiescence in unscriptural teaching and practices.

6. Some ministers, who took part with hesitation in the movement, justify their
having done so by declaring their object to have been to check irregular
tendencies, and to shape the development of the work. And what has been the
issue of their prudence? They merely serve to swell the volume, while utterly
powerless to control the force, of the current. Hundreds of ministers have I
seen, sitting as disciples at the feet of one, whose teaching only showed his
ignorance even of "the principles of the doctrine of Christ"; who, to their
face, called the churches, which they represented, "first-class mobs"; was
organizing before their eyes an association, for religious objects, outside the
churches, which may yet prove as troublesome as the naked forces of the world;
was casting ridicule on their old forms of worship, which they were sworn to
uphold; and was proposing to convert prayer meetings into occasions of religious
amusement, a change he certainly did not ask them to approve, without giving
them a specimen, which excited the laughter of thousands, and gave to themselves
a sensation of merry making in the house of the Lord.

7. I carefully refrain from forming an estimate of the results of this work, as
these are to be found in individual cases. I confine myself to the general
character of the movement, in so far as that is determined by the more prominent
teaching under which it has advanced, and in connection with its bearing on the
religious condition of the country. I most persistently continue to hope that
good has been done; for even were I persuaded that Satan was busy in forging
counterfeits, I cannot conceive what would induce him to do so, unless he was
provoked by a genuine work of grace which he was anxious to discredit and to
mar.

There are two reasons why I cannot regard the present religious movement
hopefully. 1. Because the doctrine which is the means of impression seems to me
to be "another gospel," though a mighty influence. Hyper-Evangelism I call it,
because of the loud professions of evangelism made by those who preach it; and
because it is just an extreme application of some truths, to the neglect of
others which are equally important parts of the great system of evangelic
doctrine. 2. Because unscriptural practices are resorted to in order to advance
the movement. In forming an estimate of the doctrine that was mainly effective
in advancing the movement, I had sufficient materials at hand. I heard the
leading teacher repeatedly, and I perused with care published specimens of his
addresses. I have before me as I write what appears to me amply to justify all
that I venture to affirm. Those who were present to hear, will recollect enough
to enable them to judge of the correctness of my account of the kind of
instruction by which such marked and frequent impressions were produced. My
objection to the teaching to which I refer, is, that it ignores the supreme end
of the gospel, which is the manifestation of the Divine glory; and misrepresents
it as merely unfolding a scheme of salvation adapted to man’s convenience. It
drops the first note of the angel’s song, in which the gospel is described as
"glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men." This
objection has grown and has been confirmed in my mind, by considering, 1. That
no pains are taken to present the character and claims of God as Lawgiver and
Judge, and no indication given of a desire to bring souls, in self-condemnation,
to "accept the punishment of their iniquity." 2. That it ignores the sovereignty
and power of God in the dispensation of His grace. 3. That it affords no help to
discover, in the light of the doctrine of the cross, how God is glorified in the
salvation of the sinner that believeth in Jesus. 4. That it offers no precaution
against tendencies to antinomianism on the part of those who profess to have
believed.

I. No pains are taken to present the character and claims of God as Lawgiver and
Judge, and no indication given of a desire to bring souls in self-condemnation,
to accept the punishment of their iniquity. The law of God has its place in the
book, and its use in the work of God. "By the law is the knowledge of sin"; and
the Spirit, who convinces of sin, uses it in that department of His work. A due
regard to the glory of God demands that it be so used. Sinners are not to be
saved on a misunderstanding as to what they are, and as to what they merit. They
must know Him against whom they have sinned. They must know what is justly due
to Him from them as His creatures. They must be made acquainted with their
iniquity as well as guilt, as sinners. And through the coming of the commandment
sin must "revive" in their consciousness, so that they know that they are
desperately wicked, as surely as that their persons are condemned to die.
Without this they can have no conception of gospel grace. Any hope attained to
without this, can only be based on a misunderstanding, and must involve dishonor
to God. God is not to be conceived of as one who has to study man’s convenience
only, instead of supremely consulting his own glory. It should be an aim of
preaching, therefore, to bring sinners to plead guilty before God; to feel
themselves, in excuseless guilt, shut up to the sovereign mercy of Him against
whom they have sinned. The attainment of this may be the result of a moment’s
working of the power of God, or it may be reached only after a protracted
process; but to this all must come who are reconciled to God.

True, it cannot be expected that the operation of the applied law, on an
unrenewed soul, can ever bring him to submit to God’s claims as a Lawgiver, or
to His terms as a Savior. Subjection of the will to the law, is as impossible as
submission to "the righteousness of God," on the part of an unregenerate sinner.
And this is one reason why this is not insisted on in ultra-evangelic teaching.
To insist on God’s claims—to consider what is due to God in the personal
transaction between the sinner and Him as to peace—would bring the moral as well
as the legal difficulty into view, and thus the necessity of the new birth would
have to be faced as well as that of atonement. The latter cannot be passed over
by any who profess to preach the gospel at all, though in the teaching referred
to it is most perfunctorily dealt with; but the former, as shutting up souls to
repentance, to which only the renewed can attain, is most persistently ignored.
And this is done professedly in the interests of gospel grace. To require men to
consider the claims of God as Lawgiver and Judge, in order that they may feel
themselves shut up to His mercy as Sovereign, seems to such teachers to be
raising an obstruction between sinners and the grace of the gospel. It seems
hard to them that man’s convenience should be interfered with by the claims of
God. A call to repentance, therefore, never issues from their trumpet. In their
view, there is no place for repentance either before or after conversion. A
vague brief sense of danger is all that is required at the outset; and converts
are taught that, once they have believed, they are not to remember and mourn for
their sins. "Why raise up your sins again, to think of and to confess them?"
their leading teacher said to them; "for were they not disposed of nearly two
thousand years ago? Just believe this, and go home, and sing, and dance." It is
no wonder, then that they decry as not evangelical the preaching that does not
ignore repentance. But they forget that, on the same ground, they might bring
this charge against the Word of God itself; and not only against the Book of
Exodus, but against the Epistle to the Romans as well, the writer of which had
not learned how to bring men to know the grace of the gospel, except by bringing
them first to know God and His law, their sin and its demerit, and their hearts
and their desperate wickedness. What a strange delusion men labor under who
imagine that what is essential to any right appreciation of the grace of God and
to an intelligent submission to it, must be dispensed with, in order to guard
the freeness of the gospel! By a "free gospel" they can only intend to indicate
a gospel that suits a sinner’s disposition, instead of being adapted to his
state, that dispenses with all humbling of the soul before God, and of which
man, unaided, can make sure. Verily, for the defense of such a gospel,
repentance must be excluded. The favorite doctrine of sudden conversion is
practically a complete evasion of the necessity of repentance. Suddenness is
regarded as the rule, and not the exception, in order to get rid of any process
preliminary to faith. And on what ground do they establish this rule? Merely on
the instances of sudden conversion recorded in Scripture. True, there are cases
not a few of sudden conversion recorded in Scripture, and there have been such
instances since the Book of God was sealed. There was a wise and gracious design
in making them thus marked at the outset. They were intended, by their
extraordinary suddenness, to show to all ages the wondrous power of God. But was
their suddenness designed to indicate the rule of God’s acting in all ages? This
it will be as difficult to establish, as that the miraculous circumstances
attending some of them were intended to be perpetual. The work of conversion
includes what we might expect to find detailed in a process. There can be no
faith in Christ without some sense of sin, some knowledge of Christ—such as
never was possessed before—and willingness, resulting from renewal, to receive
Him as a Savior from sin. If a hearty intelligent turning to God in Christ be
the result of conversion, it is utterly unwarrantable to expect that, as a rule,
conversion shall be sudden. Indeed, the suddenness is rather a ground of
suspicion than a reason for concluding that the work is God’s. The teaching of
Christ, in the parable of the sower, warrants this suspicion. They who are
represented as suddenly receiving the word with joy are those who, in time of
temptation, fall away. Suddenness and superficiality are there associated, and
with both ephemeralness. In the experience of some, whose conversion was sudden,
there was, as in the case of the Apostle of the Gentiles, an after-process,
intended to prepare them for useful service in the church. And is it not the
fact, that those, who were most remarkable, in latter times, for their godliness
and their usefulness, were the subjects of a detailed and extended process,
before attaining to "peace and joy in believing"? The extremely unguarded use of
the statement, that it is through faith, and not through feeling, salvation is
attained, tends to the same effect. True, there is a danger of hampering oneself
by the idea that, unless there is a certain state of conscious feeling, an
effort to believe is vain. There is a danger, too, of substituting feeling for
faith, and of resting on a certain experience, instead of on what is objectively
presented in the Word, as a ground of hope. All earnest souls are apt, at a
certain stage, to search for the warrant of faith in their own state of feeling,
rather than in the written Word. True, reception of Christ is the immediate duty
of all who hear the gospel; and nought can excuse their not doing so. But is it
not extremely dangerous even to appear to say that faith is the opposite of
feeling? Does not faith itself express a state of feeling? Is it not an exercise
of the heart as well as of the understanding? Those who so thoroughly separate
faith and feeling, are led to regard faith as merely the assent of the
understanding to certain statements regarding the way of salvation. And is it
not the practice of some evangelists to press men to believe certain
propositions, while telling them that their state of feeling is to be made no
account of, that they are just to receive these as true, and that, if they do
so, they are to regard that belief as faith, and at once to conclude that they
are saved because they have so believed? It seems to be imagined that, in order
to have in faith the opposite of works, it is necessary to reduce it to mere
belief. But in reality this is but to place it on the same footing with works.
Faith, as mere belief, is considered to be something within the power of all;
and, by reducing it to a minimum of effort, both as to time and action, it is
made to appear to be something different from protracted self-righteous labor.
But it is only different as an easier thing for men to do. Never can faith be
truly seen to be opposed to works, till it is considered as indicating a state
of feeling—till it is seen to be a "believing with the heart"; for it is only
when it is regarded as a hearty reception of Christ Himself as "all in all,"
that salvation through faith can be recognized as salvation by grace. To some
minds the facility and the suddenness seem essential to the graciousness of
faith. They reduce it to mere belief, that men may appear able to do it, and it
must be done at once, that there may be no room for repentance, and that it may
appear to be something else than a work. But there never was more legal doctrine
delivered, than that of those, who urge men to mere belief, in order to
salvation.

II. It ignores the sovereignty and power of God in the dispensation of His
grace. This omission is usually justified on the ground, that references to
these are apt to be abused or to give needless offense. If men are to be told
that salvation is entirely at the disposal of God’s sovereign will, and that
sinners are so utterly lost that only the working of God’s power can move them
either to will or to do what is required by the claims of the law and by the
call of the gospel, then the result will be, that some will be offended and go
away, others fold their hands and sleep, and others still sink down into
despair. Am I therefore to refrain from proclaiming Jehovah as King? Am I to be
silenced by fear of the result of telling that it is His right to regulate, by
His own sovereign will, His own work of grace? Am I not rather very specially
called to announce His sovereignty in connection with salvation? In no other
sphere does he appear more gloriously kingly than in this. Did not the Divine
preacher make the sovereignty of God the theme of His very first sermon, though
His hearers were thereby so incensed, that only by a miracle could He preserve
His life from their fury (Luke 4)? And did He not, in all His preaching, ascribe
salvation to the sovereign will of the Father who sent Him?

Men, anxious to secure a certain result, and determined to produce it, do not
like to think of a controlling will, to whose sovereign behests they must
submit, and of the necessity of almighty power being at work, whose action must
be regulated by another will than theirs. Certain processes must lead to certain
results. This selfish earnestness, this proud resolve to make a manageable
business of conversion work, is intolerant of any recognition of the sovereignty
of God. "Go to the street," said the great American evangelist to a group of
young ladies who were seated before him, "and lay your hand on the shoulder of
every drunkard you meet, and tell him that God loves him, and that Christ died
for him; and if you do so, I see no reason why there should be an unconverted
drunkard in Edinburgh for forty-eight hours.

There is of course frequent reference to the Spirit, and an acknowledgment of
the necessity of His work, but there is, after all, very little allowed to Him
to do; and bustling men feel and act as if somehow His power was under their
control. There is a prevalent notion, only in a few utterances assuming definite
shape, that there is a pervading gracious presence of the Holy Spirit, requiring
only, in order to its effective influence, a certain state of feeling and
certain amount of effort. There is prayer, but many who engage in it look around
them for an overflowing, rather than upward for an outpouring, of the Spirit of
promise. There is prayer, but it is rather to constitute a ground of hope, than
the result of reaching that which is set before us in the gospel. Faith in the
efficacy of prayer is far more common than faith in the Hearer of prayer.
Prayer, in order to produce expectation, may seem to be followed by an answer,
when the susceptibility, caused by the hopefulness it engendered, accounts for
all the result.

It is true that it is quite as unwarrantable to expect the outpouring of the
Spirit, without prayer for His coming, as it is to hope for His coming because
this has been asked. There is a call and encouragement to ask, and those who ask
in faith shall never ask in vain; but the asking is under the sovereign control
of God as surely as the giving. I believe, too, that men professing to ask for
the coming of the Comforter, may really be asking something else, and may, in
answer to their cry, be receiving as a judgment what they regard as a mercy. It
is also true that to pray for the Spirit’s coming, and not to employ, in all
earnestness, the means which He has been wont to acknowledge and to use, is
nothing short of presumption. To wait for His coming is not to be idle till He
comes. But it is also true, that those, who are blindly craving some excitement,
may be preparing instruments to be used by some other power than that of the
Spirit of the Lord. The prayers and the efforts, the asking and the preparation,
may correspond, but the one may be directed towards something else than that
which is presented in the promise of the Lord, and the other adapted for another
hand than that by which the promise is fulfilled. It is true, besides, that the
withholding of the Spirit, in His gracious influences, is a token of the Lord’s
anger provoked by iniquity, but it is terrible to think of an impenitent people,
regarding as a gracious work of God that which is really not so, that, under
covert of an imagined mercy, they may remain at ease in their sins, and
congratulate themselves on having been favored by the Lord, without having to
part with their idols. In the present movement, at any rate, there seems to be
little that is allowed of work to the Spirit of the Lord. In the prominent
teaching, there is no exposure of the total depravity and the utter spiritual
impotence of souls "dead in trespasses and sins." To face this reality in the
light of God’s word, would be to discover the necessity of the Almighty agency
of the Holy Ghost. This cannot be endured. But another reason must be assigned
for avoiding the doctrine of total depravity. To preach it is decried as
treating men as inert matter, to be wrought upon, but never to be active. This
must not be preached to sinners, it is said, lest they fold their hands and
sleep. They are intelligent and responsible beings, and must be differently
dealt with. And how do you propose to treat them? Are you to hide from them what
they must know, ere they can ever act as intelligent beings in dealing with
their souls’ condition? Are you to set them to work, as if they were what they
are not? Is this your way of urging them to act as becomes responsible beings?
You would hoodwink their understandings, and misdirect the movements to which
their sense of responsibility urges them! But you hide the true state of things
from yourselves as well as from them. You do so that you may have hope of
success. You have no faith in the Spirit of God. You cannot bear, therefore, to
discover that there is a great work for Him to do; and you cannot endure to feel
dependent on His love, for you cannot trust in it as the love of God; and if you
think of it as Divine, you know that you must also think of it as sovereign. And
you would fain account the work to be done as not too much for your own power of
persuasion; for you are ambitious of having it to do yourselves, as well as
hopeless of having it done by the Lord. And yet, forsooth, you are the men who
have faith, and those who differ from you are the dupes of unbelief. Yes, you
are men of faith, but yours is faith in men. The man who can cry in faith for
life, with a valley of dry bones before him, is the man who has faith in God.

Sometimes, an address may be heard, in which the necessity of regeneration is
very strongly urged, but this is sure to be followed by some statement that
blunts the edge of all that was said before. After some strong sayings about the
necessity of regeneration, in one of the leader’s addresses, the question was
put, "How is this change to be attained?" And the speaker answered the question
by saying, "You believe, and then you are regenerated"; and in confirmation, he
referred to John 1:12, forgetting the verse which follows! Faith regenerates! If
it does so, as the act of a living soul, then the soul could not have been dead
in sins. If it was, whence came the life put forth in believing? If that
regenerating faith was the act of a dead soul, then a dead man, by his own act,
brings himself alive! The same teacher said on another occasion, "God would not
call men to believe, unless they had the power to do so." I would like to hear
his answer to the question, Can natural men "love God with all their heart, and
soul, and mind, and strength," who yet are required by God to do so? And how
would he expound the words, "The natural man receiveth not the things of the
Spirit of God; for they are foolishness unto him; neither can he know them,
because they are spiritually discerned"; and the words of Jesus, "No man can
come unto me, except the Father who hath sent me, draw him."

There is a faith which can be exercised without the gracious aid of the Holy
Ghost, but it cannot be the faith that is "to the saving of the soul." That is
expressly declared to be "of the operation of God," and to require for its
production "the working of His mighty power which He wrought in Christ, when He
raised Him from the dead." That faith stakes the eternal all of an immortal
being, who is a lost sinner, on the truth of Divine testimony. Can one do so who
does not regard the testimony as Divine? Can one so regard it who does not
realize that God is, and that He speaks in that testimony to him? Can a dead
soul thus believe? As well expect a sense of your presence, and a response to
your words, from the bones that lie mouldering in the grave, beside which you
stand and speak. True, there may be a persuasion of the truth, arising from its
correspondence to the dictates of conscience, and because of evidence which has
led to a rational conviction of its divinity; for in the grave, in which lie the
spiritually dead, there is still intellectual life and a moral faculty that may
occasionally be very active. But this is something very different from the faith
in God, which is the gift of God. That faith, too, respects the person of
Christ. It does so, not merely as looking to the historical personage who
appears in the inspired record, nearly two thousand years apart in the hazy past
from us, who has left a gospel and a salvation with us, with which, apart from
His person, we can deal by faith. It not only realizes Jesus of Nazareth as the
Christ and the Son of God, but it apprehends Him as a living present Savior in
the testimony of God regarding Him. It actually receives Him as He is actually
presented by God. It embraces Himself in order to finding all in Him. It is not
merely belief in testimony, it is also trust in the person who is presented
therein. It is the homage of confidence in and submission to the Son of God as
Jesus the Christ of God. That faith, besides, implies unreserved dependence on
the grace of God. It is not merely taking advantage of a convenient ground of
hope. It is an acknowledgement, at the foot stool of the Divine throne, of being
justly condemned and of being utterly helpless,—It is the acceptance of
salvation from the hands of the Sovereign in order "to the praise of His grace."
That faith is, moreover, the cordial reception of Christ in order to salvation
from all sin. It is not the mere appropriation of the boon of deliverance from
death. This is all that is desired by those who allow themselves to be hurried
vaguely to believe in the love of God, and the substitutionary death of Jesus.
True faith is the act of a soul who, up to that hour, was a lover of sin and an
enemy to holiness, but who now cordially receives the Savior in order to the
destruction of what he loved, and to the attainment of what he hated before. Can
a man thus believe who has not been regenerated by the Holy Ghost? And why hide
from sinners that they cannot? Surely this cannot be wisely done in order to
make the gospel more manifest. Which knows best about the grace of the
gospel—the man who thinks he is saved by grace through a faith which he owes to
himself alone, or the man who has also learned that the faith, through which he
is saved, is not of himself, but "is the gift of God"? Did Jesus hide this in
His preaching from His hearers? Did He do so in His first sermon (Luke 4)? Did
He do so in His first recorded dealing with an inquirer (John 3)? Did He not
openly proclaim this in His great gospel sermon addressed to a multitude by the
sea of Galilee (John 6)? It was while preaching that sermon He said, "No man can
come unto me except the Father, which hath sent me, draw Him."

It does raise one’s indignation to hear some men speak of what would conserve,
to the Spirit of God, His place and His work, as a mere obscuration of the grace
of the gospel, and a fettering of souls in bondage. But it grieves one’s heart
to know that this is tolerated, and even approved of, by some who ought to be
more zealous for the grace and glory of the Lord, than to be able to endure it.

III. No care is taken to show, in the light of the doctrine of the cross, how
God is glorified in the salvation of a sinner. The designed overliness with
which the doctrine of sin is stated, necessarily leads to this. The omission of
any definite unfolding of the law’s claims, and of any distinct tracing of the
sinner’s relation to it and to God—the lack of all that would raise the
question, "How can God be just in justifying the ungodly?"—leaves the anxious in
such a state of mind and feeling, that all they require, to satisfy them, is to
discover that they have a convenient warrant to hope. Neither teacher nor
disciple seems to desiderate aught besides the assurance, that salvation can be
reached through faith. The gospel seems convenient for man, and that suffices.
How salvation is to the praise of God’s glory the one is not careful to show,
the other is not anxious to know. To any unprejudiced observer, this must have
appeared a marked feature of revival teaching.

True, much use is made of Christ’s substitutionary death. But it is usually
referred to only as disposing of sin, so that it no longer endangers him who
believes that Christ died for him—who accepts Christ as his substitute. This use
of the doctrine of substitution has been very frequent and very effective.
Christ, as the substitute of sinners, is declared to be the object of faith. But
it is His substitution rather than Himself. To believe in the substitution is
what produces the peace. This serves to remove the sense of danger. There is no
direct dealing with the person who was the substitute. There is no appreciation
of the merit of His sacrifice because of the Divine glory of Him by whom it was
offered. Faith, in the convenient arrangement for deliverance from danger, is
substituted for trust in the Person who glorified God on the earth, and "in
whom" alone we can "have redemption through his blood." The blood of Jesus was
referred to, and there was an oft-repeated "Bible reading" on the subject of
"the blood"; but what approximation to any right idea regarding it could there
be in the mind, and what but misleading in the teaching, of one who could say,
"Jesus left His blood on earth to cleanse you, but He brought His flesh and
bones to heaven"?

Souls who have a vague sense of danger excited by the sensational, instead of an
intelligent conviction of sin, produced by the light and power of applied truth,
are quite ready to be satisfied with such teaching as this. To these, such
doctrine will bring all the peace they are anxious to obtain. But what is the
value of that peace? It is no more than the quiet of a dead soul, from whom has
been removed an unintelligent sense of danger. A true sense of peace with God
there cannot be, unless a sinner, assured that God was glorified by Him who died
on the cross, can, with reverence of His glorious name, approach Him in the
right of the crucified and exalted Jesus, having hope of acceptance in His
sight. To this he cannot attain till, in the light of the Son’s glory, he
appreciates the merit of Jesus’ blood, comes to Christ Himself to appropriate
His blood in Him, approaches through Him to God, and receives, by the
application of the promise of peace, a persuasion of acceptance, in faith, from
the throne. Where there is no wounding, there can be no healing, of the
conscience. The doctrine that can do neither can only do deceiver’s work. A
sinner having peace without knowing, or caring to know, how the law which he has
transgressed hath been magnified, how the justice that demanded his death hath
been satisfied, how the name of God which was by him dishonored has by Christ
been glorified, and how what availed for these ends can be a ground of hope to
him in the presence of the God with whom he hath to do, may have enjoyment, may
be zealous, may be active, but cannot have "a good hope through grace."

IV. No precaution is offered against a tendency to antinomianism in those who
profess to have believed.

Yea, this tendency must be fostered by the teaching given to them. If the law of
God has not its own place accorded to it, in connection with the sinner’s
natural relation to God, and in order to conviction of sin, it is not likely to
get it at a later stage. The man, who is disposed to think of his sin, as a
great calamity, rather than as a heinous crime, is not likely either to
reverence God or to respect His law. To his view, salvation is something which
it would not be fair to withhold from him, rather than a gracious gift which a
sovereign God is glorified in bestowing. The government under which he ventures
to claim his salvation presents nothing venerable to his mind. He thinks of an
easy reign of mercy, under which he can be as imperious as if his own will were
law. In his altered position, it is easy for him to ignore the law of God. He
never had to face it; and, if he has faith without life, there is nothing in him
to incline him to do so now. Not having respect to the standard of God’s law, it
is easy for him to imagine that he is without sin. He is taught that now he has
nothing to do with confession of sin, because his sins were long ago disposed
of, and that he should not now remember them. As for "the corruption of his
whole nature," it never was a trouble to him, and is less likely to be so now
than before, since a delusive peace has drugged his soul to sleep. Antinomianism
leading, in the first instance, to perfectionism, must be the result of the
teaching under which he has been trained. In his leader’s prayers he never hears
any confession of sin, and he is apt to think that, if he follows him, he must
be right. True, he is urged to work; and there is no service, however high,
which, during his novitiate, he is not directed to attempt. The work which he is
disposed to choose, and the first work he is instructed to engage in, is to
preach to others what he himself has found. Meetings are multiplied that he may
attend them, and crowds are gathered that he may address them. The excitement of
his first impressions is thus to be kept up by the bustle of evangelistic
service. And what kind of being is he likely to become under such training as
this? A molluscous, flabby creature, without pith or symmetry, breathing freely
only in the heated air of meetings, craving to be pampered with vapid sentiment,
and so puffed up by foolish flattery, as to be in a state of chronic flatulency,
requiring relief in frequent bursts of hymn singing, in spouting addresses as
void of Scripture truth as of common sense, and in belching flippant questions
in the face of all he meets. Self-examination he discards as a torture only
meant for slaves, humility and watchfulness as troublesome virtues which the
wise will eschew, secret communions with God as a relic of less enlightened and
less busy times, and the quiet habitual discharge of home duties, in the fear of
God, as a tame routine for legalists. The doctrine of assurance, which is
preached, tends to the same effect. Assurance is regarded as the direct result
of faith, or as essential to its exercise. A consciousness of faith is of itself
deemed a sufficient ground of assurance. There is no place at all allowed to an
attestation of faith by works. True, faith does often rise into assurance as to
the sufficiency of Christ as its object, and of the Word of God as its warrant.
There is a hope arising from the consciousness of this faith, as well as a hope
occasioned by its exercise. But there is also a place reserved by God for the
hope arising from the attestation of faith by works. And the Lord calls the
believer to examine himself, as to fruits which his faith produceth, in order to
ascertain that his faith is genuine, and that therefore Christ is already his.
"Faith without works is dead." Where there is a careful disallowing of
self-examination, there is sufficient proof of the law being ignored as the
authoritative rule of the Christian’s life. Suggestions to this exercise, are
not infrequently decried as temptations of Satan, or as necessarily the result
of backsliding. And why so? Because it is imagined that a man is not required to
prove himself to be a genuine believer, by doing the will of Christ, in
obedience to His law. And yet it will be on the ground of works, as evidence of
true faith, that Christ Himself, on His great white throne, will justify the
verdict which proclaims them blessed, who are heirs of the kingdom prepared by
His Father. A religion without reverence and without contrition can alone be
fostered under such teaching as this. But now, as surely as of old, "Thus saith
the Lord," "To this man will I look, even to him that is poor, and of contrite
spirit, and trembleth at my word." Now, as of old, the heirs of the "kingdom
which cannot be moved," "serve God acceptably with reverence and godly fear";
and only in that measure can they taste "the peace of God," and "rejoice with
joy unspeakable and full of glory."

I make no attempt to trace, to its source, the influence exerted in producing
the marked effects resulting from the present religious movement. I confine my
attention to the advantage afforded by the feeling which preceded that movement,
and to certain elements of power in the means employed to advance it.

It was preceded by a very prevalent desire for a change. All classes of
religious society seemed to be stirred by a wistful longing for something to
break up the dead monotony, of which all were wearying. Some were actuated by
genuine spiritual feeling. They felt that tokens of the Lord’s absence abounded;
and turning to the Lord they cried for the manifestation of His power and glory.
Others, strangers to stated spiritual enjoyment in the means of grace, were
longing for some change—some excitement to lift them out of their dullness—and
for some bustle in which they might take their share of service. Others still,
who knew no happiness in the house of God, and had no desire for His presence,
would fain that something new were introduced into the mode of service which
they felt so jading. The excitement of a revival would be to them a relief.
"Special services" they strongly craved. Prayer for a revival was called for;
and many were ready to take part in the meetings convened for that purpose.
These meetings resulted in the hope of an answer. Though but few truly
appreciated what was needed, and really dealt with God, we cannot but hope that
something was done by the Lord in answer to their cry. But many there were who
merely craved a change—something to relieve them of the tedium of a routine in
which they found no enjoyment, because they were estranged from God—and who
joined, in asking this, with those who were asking something better. These were
the persons disposed to make much of their prayers, and who found it easy to
hope just because they had chosen to ask; and they may have received, though not
in mercy, what they sought. The expectation of a change, at any rate, was
general. There was an opening up of men’s minds to an expected influence. This
tended to affect even the Gallios who "cared for none of those things." A
revival was talked of, prayed for, and expected, and thus a general
susceptibility of impression was produced. Prayer meetings, fostering the desire
and expectation of a change, were in all places the pioneers of the movement.
Those who heard that a revival had taken place elsewhere, sought that it might
reach their own locality. Many blindly asked for what was done in other places,
instead of seeking the fulfillment of the Lord’s promise. In course of time,
musical practicings were added to prayer meetings, as preparation for a revival!
From both the addresses and the music much was expected, when evangelistic
deputies arrived. What the effect would have been, had the awakened expectancy
been left to be operated on by the stated ministrations of the sanctuary, or by
extraordinary efforts that introduced no departure from the usual mode of
worship, no one can tell; but I cannot refrain from expressing my persuasion,
that the result would have been a healthier one than that which new appliances
developed. But on this wakeful state of mind was brought to bear a system of
doctrine that ignored those aspects of the truth which are most offensive to
"the natural man," and that, while offering something that seemed plausible to
an unenlightened conscience, seemed to conserve the old heart’s imagined
independence of the sovereign and almighty grace of God, and by ignoring
repentance preserved to it its idols. The gospel, modified to suit the taste of
unrenewed men, was welcome. The recommendations of it, given by men of
influence, tended to put down suspicion, and to induce the public to receive it
as "the gospel of the grace of God." The new style of teaching made it seem such
an easy thing to be a Christian. To find oneself easily persuaded to believe
what was presented as the gospel, and to think that by this faith salvation was
secured, and that all cause of anxiety was for ever gone, gave a new and
pleasing sensation, which thousands were willing to share. And once the movement
had begun it could command an indefinite supply of agents. All who say they were
converted are set to work. Anyone who can tongue it deftly, can take a part,—he
requires neither knowledge nor experience. The excitement is kept up by the
bustle of public service. No fear is felt of lifting up novices "lest they fall
into the condemnation of the devil." That feeling may have been suitable in
Paul’s day, but it has now ceased to be so regarded. But there is a fear of
converts ceasing to seem to be so, if they are not kept busy in religious
service. A proselytizing bustle must therefore be the outcome of their faith.
There is an utter avoidance of testing work on the part of their instructors;
but attesting work enough is done. They have at once been proclaimed Christians
in their own hearing, and in the presence of thousands; and those who presume to
tell them this are quite ready to join with themselves in thinking that they are
fit for any service that they may choose to try. A season apart, to be alone
with God, a solemn time for careful counting of the cost, has from Christ the
double recommendation of His example and of His precept, but is desired neither
by nor for these so-called converts. To these advantages for effect were added
various devices, which, though quite unscriptural, or rather, because they were
so, were fraught with impressing power.

Unscriptural Devices

1. Excessive hymn singing is one of these. The singing of uninspired hymns even
in moderation, as a part of public worship, no one can prove to be scriptural;
but the excess and the misdirection of the singing in this movement were
irrational as well. Singing ought to be to the Lord; for singing is worship. But
singing the gospel to men has taken the place of singing praise to God. This, at
an rate, is something new—that indeed is its only recommendation—and when the
singing is also good, its melody combines with its novelty to make an
impression. The singing produced an effect. Many professed to have been
converted by the hymns.

2. The use of instrumental music was an additional novelty, pleasing to the kind
of feeling that finds pleasure in a concert. To introduce what is so gratifying
there, into the service of the house of God, is to make the latter palatable to
those to whom spiritual worship is an offense. The organ sounds effectively
touch chords which nothing else would thrill. To Scottish Presbyterians this was
something new; but as their spiritual guides did not object to it, why should
they? Tided thus, by their pastors, over all difficulties which their scruples
might occasion, they found it pleasant to enjoy the new sensation. They could be
at the concert and in church at the same time. They could get at once something
for conscience and something for the flesh. And yet it is not difficult to prove
that the use of instrumental music in the worship of God is unscriptural, and
that therefore all who have subscribed the Confession of Faith are under solemn
vow against it. There was a thorough change, in the mode of worship, effected by
the revolution which introduced the New Testament dispensation. So thorough is
this change that no part of the old ritual can be a precedent to us. For all
parts of the service of the house of God there must be New Testament precept or
example. No one will pretend that for instrumental music, in the worship of God,
there is any authority in New Testament Scripture. "The fruit of the lips,"
issuing from hearts that make "melody to the Lord," is the only form of praise
it sanctions. The Church of Rome claims a right to introduce into the worship of
God any innovation it lists; the Church of England allows what is not expressly
forbidden in Scripture; but Scotch Presbyterians are bound, by the Confession of
Faith, to disallow all that is not appointed in Scripture (Confession, chapter
21). How those, who allow the use of instrumental music in our Assembly Hall,
can reconcile their doing so with their ordination vows, I cannot even
conjecture.

It may seem strange, but it is quite as true as it is strange, that those who
are ready to plead that principles and doctrine, inculcated under the former
dispensation, are no longer entitled to our acceptance, unless redelivered with
New Testament sanctions, are just the parties who are also ready to go back to
Old Testament antecedents in the mode of worship. What is eternally true is
treated as if it were temporary, and that which has "vanished away" is regarded
as perpetual. But if the ancient mode of conducting the service of praise
furnishes an example for all time, on the self-same ground you are entitled to
choose what you list out of the ceremonies of Old Testament worship. The altar
and the sacrifice may be defended as surely as the organ.

"But we use the organ only as an aid," it is said. "It is right that we should
do our best in serving the Lord; and if the vocal music is improved by the
instrumental accompaniment, then surely the organ may be used." On the same
ground you might argue for the use of crucifixes and pictures, and for all the
paraphernalia of the Popish ritual. "These," you might say, "make an impression
on minds that would not otherwise be at all affected. They vividly present
before worshipers the scenes described in Scripture, and if, as aids, they serve
to do so, they surely cannot be wrong." To this, there are three replies,
equally good against the argument for instrumental music. 1. They are not
prescribed in New Testament Scripture, and therefore they must not be introduced
into New Testament worship. 2. They are incongruous with the spirituality of the
New Testament dispensation. 3. These additions but help to excite a state of
feeling which militates against, instead of aiding, that which is produced by
the word. An organ may make an impression, but what is it but such as may be
made more thoroughly at the opera? It may help to regulate the singing, but does
God require this improvement? And whence arises the taste for it? It cannot be
from the desire to make the praise more fervent and spiritual, for it only tends
to take attention away from the heart, whose melody the Lord requires. It is the
craving for pleasurable aesthetics, for the gratification of mere carnal
feeling, that desires the thrill of organ sounds, to touch pleasingly the heart
that yields no response to what is spiritual. If the argument against the use of
the organ, in the service of praise, is good, it is at least equally so against
its use in the service of preaching. If anything did "vanish away," it surely is
the use of all such accessories in connection with the exhibition of Christ to
men.

3. The novelty of the "inquiry room" was another effective aid in advancing this
movement. It is declared to be desirable to come into close personal contact
with the hearers of the gospel immediately after a sermon, in order to ascertain
their state of feeling, to deepen impressions that may have been made, and to
give a helping hand to the anxious. Such is the plea for "the inquiry room." In
order that it may be supplied, hearers are strongly urged, after a sensational
address, to take the position of converts or inquirers. They are pressed and
hurried to a public confession. Strange means are resorted to, in order to
commit them, by an open avowal of a certain state of feeling. But what right has
any individual, not authorized by the Church of Christ, to do so,—to insist on a
public confession on the part of anyone? Even the Church can admit to public
confession only after trial. And the admission must be in connection with the
dispensation of the appointed sealing ordinances. But here is a stranger, who
never saw their faces before, hurrying people, whom a sensational address has
excited, to make public profession of faith, thus associating them, without
possibility of trial, with the Christians of the locality, and involving the
credit of religion in their future conduct before the world. This, surely, is
both unwise and presumptuous. How unlike this to the Divine Teacher’s way! When
a crowd of seemingly anxious souls gathered around Him, instead of urging them
to confession, He tested them by searching doctrine, and the result was, that
instead of crowding an inquiry room, they "went away and walked no more with
Him." I feel persuaded that if an excited crowd, at a revival meeting, were to
be addressed as were the multitude at the Sea of Galilee, the conductor would
put the speaker down, denounce him for casting a gloom over the meeting, and
give him no other opportunity of dealing with inquirers.

Why are men so anxious to keep the awakened in their own hands? They, at any
rate, seem to act as if conversion was all their own work. They began it, and
they seem determined to finish it. If it is at all out of their hand, they seem
to think that it will come to nothing. They must at once, and on the spot, get
these inquirers persuaded to believe, and get them also to say that they do.
They may fall to pieces if they are not braced round by a band of profession.
Their names or numbers must, ere the night passes, be added to the roll of
converts. They are gathered into the inquiry room, to act in a scene that looks
more like a part of a stage play than aught more serious and solemn. Oh, what
trifling with souls goes on in these inquiry rooms, as class after class is
dealt with in rude haste, very often by teachers who never "knew the grace of
God in truth!" The inquiry room may be effective in securing a hasty profession
of faith, but it is not an institution which the Church of Christ should adopt
or countenance.

4. Even prayer meetings are converted into factories of sensation. Brief prayers
and brief addresses to the stroke of hammer, or the toll of bell, silent
prayers, hymns, which often contain a considerable amount of nonsense, and
occasionally of something worse, sung to the strains of an organ, and a chance
to address or prayer given to anyone who chooses to rise and speak,—such are the
arrangements of the new prayer meeting. The silent prayer, what is it? It is
secret prayer, and therefore ought to be prayer in secret. It must be secret,
just because it is silent. And where is it engaged in? In the closet? No; it was
Christ who directed it to be there. There are other leaders now, and they direct
that it should be in open assembly. Christ would have men, when they pray
secretly, to enter their closet and shut the door. Now it must be done so that
those who do it "may be seen of men." And this device, so directly opposed to
the mind of Christ, is lauded as if nothing could be better. And it is becoming
the habit now of worshipers as they enter the house of God. They assume, before
the eyes of hundreds, the attitude of prayer, to do, in the public assembly,
what Christ directed to be done in the closet. If they intend this as a public
confession of their sin, in neglecting prayer in their closet, such confession
would not be at all uncalled for, if duly made. They who forget to do it where
Christ required it to be done, are the persons most likely to do it where it can
only be a bit of will-worship and formality. The device of "open meeting," what
of it? It is simply ceasing to take care that, in the worship of God, "all
things be done decently and in order"; and giving the place to those who have
conceit and tongue, and nought beside, which ought to be filled by those who in
honor prefer others to themselves, and who seek grace to "serve with reverence
and godly fear."

I have had to endure the trial of watching over a darling child, during her
dying hours. Spasm, succeeding spasm, was the only movement indicating life,
each one, as it came, shattering the frame which it convulsed, and thus wearing
out its strength. While the spasms lasted I knew there still was life, but I
also knew that these must soon end in death. There was life, but it was dying,
and the convulsions of life soon ended in the stillness of death. But after the
double pain came the ecstasy of a resurrection hope, and my heart could sing
beside the grave, that covered for a season my dead out of sight. With still
greater grief should I look on my Church, in a spasmodic state, subject to
convulsions, which only indicate that her life is departing, the result of
revivals got up by men. It will be a sad day for our country if the men, who
luxuriate in the excitement of man-made revivals, shall with their one-sided
views of truth, which have ever been the germs of serious errors, their lack of
spiritual discernment, and their superficial experience, become the leaders of
religious thought and the conductors of religious movements. Already they have
advanced as many as inclined to follow them, far in the way to Arminianism in
doctrine, and to Plymouthism in service. They may be successful in galvanizing,
by a succession of sensational shocks, a multitude of dead, till they seem to be
alive, and they raise them from their crypts, to take a place amidst the living
in the house of the Lord; but far better would it be to leave the dead in the
place of the dead, and to prophesy to them there, till the living God himself
shall quicken them. For death will soon resume its sway. Stillness will follow
the temporary bustle, and the quiet will be more painful than the stir. But to
whatever extent this may be realized in the future of the Church in Scotland,
our country shall yet share, in common with all lands, in the great spiritual
resurrection that will be the morning work of that day of glory, during which
"the knowledge of the Lord shall cover the earth," and "all nations shall be
blessed in Messiah, and shall call Him blessed." Meantime, were it not for the
hope of this, it would be impossible to endure to think of the present, and of
the immediate future, of the cause of true religion in our land. The dead, oh,
how dead! the living, oh, how undiscerning! And if there continue to be progress
in the direction in which present religious activity is moving, a negative
theology will soon supplant our Confession of Faith, the good old ways of
worship will be forsaken for unscriptural inventions, and the tinsel of a
superficial religiousness will take the place of genuine godliness.


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  CHAPTER 3: S. THE FATHER'S DRAWING
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The Father’s Drawing Preached by The Rev. John Kennedy at Dingwall

About the author: John Kennedy was born in 1813. He served a charge as a
minister of the gospel in the one church he pastored at Dingwall, Scotland until
his death at the young age of 34 in 1847. He was of the true Puritan tradition
in that he faithfully preached Christ and Him crucified and the necessity of the
grace of God to make a sinner willing to repent of his sins and believe upon the
Saviour. The majority of his writings are of his sermons, most of which were
written down during the last year of his life. However, he was also an
out-spoken critic of the methods of evangelism taught and practiced by D.L.
Moody. The heavy emphasis upon the need of a sinner to "make a decision" and the
use of the novel "inquiry room" and other novel tactics to gain conversions drew
no little attention and objection from Kennedy and others. Thus he stood among
his forebearers who rather saw the necessity to speak of the sinner’s need of
regeneration; a new nature, thus focusing upon the need of divine intervention
and grace if one is to be saved.

“No man can come to me except the Father which hath sent me draw him; and I will
raise him up at the last day.” — John 6:44

THESE words were spoken by “Jesus,” “the Son of man,” and their teaching is
therefore gracious; “by the faithful witness,” and therefore they are true; by
Him who is Himself Jehovah, the Eternal Son, and therefore they are divine.

He did not deliver the doctrine of the text, in His sermon to the congregation
which assembled to hear Him beside the Lake of Tiberias, till He had first
spoken regarding the necessity, in order to salvation, of coming to Messiah; the
excellence of Him to whom they were called to come; the blessedness of those who
came; and the warrant to come to Him, as given to all who hear the gospel. He
insisted on the necessity of faith at the outset of His discourse, teaching them
that what they needed, as sinners having an endless existence, was not “meat
which perisheth,” but “meat which endureth unto everlasting life,” that this
enduring meat “ the Son of man” alone could give to them, and that this meat was
received and enjoyed only by those who believed on Him whom God had sent. He
then speaks of the excellence of Him who was sent, as “the bread of God” “which
cometh down from heaven, and giveth life unto the world.” This is followed by a
description of the blessedness of all who come to Him. “He that cometh to me
shall never hunger, and he that believeth on me shall never thirst” — “Him that
cometh to me I will in no wise cast out” — “This is the Father’s will which hath
sent me, that of all which he hath given me I should lose nothing, but should
raise it up again at the last day.” And after insisting on the necessity of
faith, on the excellence of Him who is its object, and on the blessedness of all
who have come to Messiah, He tells them of the warrant of faith as given in the
command of God to believe in His Son. “This is the work of God,” He tells His
hearers, “that ye believe on Him whom He hath sent.” This is the one way of
securing the favour of God, and the faith by which this is attained He requires
us to yield to Him whom He hath sent.

It is in connection with these truths we are required to consider the doctrine
of the text. At first sight it would seem as if this part of Christ’s sermon had
rendered it impossible to derive any encouragement from all the rest of it. It
would seem as if it were cruel to tell a man that he must believe or he is lost
for ever, and then to tell him he can’t believe. What matters it how excellent
Christ is if I cannot come to Him? To speak to me of the blessedness of those
who believe, if I am unable to join them, is but to tantalise me. And of what
advantage to me is it to have a warrant to come if I cannot make use of it? So
some may be disposed to speak regarding such a doctrine, in such a connection,
as that of the text. I may have something to say to those who thus regard the
doctrine of this passage; but meantime I would only say that no one can quarrel
with the doctrine of the text without quarrelling with Christ, for it is His
mouth that uttered it, and it was He who preached the truths in connection with
which it stands before us here. In addressing you from this text, I would direct
your attention to the spiritual impotence here declared — to the drawing of the
Father — and to Christ’s perfecting of the salvation of all whom the Father
causes to come to Him.

I. THE SPIRITUAL IMPOTENCE HERE DECLARED.

It is inability to come to Christ as He is revealed and offered in the gospel.
And this spiritual impotence is universal, for Jesus saith — “No man can come to
me.” And He very plainly declares every man’s inability to come to Him, for the
words “can come” can have only one meaning assigned to them, and might be
rendered “is able to come.” Such is the plain import of Christ’s teaching in the
first part of this verse, whatever view may be taken of man’s impotence, and in
whatever way it may be attempted to reconcile this statement with those which
insist on his responsibility. Let us take the explicit teaching of Christ so far
as it goes, and let not our reception of it as true depend on our being able to
reconcile it with all other parts of His teaching. To refuse to receive His
teaching as true simply because it is His, is to lapse into rationalism, and to
allow our own conceptions of the fitness of things, and not the revelation of
His will by God, to determine the form and measure of our faith.

Coming to Christ is a willing movement of the heart. He must be so known and
regarded by him who comes to Him that He is heartily desired. The soul coming to
Christ is willing to accept of Him on the terms according on which He is offered
in the gospel, as a Saviour from all sin. And this coming to Christ is an
exercise of faith . There is in it a trustful, as well as a wistful, feeling,
towards Christ, resulting from receiving as true God’s testimony regarding Him,
and from discovering, in the light of that testimony, the suitableness, as well
as the divine appointment, and personal excellence, of Christ, as a Saviour. It
is to come thus to Him that Christ declares every man, without exception, to be
unable, without the drawing of the Father.

Such a doctrine as this is not pleasing to “the natural man,” and he either
openly rejects it; or, while professing to receive it, wickedly abuses it. The
old heart’s pride, with its strong dislike of being indebted to the grace of
God, rises against it. And one’s love of ease combines with his pride in
securing its rejection; for if one realised that his salvation was dependent on
the will of God, he could not be at ease; but when he thinks of it as a matter
that is in his own hand, then, he can sleep on imagining that when a convenient
season” comes he can secure his salvation. Not such is the feeling of the poor
captive, who in his madness barred and bolted the door of his cell thinking it
was a palace, but who has been awakened to find himself in bondage, with no
power to remove the bars and bolts wherewith he himself shut the door, because
he has no strength to reach them, and finds sentinels posted to keep him in his
prison. He now feels assured that he cannot escape unless an order for his
release is issued by him at whose instance he is confined, and that the only key
by which the door can be opened is in his hands. He cannot now sleep quietly in
his cell, dreaming of finding escape whenever he inclines to go out. His sleep
is broken and his vain dreamings are at an end. And there are others who, while
professing to receive the doctrine of man’s spiritual impotence, at the same
time abuse it, and do so also from the desire to be at ease. “No efforts of
ours,” they say, “are of any avail, therefore we will do nothing, and enjoy our
case till the Lord does His work the only work that can avail for good to us.”
It is as if one who was declared to be dying, and was told that there was only
one physician who could cure him, continued quite unmoved, made no effort to
secure the attendance of the only one who could treat with success his case, and
continued to take the kind of diet by which his sickness was induced. The man
who could act so must have been insane; but still more insane is the sinner, who
makes his utter dependence, on the sovereign grace of God, a reason for
continuing at his ease in sin. But let men reject or abuse this doctrine as they
may, it is plainly stated in the text, and let us now proceed to consider the
grounds on which, besides the statement before us, it may be based.

1. The sinner is spiritually impotent because he is spiritually dead.

“Dead in trespasses and in sins” is the description given of every one as he is
“by nature.” Now if there is any exercise that is impossible to a spiritually
dead sinner, it is a movement towards God — it is coming to Christ. This was the
doctrine of Christ to Nicodemus. “Except a man be born of water and of the
Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God,” though Christ, as revealed in
the gospel, is “the door,” and though it is by faith in Him the kingdom of God
is entered; and this is plainly declared in the words which tells us that “as
many as received” Christ, even they “that believed on His name” “were born, not
of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.”
This is an abundantly strong confirmation of the doctrine of the text. We have a
direct affirmation of it thrice over in the gospel of John within its first six
chapters, and frequently elsewhere, and he is mighty in his strength to resist
Scripture evidence, who refuses to receive this doctrine as true.

2. Coming to Christ is opposed to all man’s “natural”tendencies.

Coming to Christ, implies willingness to be indebted to the grace of God for
salvation. That must be expressed in every exercise of faith bearing on the Lord
Jesus Christ. But this is quite opposed to the pride of man’s heart, which is
such that never can it cease to be ambitious of being independent of God. How
then can a man come to Christ unless the Father draws him? And coming to Christ
is an exercise of faith in the word of God as the only warrant of his hope of
salvation. This word, and this word alone, presents to him the object of his
faith, gives the only light by which he can be guided to Him, and is the only,
cord by which he can take hold of Him when he comes. But nothing is more natural
to a man than to think that nothing is real which he cannot see or handle, and
that to trust in the word of God as true, is to act the part of a vain dreamer.
Specially is this true as to his state of feeling towards “the word of the truth
of the gospel.” So far as the truth of the word of the law is concerned, he has
some warrant in believing in its divine authority, from the operation of his
conscience, which testifies on the side of the divine law in its claim and in
its curse. But he has no such help in accepting as true “the gospel of the grace
of God.” The good news is such that he can have no anticipation of it. So new
and so wonderful is it, that he feels as if he must be furnished with evidence
that will reach him through all his senses ere he can realise it as true. But to
him who is coming to Christ no other warrant of faith than the simple word of
God, as written in the Bible, is given, and on that he must hang the whole
weight of his case as a sinner. How then can he, so resolved to “walk by sight”
ever come to Christ “except the Father” “draw him?” And coming unto Christ is
coming to Him for salvation from all sin. Every man by nature loves sin,
“because the carnal mind is enmity against God.” I cannot be a hater of God
without being in love with sin, to which He in His holiness is infinitely
opposed. To what he loves the sinner will cleave, and never shall he willingly
come to Christ for salvation from it.

3. Coming unto Christ is opposed by all the powers of darkness.

“The god of this world,” with the great army under his command, is ever busy in
endeavouring to keep souls away from Christ. He is ever active in “blinding the
eyes of them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ,
who is the image of God, should shine unto them.” This is surely most formidable
opposition. Think of the might and malice of such an army, think of the
opportunity of successful working the reigning power of sin in the heart
affords, and think, too, of the many weapons furnished to the great enemy in the
things of “a present evil world,” and then surely it must be manifest that the
words of Christ are true when He says, “No man can come to Me except the Father,
who hath sent Me, draw him.”

4. It is altogether inconceivable that there can be any coming to Christ without
some action on the part of God. As to the extent of that action, in order to the
result of faith, there may be differences of opinion, but as to there being some
measure of it, all who pretend to be evangelical must be agreed. If faith be an
actual coming unto Christ in desire and trust, must there not at any rate be a
revelation by God to the coming one of His Son, and must there not be a
reception of him when, he comes? If the giving of the word sufficed as a
revelation, why was Christ unknown since first the gospel reached us? And can we
reach Him and lean on Him without meeting with such a reception as encourages us
to do so? The presence even of our Queen is guarded, and, when there is a
reception, those who are introduced expect the Sovereign to take some notice of
their presence and obeisance. And are we to be admitted to the King of Glory
except according to an authoritative exercise of His will? and if He reveals not
Himself to us, as He does not to the world, how possibly can we trust in Him? If
we add this reason for divine action being necessary, in order to the coming of
a sinner to Christ, to those previously stated, how abundantly true appear the
words of Him who said — “No man can come to me except the Father, which hath
sent me, draw him.”

II. THE FATHER’S DRAWING.

“No man can come to me except the Father, which hath sent me, draw him.” These
words tell us that what is indispensable, in order to the coming of a sinner to
Christ, must come from the Father; that we are to regard the Father in this
connection as He by whom Christ was sent; and that the power of the Father is
exerted as a drawing power, bringing the soul to Christ.

1. The drawing that brings a sinner to Christ comes from “THE FATHER.”

“The Father” is the distinctive name of the First Person of the Godhead. This is
His name because of His relation to the Second Person, who is called “The Son”
on account of His relation to the First, while the Third is called “The Spirit”
because of His relation to the Father and to the Son. He (the Father) is the
representative of the Supremacy of the Godhead. He is so without being
personally greater than, while essentially one with, the Son and the Spirit. To
His sovereign will must, therefore, all salvation be ascribed. “All things are
of God,” the Father, through the Son and by the Holy Ghost; and to Him,
therefore, must ultimately be ascribed the bringing of a sinner to Christ.

How great an event, when viewed in its relation to the Father’s action, is the
coming of a sinner to Christ! He who wields the authority, and is sovereign Lord
of all the resources of Jehovah, alone can secure a meeting between Christ and a
sinner! Each act of faith bearing upon Christ is the result of an exercise of
His sovereign will, and of the operation of His Almighty power. How infinitely
great, therefore, is the coming of a sinner to Christ! How small it seems to the
eye which does not rest on the action of the Father! And when a sinner does
come, how well warranted is his faith! He is acting according to the call, and
because subject to the drawing of the Father. Can anything be more legitimate,
therefore, than faith in Christ?

2. But the text requires us to consider the Father, in this connection, as He by
whom Christ was sent. The sending of His Son as His Anointed by the Father is
the highest display ever given of His sovereignty; the highest commendation ever
given of His love; and is such as must be followed by the drawing unto Messiah
of all whom He sent Him to redeem.

(1.) The sending of His Son is the highest display of the Father’s sovereignty.
This must be before our minds when we think of His drawing a sinner to Christ.
How could there be a higher display of His sovereignty than in the mission of
His Son “to seek and to save that which is lost?” How could His absolute
supremacy more gloriously appear? Under what law, arising necessarily from what
He was or out of any antecedents of His action, could He be requiring such
action as this? Surely we cannot ascribe it to the operation of any unavoidable
constraint that such a one as Jehovah the Son should be sent to obey and die in
human nature on the earth. And there could be nothing in the Father’s relations
to those whom He sent His Son to redeem requiring such a gift in order to their
salvation. The mission of the Son abundantly proves that, in the view of God,
those whom He sent Him to redeem were death-deserving sinners, and that He,
therefore, could be under no obligation to provide deliverance from death for
any of them. But “it seemed good in His sight” to purpose the salvation of His
chosen, and, in order to the fulfilment of that decree, He sent His Son in
order, by “the sacrifice of Himself,” to redeem them. It is in pursuance of this
scheme of sovereign grace He draws a sinner to Christ, and, in connection with
this action, His absolute sovereignty must be recognised and acknowledged. The
last foothold, on the ground of a covenant of works, that must be abandoned by a
sinner is the idea, that he can, to any extent, be independent of God, for the
exercise of saving faith, that he has any plea to urge for the gift of faith,
and that he can escape from feeling absolutely dependent on the sovereign will
of God for that faith in the exercise of which he can come to Christ. But it
would be utterly inconsistent with His mission by the Father, with the relation
in which, as Mediator, He stood to Him who sent Him, and with His zeal for His
Father’s glory, as well as with His love to His people, not distinctly and
repeatedly to claim this acknowledgment of divine sovereignty in connection with
the gift of faith. And He claims it still. And He cannot but claim it; for if
sinners are such as the word of God describes them, they must be told the truth
regarding themselves, and if the coming of a sinner to Christ is the result of
the Father’s drawing, this must be declared to the praise of Him “of whom are
all things.”

(2) Think of the Father as giving, in the mission of His Son, the highest
commendation of His sovereign love. A higher there could not be given. And this
would appear to us if we by faith realised the divine glory of Him who was sent,
His relation, as the “Only Begotten Son,” to Him who sent Him, the humiliation
to which He, when sent, was subjected, and the designed results of His death to
the hell-deserving ones whom He was sent to redeem. The marvellous love thus
expressed in the mission of Christ, is further expressed in the drawing of
blood-bought sinners to their Redeemer. This must never be forgotten. But it may
be asked, “In what relation do sinners, who hear the gospel, stand to the Father
and to His love?” There are two relations, at any rate, in which they stand to
the Father. They are the subjects of His government, and are quite at the
disposal of His absolutely sovereign will. Thus they are as rational beings. And
as sinners they are in such a relation to Him as “Judge of all” that they are
under a sentence of condemnation to eternal death. Let neither of these
relations to the Father be ignored by any of us. “But,” it may be asked, “how
are we, who hear the gospel, related to the Father’s love?” Not so, that we have
any warrant to conclude, because of what the gospel tells you of His love, that
it now, and as you are, embraces you. It speaks to you of that love, it exhibits
the glorious proof given of the sovereignty, freeness, and riches of that love,
in the mission and death of the Son, as the Christ and “the Lamb of God,” but it
cannot, by possibility, assure you of being an object of that love till you
first come to Christ, and be embraced by it in Him. Aught else would be utterly
inconsistent with the mode in which His love was revealed, as well as with the
source whence it flows. Love, that could not approach a sinner except through
Christ’s rent body and shed blood, cannot, apart from Christ-crucified, be
approached by a sinner. It cannot come but through divine blood to you, and you
must not attempt to come to it except through the same channel. Let there be
movements in desire and faith towards it as it is revealed in Christ, but let
there be no attempt to embrace it, as a loved one, till first, as a sinner, you
embrace “Jesus Christ as He is freely offered to us in the gospel.” The
revelation of the Father’s love, in the mission of His Son, is not a declaration
that all to whom the gospel comes are loved by God. This cannot be; for if so,
all who are in a state of nature on the earth must be equally regarded as
objects of the Father’s love, whether they have heard the gospel or not. And how
can we conceive of those as objects of His love to whom He has never told of His
love, and who derive no opportunity of benefit from it? But if the revelation of
the gospel declares sinners who hear it to be loved by God, must we not ascribe
this advantage to the sovereign will of God, and thus from the marshes of
Arminianism be constrained to repair for a firm footing to the sure ground of
Calvinism? Thus far, at any rate, must the sovereignty of God be acknowledged.
The distribution of the gospel is quite as unaccountable, except by referring it
to the sovereign good pleasure of God, as is the salvation of some and not of
others to whom the gospel has been sent. The mode in which God distributes the
gospel is a palpable exhibition of the sovereign grace of the salvation of which
the gospel testifies. But any sinner who is required to acknowledge the Father’s
sovereignty is entitled to contemplate the Father’s love. O what a privilege it
is to be told that the drawing of a sinner to Christ is in the hands of Him who
commended His love in the mission of His Son. He to whom you are shut up in your
impotence to believe, as the only One who can help you, is He who so loved the
world as to give His Son to make atonement for sin by “the blood of His cross.”
That is one grand association with the Father. “Yes,” you say, “but what
encouragement can I derive from thinking of the Father’s love, unless I may
think of it as love to myself?” At any rate, you may think of it as love to
sinners, while you regard it as sovereign love to each one of all who are its
objects. Being love to sinners you may appeal to it as the fountain of all
saving grace. Friend, your difficulty arises from your thinking so much of
yourself, that you are disposed to regard yourself as an ill-used man, if God
does not, without any regard to His holiness, and to the honour of His Christ,
come to tell you where you are, and as you are, that you are an object of His
love. You would surely act more wisely if you took, before the Father, your
place as a sinner, at the disposal of His sovereign will, and appealed to His
love as love that was expressed in sending His Son, as “the Son of man,” “to
seek and to save that which was lost.”

(3.) To the Son, whom the Father sent, is due by Him who sent Him the drawing of
sinners unto Him. He owes Him this fulfilment of His promise given to Him when
He covenanted with Him as to the salvation of His chosen, and in reward of “the
travail of His soul” in their behalf. The fulfilment of that promise, and the
giving of that reward, are absolutely certain. This furnishes ground of
rejoicing to all who love Christ and who love souls, for there is security for
Christ being satisfied, and, for all His redeemed being saved. But the Father’s
way of fulfilling His promise to the Son was to invest Him as the Covenant Head
with all authority, and to anoint Him with the fulness of the Holy Ghost, in
order that the power of the Mediator might be a security for His obtaining His
reward. It is on this account you hear Christ saying that He Himself “will draw
all men unto” Him. You may then think of the sovereign love and supreme
authority of the Father as evidenced in making Christ the author as well as the
object of faith. And if the Father calls you to come to His Christ, in whom all
fulness of saving grace is to be found, may you not come for faith to Him when
you cannot come with faith, and ask Him, as the Father’s Anointed One, to do for
you all that is required to your coming to Him, as well as to save you with an
everlasting salvation when you come. Take Christ as a faith-giver, in the
presence of the Father who appointed Him to be so, and if you do not, then you
are utterly excuseless if you perish in your unbelief.

3. The Father’s drawing. This is, and must be gracious, attracting, and
effectual. Gracious, infinitely gracious, it must be, as it bears on a mean,
guilty, loathsome, hostile sinner. Gracious, beyond all conception, must be the
drawing which brings into a relation of everlasting union that sinner to His
glorious Son. Gracious enough to be matter of eternal wonder and praise is this
action of the Father, resulting as it infallibly does in the everlasting
salvation of the sinner on whom it takes effect. And it is drawing by
attraction. He who comes is “made willing” in a day of power. It pleases God to
bring, by His quickening spirit, the dead soul alive, and to reveal His Son in
Him, and by His excellence and love to draw the soul, now spiritually alive, to
His Christ. There is no dragging though there is drawing. It is attraction, not
compulsion, that overcomes the sinner, into submission, and wins his
acquiescence in the terms of the gospel. This drawing is and must be effectual.
No power can successfully resist the drawing of the Father. The three Persons of
the Godhead act, each His part, in bringing the soul to Christ, and what
possible combination of influences can withstand action of which this is true?
The wildest rebel He can subdue, the most ignorant He can enlighten, the most
hostile He can make friendly, the most oppressed He can deliver, the man who has
been longest “dead in trespasses and sins” He can quicken “together with
Christ,” and the most timid He can “persuade end enable” “to embrace Jesus
Christ as He is freely offered to us in the gospel.”

III. CHRIST’S PROMISE OF COMPLETING THE SALVATION OF ALL WHOM THE FATHER DRAWS
TO HIM — “And I will raise him up at the last day.” This is the third time this
promise was given by Christ in His discourse. It is a promise bearing on all who
come to Him, whenever and whatever they may be. It specifies only the crowning
act of salvation — it is a promise that He shall “bring forth the headstone of
the building, with shoutings, crying grace, grace, with it” — but surely this
implies a promise of doing all that is required in order to prepare for this.
“The headstone” cannot be brought forth, till every stone is laid in the wall on
the foundation — till the building is ready for the headstone. Christ, by these
words, engages to see to it that all sanctifying grace is given, that He shall
instruct and guide, and preserve and comfort to the end all whom the Father
draws to Him; that He shall receive their souls at death, when He has purged
away all their corruption, to their place in the “Father’s house,” and that
however long their bodies may lie asleep in the grave, He will at the last day
quicken and transform them, so that, perfectly like Himself, they may be
prepared for being for ever with Him.

O what a promise this is? It is infinitely rich. There is nothing awanting to it
that can be required by a soul from the first moment of faith in Christ till he
enters everlasting glory. And it is as true as it is rich. Sometimes among men
we find those who make promises which they never intend to fulfil. A small
promise, if true, would be better than all the large promises which these may
offer as a ground of hope. But in Christ’s promise there is the bounty of
infinite love with the certainty of infallible truth. And this is His promise to
all who come to Him, and an interest in all the grace of this unfailing promise
shall be yours, if, as a sinner, you come to Him as He is revealed and offered
to you in the gospel. This promise is one of those with which we repeatedly meet
in the word of God, in which the grace of all the promises is gathered up, and
nothing besides is left to be asked beyond their fulfilment. On this, believer,
you have to be drawing during all your life in the wilderness. The promised
grace is all in Him in whom “the promises of God are yea and amen.” From His
mouth comes the promise, and in Him is stored the grace. And by such a word as
this He makes you free to make use of all He is, and has, and has done and
suffered. He gives Himself over, to the faith which He has begotten, in order to
the plenishing of the sinner whom He loved. And He does even more than this, for
He not only assures those who have come, that He shall be unto them according to
the measure of their faith, but that He shall see to their having the faith, as
well as the supply which is secured through faith. O what rest would be yours
and mine, if we implicitly trusted in Him, and left our whole case in His hands!

APPLICATION.

1. We have in this text what is a marked feature of Christ’s teaching all
throughout the traces He traces up all salvation to the sovereign love of the
Father who sent Him.

It is this which is so marked in the words, “I thank Thee, O Father, Lord of
heaven and earth, because Thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent,
and hast revealed them unto babes. Even so, Father, for so it seemed good in Thy
sight.” And He thus ascribes all the praise of salvation to the Father’s
sovereign love while He declares “All things are delivered unto Me of My Father;
and no man knoweth the Son, but the Father.” If He who was the Son, essentially
one with, and personally equal to, the Father, was thus careful to refer all
salvation to the sovereign good pleasure of the Father, as “Lord of heaven and
earth,” surely all who follow Him as preachers must be careful to do the same,
even when, like the Master, they are addressing mixed multitudes.

2. We may learn from this text that a doctrine, because distasteful to hearers,
or because liable to be abused by them, ought not to be withheld.

If it is part of “the whole counsel of God” it must be preached, however
offensive it may be regarded, and to whatever extent abused. “The chief end” of
the preacher ought to be to glorify God by exhibiting Him as He has revealed
Himself. This must be done whatever may be the issue. There must be no new
aspect of His character presented to men — nothing but His name as He Himself
has revealed it — no representation of His scheme of redemption that does not
accord with His mind in the word, no modification of the bearings of doctrine to
suit them to the taste of unrenewed men, nothing that “thus saith the Lord” does
not cover. In combination with the zeal which makes one careful to keep the
glory of God, as the great end of his preaching, in view, there ought to be, as
there was in the Master, yearning pity towards the sinners to whom Christ is
preached. Carefulness to be exact in stating doctrine, according to a system,
there may be where there is no due reference to the word of God; but there can
be no pity like Christ’s in the heart of anyone who is not anxious in his
preaching to conserve the honour of the divine name, while guided solely by the
light of the divine word. Cold dogmatism or blind earnestness are not the only
alternatives in preaching. The true preacher is he who is like Christ in
glorifying Him who sent Him by ascribing all salvation to His sovereign will as
“Lord of heaven and earth,” and who is like Him also in His pity, as expressed
in His weeping over doomed Jerusalem.

3. In the light of this text we may see how desirable coming to Christ is.

Look at it as the fruit of the Father’s love, and as the result of the Father’s
drawing, and how great does faith in Christ appear to be! And then think of it
as the means of securing an interest in a perfect salvation, and how gracious
and rich a boon the gift of faith, as a gift from God, appears! Does it so
appear to you? Has this drawn forth your desire in prayer to God for the
precious gift of faith? Has it made you anxious to “win Christ and be found in
Him?” Or have you chosen as the objects of your desire only such things as first
cheat, and then utterly destroy, the soul.

4. What debtors to God are all who have come to Christ!

They are under debt for their coming, and when they come they incur debt to
grace as great as a perfect and everlasting salvation! They are under debt to
the Father for drawing them to Christ, and they are under debt to Christ for the
“righteousness and strength” which they found in Him, and they are debtors to
the Holy Ghost for fulfilling in them “the good pleasure” of God. O, friends,
seek to see and feel and acknowledge more and more the obligation under which
you lie to “the God of all grace,” that you may be kept more lowly, more
thankful, more zealous, more faithful, as your days in the wilderness are
passing away. And remember that it is only by incurring fresh debt that you can
attain to fresh growth — debt to Christ, “without whom you can do nothing,” debt
to the Father for turning you to Him “in whom it pleased” Him “that all fulness
should dwell,” for during all your life you must know that “no man,” spiritually
dead or spiritually alive, “can come to” Christ “except” as the Father draws
him; debt to the Holy Ghost, without whose gracious operation you cannot receive
according to the Father’s giving, and to the right and pleading of the Son. To
be a debtor for salvation through faith your old covenant spirit deems to be a
hard thing, but it still more vehemently rebels against your being a constant
debtor for faith to God. You sometimes think you could bravely get on if you
could only be master of your faith, and go to the storehouse when you please.
But to be dependent on the Father’s drawing, for each act of faith, during all
your life on earth, leaves to self no ground of glorying. And this is the
arrangement that is best for you, and it is so just because it is mortifying to
your pride of heart. You never feed except when self is starved.

5. The text forbids any one to imagine that he came to Christ if he has not been
taught that he could never come unless the Father drew him. This is a lesson
which Christ insisted on being learned when He dealt in secret with an inquirer
such as Nicodemus was, and then He preached to a multitude beside the Lake of
Tiberias. You, therefore, cannot be in His school if you are allowed to skip
this lesson over. It cannot save you from being deceived that you do not like
the doctrine, because you prefer a view of your relation to God which would
spare you the self-mortification which it inflicts. It is not what suits your
taste, but what suits your state you need to be told to you; and if it be true
that such is your actual condition, that you cannot come to Christ unless the
Father draw you, what but evil can result from your shutting out that truth from
your soul? But you will be disposed to say, “If I believed that to be true, I
could have no hope.” Certainly not in yourself, but that is just the reason why
you are called to believe it.

Another may say, “If I believed that, I would fold my hands and cease from all
effort.” And if you did, what a strange reason you would assign for being
listless! your being so lost that you could not escape from destruction without
being drawn to Christ by the Father! This is to be your opiate, is it? If so, it
is the most extraordinary inducement to sleep that was ever heard of. Another
asks, “How can this spiritual impotence to believe consist with my being
accountable to God for my unbelief?” That is an old question, to which no new
answer can be given. Both things are consistent in the view of God, and let that
suffice. It is high time for you to know that depravity of heart cannot excuse
iniquity of conduct, for your guilt occasioned your depravity, and the state of
your heart cannot, therefore, excuse the guilt of your actions.

6. There is encouragement in the text to all who fain would reach Christ, and
who find that nothing but the Father’s drawing can bring them to Him.

Friends, if a sense of the power of unbelief is your burden, while a sense of
the guilt of it is your shame — if the one makes you bow, while the other makes
you blush — this flows from some revelation of Christ by the Father. But having
given this, He will give more. And is it not well for you that it is the Father,
as representing the authority, grace, and power of the Godhead, whose work it is
to draw? There can be no gift too great for His love, no work too hard for His
power, and whatever it pleaseth Him that He hath the right to do. And when your
hope of help is faint, look to Him through the given Son. Remember that “all
that the Father hath is” His, and that if you may claim Him as the gift of God,
you will find in Him, as the provision of the Father’s love, enough to meet you
in your impotence, and a warrant to cleave to Him as you ask Him to help you in
your time of need.

7. Are any of you afraid of not being drawn to Christ?

If so, do not smother that fear; do not let it press you to despair; be sure to
tell it to God; and give “no sleep to your eyes nor slumber to your eyelids”
till you are drawn by the Father to Christ. I say to none of you “Be not afraid
of not coming,” for it is an awful thing not to come, and certain you are not to
come if the Father withholds from you His grace. Nor can I tell you that you
have any claim on God, or that you can offer any prayer, so long as you are
“dead in sins,” and apart from Christ, that is not “an abomination in the sight
of the Lord.” But neither can I refrain from bidding you to pray, as even Simon
Magus was commanded, though he was “in the gall of bitterness and in the bonds
of iniquity.” And if you realise that you are called by God to come, and that
the authority of that call shuts you up to Christ, and are, at the same time,
conscious of your impotence to come, while you know yourselves to be without any
right to expect that the Father will draw you, and to be at the disposal of Him
who “will have mercy on whom He will have mercy, and who hardeneth whom He
will,” do not despair, but hold on and still cry, for you are less likely to
perish than when you were at your ease; and as you are beginning to feel the
straitness of the gate, through which alone the way of life is entered, there is
some reason to hope that you are going through; and, if your soul is agonising
to enter, who knoweth but you are passing through the throes of that new birth,
because of which alone one can, by coming to Christ, enter the kingdom of God.


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Source: https://sermonindex.net/books/writings-of-john-kennedy/
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